NOTES ON THE USES AND SCOPE OF CITY PLANNING THEORY Article

N O T E S O N T H E U S E S A N D S C O P E O F

C I T Y P L A N N I N G T H E O R Y

Michael NeumanTexas A&M University, USA

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Article

Copyright © 2005 SAGE Publications(London, Thousand Oaks, CA and New Delhi)Vol 4(2): 123–145DOI: 10.1177/1473095205054601www.sagepublications.com

Abstract This mapping article highlights two concerns about cityplanning theory: its uses and roles in urban planning, and its scope.Regarding its main uses or functions, there are four: explanation,prediction, justification, and normative guidance. Each of these fourroles is briefly explained before moving on to the core of the articleregarding the scope of planning theory, as the use of city planningtheory bears directly on its reach, and vice versa. This discussionaddresses the question of the contribution of planning theory to urbandevelopment, and suggests how to explain that contribution.

Keywords normative theory, predictive theory, theoretical justifi-cation of practice, urban planning

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Throughout the life of our profession lively debates of different flavors andintensities regarding the scope of city planning, and therefore (if some-times only implicitly) its underlying theory, have animated the quiet hallsof academe and the boisterous corridors of power alike. This debate canbe posed as a question: how is city planning’s contribution to societyexplained and justified? This question can seem innocent in scholarlysettings, yet if we avoid it, it is at our peril, as the recent closures, orattempts at closures, of entire academic planning departments attested. Inpractice domains, this question is hotly contested as well. Debates aboutprivatization have huge impacts on city planning, because they shiftresponsibilities to the market, because they undermine the public’s estima-tion of the value of the public sector, and because of the abolitions ofplanning agencies, or their weakening, or reassignment of their functionsto other departments. This pattern has also affected research budgets. Forexample, the current and recent budgets of the US Department of Housingand Urban Development have virtually no allocations for city planningresearch. The recent abolition of some American cities’ planning depart-ments, the past abolition of the Greater London Council (now resurrectedunder a different name), and other encroachments on public city planningendeavors testify to the fragility of our labors and the importance of thisquestion.

This question also goes to the heart of what is city planning, a questionworthy of extended discussion which will not be entered into here, exceptto the limited extent of basic delineation. I do not limit the task of cityplanning to work that is performed by licensed or certified professionalplanners, or those professional practitioners with university degrees in cityplanning. Rather, I see planning, while not unlimited in scope, as an activitythat involves other professionals (architects, engineers, lawyers, and thelike), politicians and public administrators working in public institutions,those who develop urban places (developers, bankers, industrialists, otherentrepreneurs and organizations that shape urban space), and specificstakeholders representing private, public, community, and other interests, aswell as those parts of civil society engaged in urban development and itsplanning. While the list is long, it is far from all-inclusive. It is a definableset.

Also, in this article, the term ‘theory’, when used without a modifier,refers to theory in general. A standard dictionary definition of theoryroughly corresponds to the meaning that I impart to theory, when usedwithout qualifiers. Likewise, the term ‘planning theory’, when used withoutany modifiers such as city, urban, regional, community, or spatial, refers toplanning theory in general. This usage recognizes there are many types ofplanning in addition to city planning, such as corporate planning, strategicplanning, military planning, financial planning, vacation planning, and thelike. In this sense planning is conceived as a general process, an activity thatforesees a goal (desired state of affairs) or an activity in the future and

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organizes current actions to realize that goal or that activity. This is closerto the direction that some (not all) branches of planning theory were takingin the 1960s that extended through to the 1980s (Chadwick, 1971; Davidoffand Reiner, 1962; Faludi, 1973, 1987; McLaughlin, 1969; roundly criticizedby Wildavsky, 1973). The term planning theory is inclusive of city planningtheory. In this article, the modifiers ‘city’ or ‘urban’, when applied to theterms planning and planning theory, apply most directly to the activitiesunder discussion in this article, and the activities we teach our students inurban planning courses.1

To return to the question after this quick sorting of the meanings offundamental terms, ‘What is the actual contribution of the city planningfunction and its practitioners to the logic of urban development? Doplanners know the answer? If yes, what is the answer? What is the evidenceand is it robust? What planning theories explain that contribution? Ifplanners don’t know the answer, why is this the case, and what should bedone about it?’2

This article seeks to sketch a theoretical outline of ideas to beconsidered in a more extended answer to some of these questions. Thisarticle posits an initial framework rather than conducts a comprehensiveanalysis. It highlights two concerns about urban planning theory: its rolesin the urban planning profession and its scope. Regarding its roles in theprofession, which may be also considered as the uses or functions of theory,there are four: explanation, prediction, justification, and normativeguidance. Many have addressed portions of these issues in the past. In spiteof all these efforts, what has been missing has been a framework. This is astep towards that framework. A complete discussion would warrant amuch longer and detailed article, if not a book, to explore all the nuancesand all the debates over the last century. These debates were very lively inthe early 20th century on both sides of the Atlantic, as planning took rootinstitutionally; was transformed by radical economic and political changes,again on both sides of the Atlantic, in the 1930s; and was born yet again inthe 1960s. It is a fertile debate worth exploring, and has resumed recently,with the rise of institutional and critical theory and collaborativenetworked approaches. It is to these most recent strands of the debate,while acknowledging and building on prior strands, that this piece sketchesa frame.

