TABLE 1A: CRITIQUE OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO PLANNING

APPROACH LIBERAL LIBERAL

Rational Comprehensive Planning Incremental Planning
Planner as controller Planner as bargainer
PERIOD EMERGED 1950s/1960s 1960s

CRITIQUE OF Critique of approaches practiced Critique of RC approach

PREVIOUS APPROACH until then: (see Lindblom, 1996):
 No clear distinction
 Ad hoc methodology between means/end &
 Focus only on physical fact/value – cannot define
‘public interest’
 No time, info, money to be
comprehensive
 Human intellect cannot be
comprehensive, foresee all
options
RESPONSE
ASSUMPTIONS Society: consensus Society: plural
State: neutral arbiter State: representative
Planning: neutral Planning: representative

PURPOSE Environmental improvement & Environmental improvement:

management in the `public interest' remedial

SCOPE Socio-economic and Limited socio-economic &

physical/spatial physical/spatial

PLANNING PROCESS  Problem recognition &  Restricted problem recognition

definition of planning task by different agencies
 Data collection  Evaluation & empirical
 Data processing analysis of marginal changes to
 Goals, objectives & criteria policies
 Formulation  Limited plan alternatives
 Design of alternative plans  Evaluation of limited
 Decision making alternatives
 Implementation  Decision making through
 Monitoring & feedback mutual adjustment of agencies
 Continual problem refinement

(1) Each approach is an umbrella terms for a wide range of interpretations for each

Source: Levy, C, & Kyrou E. Urban Development Policy, Planning and Management: theory and practice, 2008
 TABLE 1B: CRITIQUE OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO PLANNING

APPROACH LIBERAL
Advocacy/Participatory planner

PERIOD EMERGED 1960s

CRITIQUE OF Critique of RC approach:

PREVIOUS APPROACHES  ‘public interest’ not homogenous – different interest groups
 planning not technical and neutral – is political
 planner not neutral – an advocate for ‘clients’/interest groups

Critique of Incremental approach:

 different groups not represented equally – do not enter
bargaining with same strengths
 marginal changes unlikely to meet plural interest of diverse
groups
RESPONSE
ASSUMPTIONS Society: plural
State: representative
Planning: representative

PURPOSE Improvement of quality of life through the participation of all groups

SCOPE Interests and needs of the client group

PLANNING PROCESS Similar to RC except:

 Problems defined by client group

 Goals & objectives set by client group
 Motivated & supported by `advocate'

 Decision making through improved local democracy

(1) Each approach is an umbrella terms for a wide range of interpretations for each

Source: Levy, C, & Kyrou E. Urban Development Policy, Planning and Management: theory and practice, 2008
 TABLE 1C: CRITIQUE OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO PLANNING (1)

APPROACH MARXIST/POLITICAL ECONOMY

Radical planner

PERIOD EMERGED 1970s

CRITIQUE OF Critique of RC planner:

PREVIOUS APPROACHES  is ‘contextless’ and ‘contentless’
i.e. it depoliticises planning

Critique of Incremental planner:

 does not recognise planning as an activity of a
class- biased state in a capitalist society
 is descriptive, not explanative, of the planning
process
Critique of Participatory planner:
 does not recognise planning as an activity of a
class- biased state in a capitalist society
 capitalist interests undermine representative
democracy

RESPONSE
ASSUMPTIONS Society: Conflict
State: Open to class alliances
Planning: Open to class alliance
PURPOSE Redistribution of resources through structural change: equity
& efficiency
SCOPE Scope of analysis: political economy
Scope of intervention: initially saw planner as marginal -
debated whether planner had a role
in urban change; 1990s trends to
building planning constituencies
among communities & workers

PLANNING PROCESS  Explanation of planning activity in socio-historical

context
 Initially ignored planning process
 Critique of selected methods
 1990s recognition of mobilisation and
communication methods to interact with
communities and workers , e.g. equity planning

