The architectural historian Iain Borden says the emergence of hostile architecture has its roots in 1990s urban design and public-space management. The emergence, he said, “suggested we are only republic citizens to the degree that we are either working or consuming goods directly.

Ben Quinn in The Guardian. Anti-homeless spikes are part of a wider phenomenon of ‘hostile architecture’
New urban design aims to influence behaviour and has been criticised as an attempt to exclude poor people (via protoslacker)