Just to cite two prior examples, it is important to recall that a similarquestion received a lengthy exposition in Robert Walker’s (1941) influen-tial book The Planning Function in Urban Government, and in the prede-cessor to the current edition of the International City ManagementAssociation handbook Practice of Local Government Planning (Hoch et al.,2000), John Nolen’s (1916) City Planning. The latter defined for two gener-ations in its successive editions the role that planning was to play in urbandevelopment. That role was to prepare a city plan made up of specificelements that was to be adopted by municipal government and used to

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guide (control) urban development (Nolen, 1916). Both books were notonly theoretical instruction books, indicating what planners ought to do,they were followed in practice assiduously; a fact that can be easily ascer-tained if one looks carefully at the city plans of their respective eras in theUSA. Other countries had their equivalents. The appearance and contentof those plans closely resembled not only Nolen’s book, but also thenumerous books and articles that his contemporaries and followersproduced. In the case of Walker’s book, an analysis of how the planningdepartments of his era were organized and administered also reveals theextent of his influence in practice. Walker’s influence was such that it tookover two decades for a serious reply from the academy, which not inciden-tally came from a scholar who was also a distinguished practitioner. I amreferring to Jack Kent’s The Urban General Plan of the early 1960s, whichhas recently been reissued by the American Planning Association’s (APA)Planners Press (Kent, 1964, 1990).

Nolen’s and Walker’s books both came out in second editions, Nolen’sin 1929 and Walker’s in 1950. Nolen’s became so popular that it was trans-formed into what is now The Practice of Local Government Planning(Hoch et al., 2000), itself so influential that it is commonly referred to asthe ‘green bible’. In sum, thanks to Nolen, Walker, and their followers, upuntil the 1960s, planners in the USA knew what their job was and what itsfunction was in the larger scheme. Since then, the scope of planning hasexpanded.

These questions were tackled again, from an explicitly theoreticalvantage, in a special issue of the Journal of the American Planning Associ-ation (JAPA) edited by John Dyckman titled The Practical Uses of PlanningTheory (Dyckman, 1969). It would be difficult to summarize the overallmessage in that volume. Its contributors strove to bridge the gap betweentheory and practice, and to distinguish yet still bridge the gaps betweennormative and substantive theory. In 1995, the Journal of PlanningEducation and Research published a special issue edited by Bruce Stiftel.In that group of papers, it is (only somewhat) easier to discern a commonthread, toward the procedural side of the equation, just then beginning tobe enriched by institutional concerns (Stiftel, 1995; see also Mandelbaum etal., 1996). Again, related debates were occurring on both sides of theAtlantic, and increasingly globally, as ACSP (Association of CollegiateSchools of Planning) and AESOP (Association of European Schools ofPlanning) began to hold joint congresses (since 1991), and a World [Urban]Planning Schools Congress was mounted for the first time in Shanghai in2001. A hypothesis worthy of serious study is to see how, why, and the extentto which planning ideas have diffused and been institutionally transplantedaround the globe (De Jong et al., 2003).

Let us briefly examine each of these four roles of city planning theory –explanation, prediction, justification, and normative guidance – one at atime, before moving on to the core of the article concerning the scope of



planning theory, because what city planning theory is used for bears directlyon its scope.

The roles of planning theory

Explanatory uses of city planning theory

Theory explains planning practice by drawing upon empirical studies ofpractice, and teasing out what works and what does not work. The explana-tory aspect of theory, which has become the norm since Bolan’s andForester’s contributions to the same JAPA issue in 1980, can be character-ized as describing and analyzing the activities that planners and planningorganizations conduct in the course of their work (Bolan, 1980; Forester,1980). Bolan and Forester were not the first to pursue this path. Meyersonand Banfield’s assessment of the Chicago Housing Authority was the firstself-conscious planning theory that called itself as such. Altshuler’s critiqueof three planning practice episodes published a decade later is in a similarmode. Both maintain their status as key exemplars of explanatory theory(Altshuler, 1965; Meyerson and Banfield, 1955). Recently, planning theor-ists have begun to measure the effectiveness of planners’ activities, a newpreoccupation of planning theory, which has significant room for scholarlycontributions (Berke and Manta Conroy, 2000; Carmona, 2003; Hoch, 2002;Innes and Booher, 1999; Mathison, 2004; Wong, 2003). Performancemeasurement holds promise for making planning theory more useful topractitioners, as it can help them to assess and justify the value of planning(Brooks, 2002). Performance measures have the added advantage of fittingwell with sustainability and other indicators of local improvement andquality, measures with close ties to the planning profession. As evaluationnot only describes but judges, it requires the application of norms. Thispoints to the importance of normative city planning theory.