(1) Each approach is an umbrella terms for a wide range of interpretations for each

Source: Levy, C, & Kyrou E. Urban Development Policy, Planning and Management: theory and practice, 2008
 TABLE 1D: CRITIQUE OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO PLANNING (1)

APPROACH NEO-LIBERAL
Entrepreneurial planner manager

PERIOD EMERGED 1980s

CRITIQUE OF Critique of R/C:

PREVIOUS APPROACHES Too much state’, ‘too much planning’.
Concede to rationality, but only to that of market.
Procedural elements reduced to minimum

Critique of I/P:
Based on institutional rivalry and securing only marginal
change. Planning deemed marginal, as institutions
weakened and (strong) economic sectors point the way
anyway.

Critique of Participatory/Advocacy:
Participation inefficient & costly. Useful only as ‘means’ to
end & avoidance of resistance. Rejection of urban
democracy considerations; citizen turned client/user.

Critique of Political Economists:

Different theoretical & ideological starting point; rejected.

RESPONSE Society: Focus on individuals

State: Support individ & market
ASSUMPTIONS Planning: Support individ & market

PURPOSE To enable to market and promote city competitiveness

internationally: efficiency
Minimal economic and physical/spatial intervention to support
market

Shift from planning (to private sector) to management

SCOPE Skeleton R/C focusing on private sector economic management

and management techniques
eg real estate techniques, corporate co-ordination tools
*recognition of city within changing global economic forces
PLANNING PROCESS
but
* delinking and demotion of equity from efficiency
* depoliticises planning through technical focus
* undermines democracy through privatisation of public good into
structures with no/limited political accountability

(1) Each approach is an umbrella terms for a wide range of interpretations for each

Source: Levy, C, & Kyrou E. Urban Development Policy, Planning and Management: theory and practice, 2008
 TABLE 1D: CRITIQUE OF DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO PLANNING (1)

APPROACH POST MODERNIST

Planner as communicative rationalist
PERIOD EMERGED
1980s/90s

CRITIQUE OF o RCP & EPM: planning commodifies particularities of

place; growing cleavages, unitary plan rendered useless;
PREVIOUS APPROACHES conservative state allied with financial capital delinks
efficiency and welfare and enables market to the
detriment of democratic structures; scientific rationalism
as ‘truth’ enhances rationality and ‘truth’ of market
o Incremental: critical of marginal adjustments to the
present, retaining exclusion of diversity, superiority of
knowledge and unitary plan
o Participatory: did not alter balance of power and
participation ended being coopted by technical rational
language, procedures
o Political econom /radical planner politician: more
tolerant; same social theory, highlighting association of
capitalism, groth of city, role of planner. Recognition of
other forms of social cleavages.

RESPONSE
Society: Co-operative conflict
ASSUMPTIONS
State: Open to diverse alliances

Planning: Open to diverse alliances

* recognition of diversity of identities and means of expressing

them
* recognition of power and its influence in planning at macro &
micro levels
* more attention to institutionalisation of change (bias of
procedures, language, other visible & invisibility mechanisms of
exclusion)
but
* implications for methods developing
* guard against relativism
* guard against idealist fundamentalism

To restructure improvements in cities which are constructed

PURPOSE through the interaction and mutual understanding among different
social groups and with planners

SCOPE o Scope of analysis: interactive; power relations into

class, gender, ethnicity, age
o Scope of intervention: socio-pol, ec, env and
physical/spatial dimensions of cities
* interactive communication between & among planners,
PLANNING PROCESS communities, other actors open to all forms of discourse
- open to all forms of discourse
- critical view of power relations & their
manifestation in language &
communication – deconstruction
- critical process of argumentation
* mutual reconstruction of decision making and actions

(1) Each approach is an umbrella terms for a wide range of interpretations for each

Source: Levy, C, & Kyrou E. Urban Development Policy, Planning and Management: theory and practice, 2008