Nurit Alfasi

Planning Policy? Between Long-Term Planning and Zoning Amendments in the Israeli Planning System

The Israeli planning system, like many other Western systems, is a regulatory system, meaning that statutory land-use plans are attempts at both setting long-term planning policy and defining planning rights. However, planning in Israel faces a growing gap between its official structure and what is actually implemented. Mainly, an inconsistency exists between the formal top-to-bottom approach of the system and the flexible dynamics that occur in practice. In this paper I focus on the prevalent local zoning amendment procedure and examine its background as well as its implications. Based on this, the paper claims that in Israel, the tension between certainty and flexibility in planning creates a spatially disturbed behavior, which actively tests the bans and limits of existing possibilities.

An Approach to Planning Discourse Analysis

The field of planning discourse is associated with two main approaches to planning: one that is based in social theory and another that is related to discourse analysis as practised in cognitive science. In both domains, the aim of the analysis is to reveal policies, ideologies, linguistic structures, etc. that are represented by the discourse. This paper looks not beyond the discourse, but rather at the dynamics of the discourse itself. It does so by means of the SIRN (synergetic inter-representation network) approach that was originally inspired by Bartlett in a study of remembering that also provided the foundation for discourse analysis as practised in cognitive science. The usefulness of the SIRN approach is illustrated by reference to empirical data obtained from participatory observation of a planning team that worked on a plan for the city of Beer Sheva, Israel, during the years 1994—97.

Jerusalem of (foreign) gold: entrepreneurship and pattern-driven policy in a historic city

This article examines the relationship between recent luxury residences built in Jerusalem and the city’s fragile urban fabric regarding the extent to which government affects the form of such projects in practice. It highlights the establishment of a pattern-driven policy—a form of policy resulting from the entrenchment of specific solutions. The research addresses two seemingly unrelated spheres, namely urban regime and planning gains, and urban design, as embodied in Jerusalem’s “ghost complexes”. Based on the Jerusalem case, we depict the practicability of the planning deal between the municipality and the entrepreneur as the driving force shaping the built environment under the neo-liberal rationale that controls negotiations between the municipality and the developers. Relations between local government and developers may develop in a pattern-driven path; hence, specific solutions may become entrenched and affect the nature of understandings or agreements, thereby continuously affecting the cityscape.

Between socio-spatial and urban justice: Rawls’ principles of justice in the 2011 Israeli Protest Movement

The occupy movement of summer 2011 provides an opportunity to examine practical and theoretical implications of the notion of planning justice and human rights. Analyzing the discourse by activists in a planning team associated with the Israeli Protest Movement reveals inner conflicts and debates regarding the meanings of justice and human rights in planning. The discourse exposes an ongoing rift between spatial professionals (mainly geographers, planners, and architects) and subfields (municipal and governmental bodies, nongovernmental organizations, and academia) related to applying ideas of just planning in the Israeli context. Specifically, two opposing schemas of planning justice appear—that of socio-spatial justice and urban justice. A further investigation links each schema with a different principle of justice, as defined in Rawls’ Theory of Justice: The first schema is associated with the principle of difference and the second with the principle of fair equality of opportunity. Together, the unsettled conflicts hint at an inconsistency occurring when the theory is interpreted in practice.

Between the "Global" and the "Local": On Global Locality and Local Globality

This study offers new perspectives on the impact of global and local interactions on cities today. We look at two opposing ways of integrating global processes with the local functioning of cities. The first mode relates to a city representing unique local significance that is recognized and valued on the global scale. This globality is not economic but it affects the global interactions of individuals, institutions, and businesses in these cities. We term this type of city a global locality. The second mode is a city that serves as a local cultural and economic gateway to its region. Whether located higher or lower on the World Cities roster, at the local and regional scale it serves as both business center and cultural hub. We term this type of city a local globality. In this article, we discuss both city types using Tel Aviv-Jaffa and Jerusalem as examples.