Often, what contemporary theory does in its explanatory mode isdescribe and interpret what planners actually do in practice, and whatplanning as a professional activity is. Early contributions in the current flowof this stream were made by Forester (1993), Healey (1993), Hoch (1994),Innes (1995), and their numerous followers. More recently, theorists havebeen assessing the contexts in which planning occurs, especially institutionalones (Gualini, 2004, 2001; Hajer and Wagenaar, 2003; Rydin, 2003; Salet etal., 2003; Vigar et al., 2000).

Thus we can see that the evolution of planning theory over the lastquarter to half century has been decidedly functional. That is, theory hasbeen placed in the service of explaining how planning practice works. AllanJacobs’s Making City Planning Work is a quintessential book in this vein,though it was not written as city planning theory, per se (Jacobs, 1976). Onelimitation to this type of theory is that it does not necessarily provide a



normative guide to planners as to the ethics of what they do, or necessarilyprovide a performative guide as to the efficacy of their actions. In fact, inthis vein, city planning theory serves the opposite function compared to theearly and middle 20th century, at least in the USA. Then its theory indicatedwhat planners should do, today it indicates what they actually do.

A tendency among some city planning theorists working in the explana-tory mode is to extrapolate normative judgments about what constitutesgood planning from their empirical analyses of actual planning processesand institutions. The danger of this move is that there is no indication in thepractices themselves as to their goodness or badness, rightness or wrong-ness. The quality or correctness of practice is left to the individual judgmentof the theorist-interpreter. Today’s theorist-interpreters do not, in general,appeal to ethics or moral philosophy in order to buttress their normativeassertions. The message here is simply that there is no irrefutable logicunderlying the premise of extrapolating normative judgments from empiri-cal analysis of practice.

City planning theorists might be excused in this, as they often havemimicked leading trends in theoretical scholarship of other disciplines, downto the titles of books (Forester, 1989; Wildavsky, 1979). (Planning scholarsare not alone in this.) The disciplines and thinkers mimicked include, forexample, political science, sociology, and geography; Wildavsky, Habermas,Foucault, Bourdieu, and Harvey. The tendency to mine, borrow, interpret,adapt, and occasionally misappropriate selective bits of theoretical conceptsfrom others is standard practice in most if not all intellectual endeavors, andindeed is how knowledge advances. Of course, there are stumbling blocksalong the way, and science is in the business of rewriting itself each day. Yetthere are limits to the extent of borrowing. These limits are worthy ofdiscussion and exploration. Indiscriminate or careless borrowing can narrowhorizons and lead down paths that are not necessarily appropriate for cityplanning (Neuman, 2000). In so doing we expose ourselves to the risk ofsinking in a polyglot theoretical quicksand of our own making.

Another side of this risk refers not to theory, but to planning practice. Itconcerns the practitioners’ custom of borrowing carelessly from othercultures, other countries, other norms in ways that were ill suited to theirunique context and conditions (Peattie, 1987). Anthropologist PaulRabinow, a Foucauldian at the time, offered a telling example of insti-tutional technology maladaptation and misuse in his analysis of the rise ofMoroccan government administration in the 19th century, which includes asignificant analysis of urban planning and development administration(Rabinow, 1989). Inappropriate use of distant planning technologies hashad disastrous results in some cases, and had the unfortunate consequenceof retarding the development of local planning thought and local planninginstitutions (Neuman, 1996; see also De Jong et al., 2003).

For the purposes of this article, let me sketch the trajectory of Habermasas an example that indicates how appropriating his work has guided



planning theorists of a communicative bent (for a defense, see Innes, 2004).Habermas’ output can be roughly organized into three phases: empiricallybased theory, theory-based theorizing, and philosophizing about normativeethics. The first phase was highlighted by his masterful assessment Theoryand Practice (Habermas, 1971/1973), whose fourth edition was published inGerman in 1971, and included a work remarkably similar to the genealogi-cal approach of Foucault, The Structural Transformation of the PublicSphere (Habermas, 1962/1989), first published in German in 1962. The latterbook was finally translated into English in the midst of the initial explosionof new institutionalism, and has much to offer about institutions, civilsociety, and planning. His second period, a foray into human communi-cations and its pathologies, culminated with his two-volume treatise Theoryof Communicative Action (1981/1984, 1984/1987). His latest period is anextended philosophical excursion into communicative ethics. It is as ifHabermas had learned from the essential mistake of his first two periods –especially his second – which was that he imputed normative principlesfrom his studies of historical practices (first phase) and from his studies ofsocial and psychological theories of communications (second phase). Inother words, he inferred normative principles from empirical data (whetherthe sources of those data were actual human activities or the theoreticalconstructs of others). One way to read the communicative ethics turn is asa corrective, which delves into a philosophy of ethics, one distinctly anddistinctively attuned to his prior concerns, distorted communications andtheir effect on the lifeworld.

