Ideology and agency. Architecture is also used to promote political views, culture, or control, by conveying symbolic messages of power, nationalism, liberation, cooperation, justice, or other political themes or notions (Wren c1670s). One issue concerns the architect’s agency in promoting an official political ideology. In government commissions, the architect generally cedes design control, at a certain point, to the government. Yet the architect is the creator of record.  This leaves open whether architects so engaged are promoting the given ideology—or else merely acting as proxies for such promotion. It may seem odd to suggest that, from an aesthetic standpoint the design is of architect X but from a political standpoint the same design is not attributable to X.