Megaprojects as Ruins-in-Waiting A Postmodern Reading of Incompletion in Tirana

In Tirana, the unfinished has become an architectural condition in its own right. This paper investigates the socio-political and aesthetic logic of the incomplete, over-promised and speculative megaprojects, framing them as “ruins-in-waiting” that reflect the deeper ideological structures of postmodern urbanism. Engaging with Jean-Francois Lyotard’s critique of grand narratives and Frederic Jameson’s analysis of late capitalist spatial production, the paper argues that incompletion functions not as a flaw in the system, but as a defining expression. The projects of the high-rise towers become visual and material manifestations of a city governed by deferred futures and aestheticized promises. To further contextualize this phenomenon, the paper draws a conceptual parallel with the surreal etchings of Giovanni Battista Piranesi. His visionary ruins are employed as a critical lens through which Tirana’s contemporary landscape can be read: monumental yet suspended, intricate yet devoid of use. By analysing this visual language and political economy of the megaprojects, the paper proposes that Tirana offers a paradigmatic case of post-socialist urbanism in which the ruin is no longer a remnant of the past, but a permanent placeholder for futures that never arrive