Planning theorists have sometimes fallen into the same trap as Habermasby also attempting to derive ethical implications from their analyses ofpractice. There is nothing inherently wrong in so doing, as long as it is explic-itly conducted. This means elaborating a rigorous research design a priori,and constructing a philosophical base for empirically informed theoreticalresearch – a base that draws on a philosophy of ethics among other things.Except for a few theorists, some of whom are indicated below, this is notcurrently being done, on the whole.3

What explanatory planning theorists do is reinterpret planning practicethrough a multifaceted prism of borrowed and appropriated concepts, andreflect it back to the practitioners. Practitioners’ reactions have beentwofold, and they should not come as any surprise. One reaction byplanning practitioners to contemporary planning theory has been ‘duh’, theother has been ‘huh?’. They either consider it obvious and therefore not souseful, or too convoluted and arcane in its trappings to be of much use atall. Either way, it begs the question: what is planning theory useful for?4

Predictive uses of city planning theory

An extension to the explanatory approach is to seek ‘predictive theory’. Ifphysics can explain why one celestial (or atomic) body orbits another with



statistical repeatability, then it can devise a predictive theory if and only ifthe actual principle causing the phenomenon is understood. It is not enoughto know what (orbiting at a certain speed and trajectory), a physicist mustknow and be able to explain why. For theory to be valid and valuable, itsprecepts must be applicable and its findings replicable in other settings,whether lab or nature. The problem with predictive theory in a complexinstitutional context that is highly situated in a specific setting is preciselythe limited ability, if not the complete inability, to transfer findings else-where, including the future in the same place. Furthermore, when humanwill and caprice are at play, predictions of stochastic processes engenderprobabilities and statistical treatments that are contingent to context atbest. Complexity and place-time specificity weave their intricate webs oninstitutional and social theories that strive for generality, a topic of con-troversy in the social sciences throughout the 20th century. Let the theorybuyer beware.

To date, even the most sophisticated mathematics cannot render thecomplexity of political decision-making in multiple institutional networksin a predictable manner. It is not that there are too many variables tocontrol for, as the architecture of supercomputers and various new branchesof mathematics are beginning to match the task of complexity. (Althoughplanning and its theory are light years away from considering this type ofcomplexity.) It has more to do with the nature of the social and politicalcomplexity that planners confront, and the limited applicability of causeand effect models to this complexity. Moreover, and more relevant toplanning institutions, there are still other variables, other types of variables,that cannot be controlled for. History shows that in every attempt at total-itarian or other strict forms of societal control, humans invariably devisemeans to evade, counteract, redirect, or otherwise manipulate the controlof others who intend to control them. This is also true at scales smaller thansocieties, such as individual relationships, groups, organizations, and insti-tutions. In these circumstances, perhaps the best that scholars can hope foris an analysis that provides a thick description of practice, which conveysthe multiplicity of ways of thinking about politico-planning decision-making, and portrays general principles that guide and circumscribe action(Allison, 1971; Geertz, 1973; Kingdon, 1995).

These limitations and cautions have not prevented the social, political,economic, and geographic sciences from attempting to erect elaboratetheoretical structures intended to be predictive. The quantification of somebranches of these disciplines has been pursued in legitimate attempts toestablish rigor and respectability. Much research has been conductedwith rigorous designs – hypothesis testing, variables, statistical analysis,mathematical modeling, and findings that are in part predictive (Berke,2003; Kelly-Schwartz et al., 2004). Government agencies and other researchfunding entities reward this approach handsomely.

A scan of the contents of leading academic urban planning journals over



the last 30 years reveals a trend toward more quantitative hypothesis-testing research. So far, most hypothesis-testing research has been appliedto theories in planning, not theories of planning. The authors themselvesmay not arrogate predictive capacity to their findings. They tend to becareful and qualify the context, limitations, and significance of their findings.Nevertheless, accurate and reliable predictive theory in the city planningrealm awaits either change in fundamental human behavior, full automa-tion of the decision-making process, or new mathematics and theories thatcan account for actual human behavior in complex settings.

