This paper comments on a recent paper by Tewdwr-Jones and Allmendinger which presents a critique of the new paradigm of communicative planning theory. The comments focus on the significance of a social relational perspective in the communicative/institutionalist approach, the treatment of power, the method of 'critical theory', and the condition of contemporary British land-use planning practice. I conclude the paper by emphasising the need for new forms of policy analysis to reflect both new perspectives on the social relations of governance processes and the reconfiguration of governance unfolding in practice.
Improving the qualities of places is attracting increasing policy and academic interest in contemporary Europe. This raises questions about the appropriate governance capacity to deliver such improvements. I argue that a key element of such capacity lies in the quality of local policy cultures. Some are well integrated, well connected, and well informed, and can mobilise readily to act to capture opportunities and enhance local conditions. Others are fragmented, lack the connections to sources of power and knowledge, and the mobilisation capacity, to organise to make a difference. In recent years, the emphasis in attempts to change urban governance capacity, particularly in Britain, has been on encouraging catalytic projects and partnerships. Recent experience across Europe suggests that wider transformative effects are difficult to achieve without careful consideration of the partnership form and how it connects to the wider policy culture. They may also have the effect of increasing the fragmentation of local capacity. I examine the potential of collaborative approaches in place-making initiatives in achieving more effective and durable transformations. Collaborative approaches emphasise the importance of building new policy discourses about the qualities of places, developing collaboration among stakeholders in policy development as well as delivery, widening stakeholder involvement beyond traditional power elites, recognising different forms of local knowledge, and building rich social networks as a resource of institutional capital through which new initiatives can be taken rapidly and legitimately. They shift the task of urban planning from 'building places' to fostering the institutional capacity in territorial political communities for ongoing 'place-making' activities.
The impact of public policy on the opportunities available for property development in an urban region and the effect of such policy on the institutional organisation of the property-development sector are examined. Also explored are the problems of generating autonomous private-sector development capacity in a fragile local economy (Tyne and Wear in North East England) experiencing decline in its traditional industrial base, within which active property markets may only exist with respect to certain types of properties and locations. The tension between a financial orientation and a production orientation towards property development is highlighted. During the 1980s, planning and urban policy in Britain promoted the former orientation, but the needs and opportunities of the local economy emphasised the latter. The importance of understanding the specificities of local property-development organisation and relations for the design and evaluation of public policy directed at the property sector is stressed.
Discusses the significance of the processes through which policy is formulated and implemented, and in particular explores the argument that different types of policy process produce different distributive consequences. 'Process forms' are defined, and different types of process outlined, with particular reference to their manifestation in British town and country planning. (Abstract amended)
This paper is an exploration of the way the new political economy approaches in the social sciences can be developed to provide a more robust knowledge-base for local land-use planning. Consideration is given to present deficiencies in our understanding and their consequences. There then follows a review of recent developments within political economy and their significance for understanding land-use policy programmes and outcomes. The potential of the approach for addressing methodological issues in the field is then examined, with a particular focus on the importance of a process emphasis, on identifying choices within structural limitations, and on evaluating outcomes.
It is increasingly recognised that meeting the obligations set out in the Paris Agreement on climate change will not be physically possible without deploying large-scale techniques for either removing greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere or reflecting sunlight away from the Earth. In this article we report on the findings of a scenarios method designed to interrogate how far these 'climate engineering' ideas may develop in the future and under what governance arrangements. Unlike previous studies in climate engineering foresight that have narrowly focussed on academic perspectives, a single climate engineering idea and a restricted range of issues, our approach sought to respond to theoretical imperatives for 'broadening out' and 'opening up' research methods applied to highly uncertain and ambiguous topics. We convened a one-day event with experts in climate change and climate engineering from across the sectors of government, industry, civil society and academia in the UK, with additional experts from Brazil, Germany and India. The participants were invited to develop scenarios for four climate engineering ideas: bioenergy with carbon capture and storage, direct air capture and storage, stratospheric aerosol injection and marine cloud brightening. Manifold challenges for future research were identified, placing the scenarios in sharp contrast with early portrayals of climate engineering research as threatening a 'slippery slope' of possible entrenchments, lock-ins and path dependencies that would inexorably lead to deployment. We suggest that the governance challenges for climate engineering should therefore today be thought of as less of a slippery slope than an 'uphill struggle' and that there is an increasingly apparent need for governance that responsibly incentivises, rather than constrains, research. We find that affecting market processes by introducing an effective global carbon price and direct government expenditure on research and development are incentives with broad potential applications to ...
In this paper, the processes of governance within the UK government's recent urban policy initiative, City Challenge, are explored. This initiative targets the involvement, through "partnership", of residents of "areas of concentrated disadvantage" in the processes of programme formulation and delivery. Underlying this is the objective of "incorporating" neighourhood residents in 'mainstream' political and economic life. In this paper, that objective is set in the context of contemporary conditions in such neighbourhoods. Experiences of the early stages of two City Challenge programmes are then discussed, in order to assess the character of the partnerships which are evolving. The two examples vary significantly in their style and in the strategy of the local authority, as well as in the characteristics of the areas. It is argued that, although central government's influence over the style of the programmes remains pervasive, the strategy of the local authority and the struggles by the participants in the partnerships have a significant influence on the content and style of the programmes. Further, the style of the programmes affects the balance of power within the programme and the terms of incorporation of the various partnerships in governance processes.
