Framing people and planning: 50 years of debate

The last 50 years have not only seen major changes in the forms and practices of participation but also in the ways in which it has been characterized and understood. Alongside the report of the Skeffi ngton Committ ee on public participation in planning, 1969 saw the publication of Sherry Arnstein's 'ladder of participation' which famously typified participation from tokenism to citizen control. Since then the ladder has been replaced by the networks of collaborative planning and both have been challenged by the focus on planning's 'dark side' where participation is associated with coercive forms of governmentality and governance through community. This article discusses the evolution of these ideas, not to provide a historiography per se, but to highlight the themes, issues and contradictions they suggest lie behind participation. These include debates about the extent to which power can ever be devolved to the people; clashes between the different modes of governance inherent in planning (representative, legal/bureaucratic, participatory); the significance of action outside the formal participation apparatus (insurgent planning); and the ways in which the publics of planning have been made and remade within different planning regimes, often with profound implications for the inclusion and exclusion of different social groups and concerns. The article concludes that as a result public participation in planning can be seen as a shifting terrain of underlying tensions and contradictions, which presents both openings and closures for citizens seeking to influence the use and development of land

People’s right to the city has been eroded by mega-event evictions in Rio de Janiero

Brazil has been preparing furiously for the upcoming World Cup and 2016 Olympics. While these developments are thought to represent the country’s growing economy and rising middle class, such “progress” has come at the expense of Brazil’s poorest citizens. Sue Brownill, Ramin Keivani, and Erick Omena de Melo look at the forced evictions in Vila Autódromo to make way for Olympic venues, in spite of the residents’ legal title to their site, arguing that it is representative of global trends of market and state forces eroding people’s right to the city

From planning to opportunism? Re-examining the creation of the London Docklands Development Corporation

East London’s former docklands have been at the centre of planning and regeneration debates for the past four decades. The setting up of the LDDC has been variously interpreted as ‘3-D Thatcherism’ in action, a symbol of the death of comprehensive planning and the replacement of a corporatist, Keynesian era of urban policy with a more neo-liberal approach. Moving away from simplistic and straightforward interpretations of the processes happening at this time, this paper uses new archival and interview material to re-examine the setting up of the LDDC and its early years, revealing a more complex and contradictory picture than existing accounts suggest. It focuses on three themes: changing forms of state intervention; the uncertain ‘break’ in the post-war consensus as evidenced by the changes in approaches to the regeneration of Docklands; and the unintended, disordered process of actual policy change. As such we aim to reveal how shifting visions, modes of governance and practices can compete and co-exist in the midst of seemingly coherent ‘eras’, as Docklands as a place and as an approach to regeneration was constantly made and re-made – a process that continues to this day

The political identities of neighbourhood planning in England

The rise of neighbourhood planning has been characterised as another step in a remorseless de-politicisation of the public sphere. A policy initiated by the Coalition Government in England to create the conditions for local communities to support housing growth, neighbourhood planning appears to evidence a continuing retreat from political debate and contestation. Clear boundaries are established for the holistic integration of participatory democracy into the strategic plan-making of the local authority. These boundaries seek to take politics out of development decisions and exclude all issues of contention from discussion. They achieve this goal at the cost of arming participatory democracy with a collective identity around which new antagonisms may develop. Drawing on the post-political theories of Chantal Mouffe this paper identifies the return of antagonism and conflict to participation in spatial planning. Key to its argument is the concept of the boundary or frontier that in Mouffe’s theoretical framework institutionalises conflict between political entities. Drawing on primary research with neighbourhood development plans in England the paper explores how boundary conditions and boundary designations generate antagonism and necessitate political action. The paper charts the development of the collective identities that result from these boundary lines and argues for the potential for neighbourhood planning to restore political conflict to the politics of housing development

An analysis of professional perceptions of criteria contributing to sustainable housing affordability

Housing affordability is a multi-dimensional issue, yet it is typically defined and assessed quite narrowly in terms of financial criteria. The housing affordability problem encompasses more than financial costs of housing and extends to larger issues of social wellbeing and sustainability. Accordingly, a broader range of factors ought to be considered when defining and assessing affordability, particularly if more sustainable outcomes are desired from housing. A comprehensive system of criteria representing sustainable housing affordability, developed by the authors, is validated and analysed in this paper. The quantitative data analysis of surveys conducted with housing and planning professionals across the UK is used to determine stakeholder’s perceptions on the criteria contributing to sustainable housing affordability and to rank these criteria according to their importance. The paper establishes that professional opinions on this issue differ insignificantly across different regions of the UK, while it varies to some extent depending on the sector of housing industry

Responsible participation and housing: restoring democratic theory to the scene

Tensions between individual liberty and collective social justice characterise many advanced liberal societies. These tensions are reflected in the challenges posed for representative democracy both by participatory democratic practices and by the current emphasis on (so-called) responsible participation. Based on the example of ‘community’ housing associations in Scotland, this paper explores these tensions. It is argued that the critique of responsibility may have been over-stated – that, in particular, ‘community’ housing associations offer the basis for relatively more inclusive and effective processes of decision-making than council housing, which relies on the traditional processes and institutions of representative local government for its legitimacy

Taking stock of neighbourhood planning in England 2011-2016

Neighbourhood planning (NP) as enabled by the 2011 Localism Act in England has precipitated a considerable literature discussing its potential, limitations and likely shortcomings referenced against government rhetoric and the reporting of initial experiences of the process. This paper provides an overview of the current literature on neighbourhood planning and sets out how it has been received and practised across England drawing on empirical evidence. The extent of take-up and the experience of those involved first five years of neighbourhood planning and to consider how community-led planning may be designed and used following operational principles of inclusivity, capacity-building and adding value

Branding the City: The Democratic Legitimacy of a New Mode of Governance

__Abstract__ Place branding has been used to influence ideas concerning communities and districts, especially in regeneration programmes. This article approaches branding as a new governance strategy for managing perceptions. Considering the popular criticism that branding is a form of spin that prevents the public from gaining a proper understanding of their government's policies, this article focuses on the democratic legitimacy of branding in urban governance. The branding of two urban communities in the Netherlands is examined empirically in terms of input legitimacy, throughput legitimacy and output legitimacy. The research shows how the democratic legitimacy of branding varies in the two cases. In one case, branding largely excluded citizens, whereas in the other case there was limited citizen participation. The article indicates that, although branding can potentially be a participatory process in which the feelings and emotions of citizens are included, this potential is not always fully realised in practice