Justificatory uses of city planning theory

One of the most overlooked and therefore underreported aspects of cityplanning theory is its usefulness as a justification for the professional activityof planning. Why should we plan? Isn’t the market better? This question hasonce again been occupying a prominent place in politics and society aroundthe globe. It is a question as old as politics, perhaps as old as people comingtogether in settlements. What is it about changing historical conditions thatkeeps this question pertinent? Should it not have been resolved by now?There have been many answers to these questions. One facile answer thathas achieved near mantra status recently, partnerships, can in the best ofcircumstances yield satisfactory results. However, partnerships betweenpublic and private (and non-profit) sectors are seen as a panacea. Evokingpartnerships as the answer can elide numerous questions of legitimacy,justice, who wins and who loses, and at what cost. But it is the very existenceof the debate as to why plan, and the very real position this debate has at thetop of political agendas nowadays in a range of localities and nations, thatmakes it so important, and thus signals an absolutely vital role for planningtheory. Urban planning theory can and should explain why we should plan.

The justificatory rationale for planning that theory provides is importantin the classroom, and in the halls of power where planning decisions aremade on the front lines every day. This is especially true in times of reactionagainst government intervention, which typically occur in politically con-servative periods. Students who enter practice must be prepared to justifythe need for planning in the face of alternatives to it in meetings withcitizens and constituents, and real estate developers and other governmentofficials who are not trained in planning, or sensitive to its value, or theimportance of the spatial and equity aspects and consequences of publicpolicy. In this light the reach of planning theory in its justificatory role goesfar beyond the growing body of specialized journals for planning theorists(see also Campbell, 2004a). It is fascinating to see the different approachestaken in this regard. In the UK, for example, the recent debate on the statusand roles of planning fomented by the Royal Town Planning Institute(RTPI), among others, is markedly different in some respects from theposition taken by the APA and its leadership.



In the early 21st century, the RTPI undertook an evaluation of urbanplanning in the UK and its own role in the profession. One outcome was achange from a century-long practice focus on ‘town and country planning’to ‘spatial planning’ (RTPI, 2001, 2003). According to one commentator, itwas ‘the most thoroughgoing review of town planning education, qualifica-tions, and training in the UK for 50 years’ (Batey, 2003: 331). This debatetook place in the aftermath of massive societal changes over the course ofthe 20th century. Accompanying the RTPI’s self-evaluation was a change inits ‘corporate identity’, inscribed in its new logo ‘mediation of space: makingof place’ (Batey, 2003: 332). This logo and the other more substantivechanges it represents are the outcome of several years of critical self-reflection.

In addition to the spatial component of the examination of Britishpractice, there was an ethical one. Robert Upton, Secretary General of theRTPI in the UK and an important player in this discussion that transcendsnational borders, has argued persuasively for ethics as central to planningpractice. In the conclusion to his article ‘Planning Praxis: Ethics,Values, andTheory’ he states, ‘My reflection on planning practice argues that planninghas to be perceived as spatial ethics. That suggests to me that a primaryobject of planning theory should be to develop ethical knowledge-knowinghow to act in relation to spatial issues’ (Upton, 2003: 268). This normativetheme will be taken up below.

In the USA the organized planning profession also undertook a criticalself-reflection around the same time. Its outcome, in contrast, took the formof a marketing campaign instead of embracing a radical departure viaethical or spatial practices. ‘Growing Smart’, a term that has become intel-lectual property, and ‘Making Great Communities Happen’ are two slogansthat grew out of a deliberate and explicit strategy of the executive bodiesof the APA that built on past growth management efforts and their exten-sion into the economic and political spheres of North American society inthe 1990s.

In contrast to these differences, there exist similarities in urban planningin the two nations. The UK and the USA both registered an increase in thenumber of planning courses offered in colleges and universities (Dalton,2001; RTPI, 2003). In addition, students are flocking to urban design andphysical planning courses and studios, and university planning faculties areworking to meet this demand. Urban design, land use, and physical formprovide an essential identity for the city planning profession. These activi-ties are often cited as justifications for planning in practice today, especi-ally in countries where physical planning receded from the fore in the lastgeneration (Madanipour, 2004; Rodwin and Sanyal, 2000). In my view, thecorrelation between the dropping of spatial modifiers such as urban andcity from common usage when referring to ‘planning theory’ and ‘planningpractice’ between the 1970s and 1990s with the relative decline of theprofession and its increasing insecurities then, and the recent resurgence



of the urban design and city planning professions, at least in terms ofnumbers, with the revitalization of spatially based practices are not inci-dental.5

These debates are not limited to the USA and the UK, or even Europe(in the context of the European Union [EU], its new constitution, itsEuropean Spatial Development Perspective, and its Territorial Cohesionstrategies, among others) and the Americas (in the context of the currentUS federal proposal to halve the budget for the Department of Housingand Urban Development, a central agency for city planning). Urbanplanning is justified in a transitional economy such as China, for example,in its ‘quest for globalization’ as an important activity to bring its cities upto date as sites for advanced economic activities, within at least a modicumof sustainability as a framework (Ng, 2004: i). While the China example isnot definitive, or indicative of wider tendencies, the debates on the valueand role of planning, including urban planning, have been prominent inmany transitional economies across the globe in the last decade or two. Thisoccurred regardless of whether those transitions were political, economic,or a combination in nature.

