Conflict In Urban Development

Published in 1992, the aim of this book is to give both the professional planner and the student a feel for the current arguments alive in planning policy circles and to introduce relevant contemporary research. This book has developed out of a series of seminars run at the Institute of Planning Studies at Nottingham University as part of its continuing professional development programme. Each of the seminars brought together a variety of speakers who were involved with the topic under discussion from a different aspect – some with academic research experience and others with practical policy implementation. Most the nineteen contributors presented papers at this series of seminars, but some have been rewritten, others substantially revised, and several have been commissioned especially for this book. Four current policy issues are examined: provision and pedestrians; jobs for the inner cities; the homeless and the relationship between planners and developers. For each topic contributors were chosen who could approach the problem from a different point of view, the aim being to explore each topic with direct statements and straightforward arguments leading therefore to a more stimulating breadth of this view rather than a bland overview.

Planning and Conflict discusses the reasons for conflicts around urban developments and analyzes their shape in contemporary cities. It offers an interdisciplinary framework for scholars to engage with the issue of planning conflicts, focusing on both empirical and theoretical inquiry. By reviewing different perspectives for planners to engage with conflicts, and not simply mediate or avoid them, Planning and Conflict provides a theoretically informed look forward to the future of engaged, responsive city development that involves all its stakeholders.

Planning and Conflict discusses the reasons for conflicts around urban developments and analyzes their shape in contemporary cities. It offers an interdisciplinary framework for scholars to engage with the issue of planning conflicts, focusing on both empirical and theoretical inquiry. By reviewing different perspectives for planners to engage with conflicts, and not simply mediate or avoid them, Planning and Conflict provides a theoretically informed look forward to the future of engaged, responsive city development that involves all its stakeholders.

When designing, planning and building urban spaces, many contradictory and conflicting actors, practices and agendas coexist. This book propounds that, at present, this process is conducted in an artificial reality, 'Concept City', characterized by a simplified and outdated conception of space. It provides a constructive critique of the concepts, underlying the practices of planning and architecture and, in order to facilitate more dynamic, inclusive and subtle practices, it formulates a new theory about space in general and public urban space in particular. The central notions in this theory are temporality, experiment and conflict, which are grounded on empirical observations in Helsinki, Manchester and Berlin. While the book contextualizes Lefebvre's ideas on urban planning and architecture, it is in no way limited to Lefebvrean discourse, but allows insights to new theoretical work, including that of Finnish and Swedish authors. In doing so, it suggests and develops exciting new approaches and tools leading to 'experiential urbanism'.

"Conflicts around urban development and planning issues represent an important dimension of urban politics. Issues of social cohesion and democratic representation are all the more relevant in times when cities are undergoing a severe economic crisis and when local politics tends to meet its challenges with 'post-political' responses. The relevance of local conflicts as moments of political mobilization is particularly apparent as institutions and procedures of urban politics fall short of meeting the expectations of local communities." --Cover.