Andy Inch

Creating 'a generation of NIMBYs'? Interpreting the role of the state in managing the politics of urban development

The traditional relationship between politics and policy making has been challenged in recent years, highlighting how policy itself can generate political action. This raises questions about how conflict produced or mediated through the policy process is managed, particularly within what has been described as a ‘postpolitical settlement’ where fundamental politicoideological issues are liable to be ‘displaced’ rather than opened up for debate. I argue that such displacement generates its own distinctive politicomanagerial logic. Drawing on the discourses and practices of planning reform in England, I suggest that ongoing systemic reform might be understood as a product of a politics of displacement that seeks to cover over the causes of the antagonism generated by the logic of urban development. Tracing this logic through the policy process, I further suggest that displacement has a range of underexamined effects on local democracy and the legitimacy of local government.

Ordinary citizens and the political cultures of planning: in search of the subject of a new democratic ethos

What is required of the citizen to make planning more democratic? In this article, I argue this previously overlooked question illuminates key challenges for democratising planning in theory and practice. Distinguishing between deliberative and agonistic conceptions of communicative planning, I review the qualities these theories demand of citizens. Through examples from Scotland, I then contrast this with the roles citizens are currently invited to perform within a growth-orientated planning culture, drawing attention to techniques that use constructions of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ citizenship to manage conflict generated by development. I conclude by suggesting that while ‘ordinary’ citizens’ experiences draw attention to the strengths and weaknesses of deliberative and agonistic accounts, they also highlight hidden costs associated with participation that present significant challenges for the project of shaping a more democratic form of planning.

Putting Localism in Place: Conservative Images of the Good Community and the Contradictions of Planning Reform in England

Abstract Over the past 5 years, the UK Coalition and subsequent Conservative governments have sought to develop an agenda of localism. Recent research has evaluated how this has played out in practice. This article takes a different approach, interpreting how the language of community and place in English politics has been mobilized in reforms of the country’s planning system. We do this by tracing how conservative traditions of political thought and imagery of place were used to advance localism. This reveals a range of contradictions within the English localism agenda and highlights the wider political challenges raised by attempts to mobilize the affective and morally charged language of the local.

‘Opening for business’? Neoliberalism and the cultural politics of modernising planning in Scotland

In this paper I explore how the culture of land-use planning in Scotland has been targeted as an object of modernising reform, exploring how ‘culture change’ initiatives played a prominent role in stabilising a new settlement around ‘open for business’ planning between 2006 and 2012, containing potential tensions between diverse goals to make planning more efficient, inclusive and integrative. This highlights the potentially significant role of governance cultures in containing tensions and securing consent to processes of state restructuring. I therefore argue that greater empirical attentiveness to the cultural micro-politics of state restructuring can improve understanding of complex, contemporary dynamics of change, and the contested role of the neoliberal hegemonic project in reshaping urban governance. I conclude by arguing that the continued power of neoliberal critiques of the inefficiency of land-use planning indicate a need to acknowledge and engage contemporary cultural battles over the purposes of planning and urban governance.

A Review of Recent Critical Studies of UK Planning

Abstract British planning is in the midst of a period of turbulence and is undergoing, many consider, an attempt by government to transform the system and the way it is operated along neoliberal lines. This may therefore be an opportune moment to encourage greater questioning about the state of UK planning. In an effort to stimulate some reflection on the contribution that academia has made in recent times the authors conducted a preliminary review of UK planning research output since 1997. The review sought to gauge the level of left-critical engagement within the literature and the results are discussed below as one small step towards raising wider questions about how to uncover the bases for a more progressive planning.

Planning in the face of immovable subjects: a dialogue about resistance to development forces

ainstituto de ciências Sociais, Universidade de lisboa, lisbon, Portugal; bSchool of Urban research and Planning, University of iowa, iowa city, USa; cSchool of agriculture and environment, University of Western australia, Perth, australia; drMiT University, Melbourne, Victoria, australia; eSchool of Spatial Planning, TU Dortmund University, Dortmund, germany; fcentre for Urban research, rMiT University, Melbourne, Victoria, australia; gPlanning Democracy, edinburgh, UK

Unsettling Planning Theory

Recent political developments in many parts of the world seem likely to exacerbate rather than ameliorate the planetary-scale challenges of social polarization, inequality and environmental change societies face. In this unconventional multi-authored essay, we therefore seek to explore some of the ways in which planning theory might respond to the deeply unsettling times we live in. Taking the multiple, suggestive possibilities of the theme of unsettlement as a starting point, we aim to create space for reflection and debate about the state of the discipline and practice of planning theory, questioning what it means to produce knowledge capable of acting on the world today. Drawing on exchanges at a workshop attended by a group of emerging scholars in Portland, Oregon in late 2016, the essay begins with an introduction section exploring the contemporary resonances of ‘unsettling’ in, of and for planning theory. This is followed by four, individually authored responses which each connect the idea of unsettlement to key challenges and possible future directions. We end by calling for a reflective practice of theorizing that accepts unsettlement but seeks to act knowingly and compassionately on the uneven terrain that it creates.

Book review: Spatial Planning and Governance: Understanding UK Planning

housing demand and tenure structures coalesce and collide with the global economic downturn to produce quite different outcomes’ (p. 244). Housing Markets and the Global Financial Crisis: The Uneven Impact on Households is undoubtedly effective at achieving its title, therein its main purpose, of examining the uneven impact of the GFC on households within and between countries. However, a few shortcomings are worth note. Along with the uneven distribution within chapters of historical, empirical and theoretical contents, there remain questions around the selection of countries for investigation. In the first instance, why is Latin America completely ignored by the editors? This may be for pragmatic reasons, but it is not noted. Equally, of the so-called BRIC countries, which are of increasing importance to the global economy, only China is studied. On the other hand, while outside the stated purpose of the book, I feel an important omission is any attempt worth note, outside of a few paragraphs in Forrest’s introduction, of appropriating causes of the crisis; many chapters merely accept it happened, and move on to studying its impacts. It would be worthwhile, given the few chapters that have serious policy recommendations, to have included more theoretical work on the nature of this crisis – politics and partisanship aside. Forrest does a nice job of providing a concise overview of opinions in appropriating blame, so to speak, for the crisis, but more substantial thought of this sort is both helpful and necessary in deciphering the next steps both on part of institutions and individuals in recovering from this most recent crisis. Indeed, such an inclusion could have led to a stronger concluding chapter, which I found weak in comparison with his excellent introductory chapter. Despite these limitations, Housing Markets and the Global Financial Crisis: The Uneven Impact on Households brings together a diverse set of researchers from a solid mix of countries, culminating in an accessible, methodologically sound and engaging edited collection. Given this, and as a first-attempt at examining the GFC comparatively in terms of its impacts on households, this book is a much welcomed addition to the urban studies discourse broadly, and empirical work on the GFC specifically.