In a single issue of Town Planning Review we find two articles that reflectsea changes in the practice and perception of planning and the planningprofession, and its justifications to society. Tony Sorensen’s (2003) ‘TheNature of Planning: Economy versus Society?’ can be read in part as aradical questioning of the role of planning in society. Is it to serve theeconomy? How does this conception and justification compare to calls forserving the community or public at large, and multiple interests of society,that are common in the most basic of texts (Hall, 1982, just to pick one ofdozens) to the most progressive (Sandercock, 1998a, 1998b, to pick twoothers among dozens)? How do we teach this to our students and to ourconstituents? This question is put in even starker relief when one comparesanother article in the same issue by Alan Evans (2003b) ‘Shouting VeryLoudly: Economics, Planning and Politics’ with Meyerson and Banfield’s(1955) classic and defining book Politics, Planning, and the Public Interest.When the locus of planning changes from serving the public interest toserving private interests, how does this situate the classic planning plea toserve broader interests? (Recognizing that the concept of public interesthas been hotly contested for generations.) How do we justify urbanplanning now? Do we justify it? Of course, planning has always servedprivate interests, especially real estate development interests. This has beendocumented in sources as disparate as a critical Marxian-Foucauldiananalysis of early 20th-century planning in the USA (Boyer, 1983) and acomment by the Socialist mayor of Barcelona Joan Clos, who responded tocriticisms that Barcelona’s latest large-scale urban transformation project,the international exposition Forum Barcelona 2004, was carried out to servespeculative private interests, by asking since when did urban planning notserve real estate interests? And this in a city noted for its public sector led



planning, and the quality of its public spaces and places as a direct result ofurbanismo.

Evans presents an astute closing observation in his article: ‘A lot ofplanning action is like a predictable dance infused by a culture of risk avoid-ance – developers promoting schemes, planners offer second opinions andjudge them on a standard slate of criteria while taking into account publicopinion, and politicians make decisions that are likely to get them re-elected. Not only that, planners want to avoid confrontation, developerswant to get projects through the regulatory hurdles in minimum time, andresidents prefer things as they know them. This represents an edifice riddledwith moral hazard’ (Evans, 2003a: vii). This presents a supreme challengeto educators who seek to present planning theory as a justification forpractice. What type(s) of practice can deal with these issues? Which typesof theories handle these moral conflicts? These types of questions point aresolute finger at the importance of a discussion of the scope of planningtheory, and of its uses.

Understanding city planning and justifying it effectively require thatpractitioners, and academics who train them, consider three separate yetinterrelated elements. First is the evolution of the city as a physical andsocial entity, and as an object for human management. Second is the evolu-tion of the processes and institutions of planning, which take us far beyondthe field of city planning. Cities have been planned and built by a wide rangeof actors, not least engineers, politicians, capitalists, architects, developers,lawyers, craftspeople, and workers. Planners must take into considerationall these actors, their points of view, and their justifications for what theydo. This requires us as planning academics to take a broad view of theprofession and those who influence it, if we are to have any chance atproviding planners, and their constituents, with a robust justificatory arsenalto draw from. Fortunately much of the explanatory theory referred to abovedoes deal with expanding the range of stakeholders in planning, andstudying processes in which these stakeholders engage. Third is theplanning profession itself, which has arisen over the last century along acircuitous route. Planners are diverse like their constituencies, come frommany different backgrounds, are driven by many different motivations, andsee the profession in widely differing ways. To provide a theory, not unitaryto be sure, that is able to justify what we do, to us planners in all ourdiversity, and to our broader clientele in all their diversities, is essential toprovide a harmonious rhythm to the cacophony that stems from ourdiversity.

Among today’s justifications for planning to the broader public is theneed to better our living environments through practices of sustainableurban design and urban development. Debates surrounding these facets ofour profession all have placed city planning in the limelight. Other justifi-cations come from the governance arena. Planners are adept at coordinat-ing and managing complex multidisciplinary processes. This is a skill that



can pass inadvertently in the public consciousness, yet has been rewardedin higher levels of administration, where planners increasingly occupyleadership posts. This is true whether planners are university presidents,college deans, city managers, mayors, members of legislatures and Congress,corporate presidents and board members, and so on. Within the corridorsof power the skills of planners are justified. While much planning theory inthe last decade or two has focused on explaining governance, better justifi-cation would enhance the stature of city planning theory and practice, in myestimation.