Between Friends and Strangers: Micro-Segregation in a Haredi Neighborhood in Jerusalem

Sanhedria, an inner–city neighborhood in Jerusalem, is populated mostly by members of several sects belonging to the Haredi (Jewish ultra–Orthodox) community. The Sanhedria case offers an opportunity to examine noneconomic processes of segregation. The paper examines residential relations between sects as reflected in their residential choices and the observed residential distribution. Sanhedria residents are close in economic status and share similar preferences regarding their way of life, yet powerful mechanisms of residential preferences acting at the level of the apartment and building result in “micro–segregation” patterns. Taken together, these mechanisms provide insight into processes typical of dense inner–city neighborhoods with multi–family housing and shared by differing religious or ethnic groups.

IDEOLOGICAL DEVELOPERS AND THE FORMATION OF LOCAL DEVELOPMENT POLICY: THE CASE OF INNER-CITY PRESERVATION IN TEL AVIV

ABSTRACT: This article studies the role of ideological developers (IDs) in the formation and implementation of local development policy. The IDs are developers whose motivation is ideological as opposed to financial, and they initiate ideas rather than plans and projects. Based on a case study regarding inner-city preservation, we claim that in Tel Aviv, IDs have much leverage on local decision making. The IDs are individuals with high personal capital, who focus on an issue that it is not championed by existing civil groups. As the IDs seek out influential routes to policy makers, they build circumstantial coalitions. Through these limited and conditional partnerships with administrators and other influential actors, the IDs apply pressure and advance their specific cause.

Doomed to informality: Familial versus modern planning in Arab towns in Israel

Planning systems throughout the world are rooted in the modern, western-oriented worldview and the rationale of liberal nationalism. In this view, society consists of relatively equal and free individuals, operating in a fairly free market, while state intervention in peoples lives and in the economy is only required in extreme cases such as market failure, as with urban and regional planning, and is conducted via top-to-bottom regulations. However, whether this outlook is suitable for sociopolitical cultures other than liberalism is questionable. This paper examines the modern planning machinery with respect to traditional, family-based societies, in particular the Arab towns and villages in Israel. It claims that, in addition to the national conflict between Arab citizens and the State of Israel, the embedded tensions between the spatiality of the Arab city and modern planning systems have given rise to the informal, gray urbanism currently typical of Arab towns. The paper analyzes the different planning tools resulting from the two worldviews. The use of a culturally based urban code and mutual agreements between interested parties form central planning instruments in familial societies, while administrative planning and regulation are central to modern traditions. Based on this analysis, the paper offers a framework for overcoming existing tensions.

The Meaning of Words in Urban Conflicts: Language, Argumentation Patterns and Local Politics in Israel

Urban development is frequently accompanied by planning disputes. Such disputes are often the battleground for a variety of opposing views and interests, in relation to specific urban and environmental assets and lifestyles. Analysis of three disputes that took place in Israel recently reveals a similarity in the patterns of argumentation that form the foundations of such debates. These patterns are valid, in spite of considerable differences between the contexts and actors involved in the three disputes. The claims made by disagreeing actors have their roots in common images of the built environment, the conflicting situation and the general politics of the conflict. In addition, in all three disputes, the same symmetrical structure of argumentation emerged, as each statement was countered with an opposite assertion.

The undercurrents of entrepreneurial development: Impressions from a globalizing city

High-standard entrepreneurial ventures are usually justified as a means of stimulating capital investment for social, spatial, and financial side benefits for the public. We show the unequal consequences of these ideas in Tel Aviv—Jaffa, where the location of the projects subject to such obligations is not really mitigated by the location of municipal public flagship projects and by the spatial distribution of the municipal development budget. As in many other urban centers, planning bureaucrats in this city advanced numerous expensive residential ventures to finance a variety of municipal initiatives and increase public budgets. Despite their success in attracting private investments, collecting developers’ taxes, exactions, and revenues, the more complicated issues and the less affluent communities see less private and public spending. We link this tendency to the growing fragmentation of urban planning, to the supremacy of the local plan—practically operating as a planning deal—and to the emergence of various municipal tools supporting the feasibility of the deal. We thus claim that while the entrepreneurial planning practice fosters the connections between flexible planning and urban economy, a short-range financial conclusion is unavoidable—most of its products are directed to attract additional similar projects. By tracing this institutional conduct, we claim that while current urban planning is subordinated to market logic and investments, it is actually trapped in a vicious cycle of deepening its own economic appeal. Simultaneously, planners are losing the ability to direct public goods to where they are needed.