Planning Theory

Moroni, Stefano

doi: 10.1177/1473095210368778pmid: N/A

As is well known, many social sciences have recently attempted a sort of ‘institutional turn’ by recognizing the centrality of the institutional framework, when dealing with social and economic phenomena. Interest in such an approach has also begun to emerge in planning theory. But the passage from understanding the decisive role of institutional frameworks to suggesting how to design and modify those frameworks, is sometimes, in planning literature, overly simplistic and still somewhat ‘engineeristic’. I believe that this institutional turn could be of considerable importance for planning theory and practice, although it is perhaps better not to adopt a strictly ‘instrumentalist’ view of institutions and to recognize the marked specificity of them that calls for a more prudent and ‘evolutionary’ approach.

Gunder, Michael

doi: 10.1177/1473095210368878pmid: N/A

This article briefly reviews the history and concept of ideology, largely as articulated by exponents of the Frankfurt School, and considers the impact that this has had on historical planning theory and practice, culminating in Habermasian derived communicative planning theory. It then considers the role of ideology in a post-Marxist world and argues for the value of Žižekian critique for understanding planning’s contemporary role of ideologically defining the use of neoliberal space.

Hudalah, Delik; Winarso, Haryo; Woltjer, Johan

doi: 10.1177/1473095210368776pmid: N/A

This article explores the potential of policy networking as an important aspect of capacity building. It deals with a road development project related to the regional planning issue of North Bandung Area (NBA), a water catchment area facing the expansion of Bandung Metropolitan Area, West Java, Indonesia. The debate on the road development proposal is reconstructed to illustrate how an environmental policy network is built by committed experts, politicians, NGO activists and journalists to prevent a pro-growth project from realization. The analysis also indicates the potential contribution of such a network to the transformation of governance that is more responsive to the issues of environmental quality and regional sustainability. This potential contribution is reflected by the role of the policy network in the mobilization of discursive knowledge, empowerment of weak actors, and social learning in the decision-making process.

Bäcklund, Pia; Mäntysalo, Raine

doi: 10.1177/1473095210373684pmid: N/A

In this article the arrangements for the participatory planning of the five largest Finnish cities are examined from the perspectives of both democracy and planning theories. Four paradigms that form the continuum of general planning theoretical debate are identified as being relevant in the Finnish context: comprehensive-rationalistic, incrementalist, consensus-oriented communicative and conflict-oriented agonistic planning theory. These are discussed in relation to the parallel development of democracy theory: from the aggregative to the deliberative and further to the agonistic model of democracy. The empirical study reveals that while each paradigm shift in theory purports to replace the former theory with a new one, in practice the new theory emerges as a new addition to the palette of coexisting theoretical sources, to be drawn upon as a source of guidance and inspiration in organizing participatory planning. The five Finnish cities combine traits of different theories in their arrangements of planning participation, often in a fashion that generates institutional ambiguity. The argument concludes with discussing the necessity of further empirical and developmental research, where the contexts of both planning theory and democracy theory are related to the institutional challenges of planning conduct. If this does not happen the emerging agonistic planning theory, too, may become a paradigm shift at the level of theory only, thereby contributing to the widening gap between theory and practice.

Madanipour, Ali

doi: 10.1177/1473095210371162pmid: N/A

The article argues that a defining feature of planning is its efforts at making, formalizing and expanding connections between events, functions and institutions. In the context of contingency, diversity and uncertainty that characterizes complex urban societies, spatial planning is an instrumental formal process that seeks to shape and manage the future of spatial conditions and relations. The planning process involves setting up a series of temporal, spatial and institutional connections, which, it is argued, have been subject to rupture, shrinkage and fragmentation, and so they are themselves contingent, and frequently limited to being symbolic rather than substantive connections, turning planning into a speculative process. To meet the future challenges, planners need to rethink these connections.

Njoh, Ambe J.

doi: 10.1177/1473095210368880pmid: N/A

Rajan, Angelique Chettiparambil

doi: 10.1177/1473095210382193pmid: N/A