Normative uses of city planning theory

Shifting to the next role for theory, several theorists are reinstating norma-tive principles, notably Stan Stein and Tom Harper, Heather Campbell,Leonie Sandercock, and John Friedmann. Their work and the work of othertheorists concerned about normative issues capture the spirit of LuigiMazza’s call to recognize planning as a craft, specifically as a moral craft(Mazza, 1990). Of course, there are planning theorists who dealt withnormative principles long before Mazza’s article. Indeed, it can be argued,justifiably, that any theory has an underlying normative basis, whether thatbasis is explicit or not. This is especially true of professions, which all aremoral crafts, with ethical considerations going as far back as the Hippocraticoath. One planning theorist has stated that ‘planning is fundamentallyabout ethical judgment . . . made through just institutions’ (Campbell, 2003:286).

John Friedmann engages the normative in planning, in part, by payingattention to the public or common good, and bridges both urban theory andplanning theory in doing so (Friedmann, 1979, 2002). Leonie Sandercockdoes this by highlighting the multicultural character of 21st-century metrop-olises, what planning has done to fracture these large cities and make themunjust, and offers hope as to what planning can do to amend this problem(Sandercock, 1998b; see also Graham and Marvin, 2001). HeatherCampbell is establishing a link between the contemporary concerns ofplanning theory in its communicative mode on the one hand and contem-porary ethical theory on the other (Campbell and Marshall, 1999). Mostrecently, she has sought to provide a ‘reconceptualisation of justice forplanning that endeavours to link abstract principles to context-sensitivejudgement of particular cases’ (Campbell, 2004b: 2). Thacher offers aninductive method to clarify ethical dilemmas in ambiguous circumstancesusing case studies (Thacher, 2004). Stan Stein and Tom Harper have longwritten about philosophical matters in planning, recently turning theiranalysis to ethical theory (Stein and Harper, 2003). The work of thesescholars and others addresses the fourth function of theory – normativeguidance. As this direction of planning theory is quite young, there is notyet a firm direction in the confluence of the two vast fields of ethics and


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planning. Accordingly, the theorists cited in this paragraph range widelyacross this subject. This is to be expected, as normative principles do nottake the form of a golden rule or a categorical imperative. For instance,some normative theorizing within city planning suffers from unitary orpluralist conceptions of the good, or sometimes confuses the two, and thusis limited. It is not one size fits all in a world in which we recognize thesituated nature of ethics, relational to time and place. A universalist ethics,it appears, has not found a place in normative planning theory.6

Normative elements of planning theory are not new, of course. Howe andKauffman examined the ethics of North American planning professionalsin practice (Howe and Kauffman, 1979). Howe has followed this line ofthinking, inserting values into theoretical debates (Howe, 1990, 1994).Hendler has explored the professional ethics of planners as well, focusingon Canadian practitioners (Hendler, 1990, 1991). Wachs edited a far-rangingvolume that was among the first to establish ethics as a primary concern(Wachs, 1985). Beatley took the route of applying ethics to fields of planningaction, such as growth management and land use (Beatley, 1984, 1991, 1994).

While this brief does not do justice to the normative efforts of theoristspast and present, or to the other three uses of theory – explanation, predic-tion, and justification – it does help to understand the contours of theirterrains in assessing my own comments on the scope of planning theory,especially regarding the integration of normative principles into it,presented in the next section. Integration is an important intellectual pathto pursue, as I believe that using ‘stand alone’ ethics to frame or undergirdplanning theory is insufficient.

The scope of urban planning theory

Let us examine the scope of urban planning theory by asking howplanning’s contribution to urban development can be explained. In orderto address the scope of planning theory, a valid starting point or initialbenchmark that we will add to is Kevin Lynch’s tripartite organization oftheories for planning. Lynch named one of them ‘functional theory’, howthe city actually works. Functional theory is descriptive, and to the extentthat it can be validated and verified across contexts, it may be predictive. Tofit inside the framework of the four-part scope of urban planning theory Ipresent below (under the heading ‘Normative uses of city planning theory’),I rename it functional urban theory, as it concerns city structure andfunction. Another type of theory that Lynch termed ‘planning theory’ refersto how planning practice works. It is also descriptive, with similar caveatsfor its predictive abilities. I rename this functional urban planning theory.It encompasses most of what is loosely called ‘planning theory’ today.Lynch’s final category was ‘normative theory’, which he applied to the cityand its form, and hence the title of the book in which this classification



appeared, A Theory of Good City Form (Lynch, 1981). I rename this norma-tive urban theory. Lynch conjectured correctly that for city planners to dogood and to do well, they needed a normative guide as to what a good cityis, if planners are to improve cities.

Missing from Lynch’s grouping is a fourth category that I name norma-tive city planning theory, discussed briefly in the prior section. Our conjec-ture is that for city planners to do good and to do well in the course of theirpractice, they need a normative guide as to what good practice is. This four-part categorization of the scope of urban planning theory that replacesLynch’s three-part grouping distinguishes normative theory from functionaltheory and planning theory from urban theory. Yet it does so only pro-visionally, in this first word in the new debate. In the end, a comprehensivecity planning theory should synthesize these four pieces.

Normative city planning theory is the branch that holds much promise.It is useful for practitioners as a guide to good practice. It is not sufficientto be able to describe practice, which explanatory theory does well.Explanatory theory, especially when operating in its critical mode, maypoint out pitfalls in practice. Yet it does not necessarily point out whatethical practice is according to extant social, legal, or other norms. Criticaltheory’s normative benchmarks were often extracted from the text of othercritical theorists. Likewise, explanatory theory that measures performancecan also indicate how effective practice is, and what to do to enhance itseffectiveness. Yet it says nothing about whether the aim was good or bad.It typically accepts the aims as given, and as valued through a democraticprocess of selection. (There is a growing movement of community-basedindicators, which are grassroots in their source and democratic in theirnature [International Council on Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI),2000; Sustainable Seattle, 2005].) Are we to laud a practice for being effec-tive because it responds to popular local interests, even if it perpetratesexclusion, segregation, and other inequities, as single-use zoning does? Tohelp us decide these types of questions, we need normative planning theory.

Planning theorists, in this case, are obliged to find and create a set ofmoral norms that is specific to city and regional planning, with its spatialand territorial dimensions included, that can guide the development ofnormative planning theory. Over the last several decades, thinkers from awide array of disciplines and backgrounds have been working on an over-arching framework that may contain the seed, if not a developed corpus, ofa coherent set of moral norms. This framework has been called sustainabil-ity. Sustainability is not without conflict, however. There are numerous defi-nitions, it is difficult to operationalize, and requires massive changes in dailylife if it is to be enacted. In other words, it is a subject of controversy.Sustainability is part of a new and broad discourse that is providing anormative framework for a variety of disciplines and organizations, includ-ing urban planning and related disciplines and activities. The purpose hereis not to enter into the sustainability debate, nor to endorse it, other than



to indicate that it is one potential source for an integrative debate on cityplanning theory that incorporates both justificatory and normative argu-ments. It has been serving as such an animating source for practice for goingon two decades now.

Sustainability, when one considers the word’s grammatical form as anoun, refers to the degree to which an entity has an inherent quality(essence, state, or character) which enables it to continue evolving anddeveloping without jeopardizing its own life and livelihood, or the lives andlivelihoods of those it affects, including the larger systems and networks inwhich the entity finds itself situated, now and in the foreseeable future. Anentity may be an object (building), place (community), organization, orother living or territorial system. Sustainability thus refers to the ecology ofhuman presence in place from a normative perspective – can humansinhabit a city, region, ecosystem, etc. sustainably, without damage and illeffects to others? For reviews of the intellectual roots of sustainability andsome of its theoretical consequences in planning practice, see Neuman(2005) and Owens and Cowell (2002).

Sustainability seeks to redress imbalances and negative consequences ofexisting patterns of living and urban development. It considers the longview (intergenerational), is comprehensive (equity, economy, environment),considers trade-offs among competing interests, and considers the impactsof activities. It is far from a perfect framework, and is encountering diffi-culties as practitioners try to operationalize the concept. Yet it provides aplausible framework for normative and justificatory theorizing aboutspatial planning, and has provided a framework for practice, especiallyoutside the USA.

This debate is far from exclusive to the academic realm. Its populariza-tion, and therefore in part its impetus for such extensive and widespreadscholarly treatment of the subject, was prompted largely by the famousUnited Nations (UN) Brundtland report on environment and development(UN, 1987). Upton, the RTPI Secretary General, claimed that ‘sustainabledevelopment’ is ‘perhaps the ultimate deontological framework inplanning’ (Upton, 2003: 260). He went further by stating that ‘planning inmy view has no choice about whether to engage with the normative claimsof sustainable development’ (Upton, 2003: 261). It is clear that the norma-tive aspects of sustainability merit, and have received, extensive treatmentin urban planning practice, and merit the same from urban planning theor-ists.

However, theory that only develops normative principles that can guidegood practice is not sufficient. In addition, theorists might revisit thequestion ‘Is Planning Theory Urban?’. This question asks if the currenttrend of planning theory that analyzes practice has become devoid of urbantheory.7 Note that we as theorists tend not to insert a spatial modifier suchas city, urban, regional, community, or environmental when we refer to ourtheorizing. We tend to use the term planning theory and leave it at that. As



we revisit the question of the place of the city in planning theory, we willfind that we need to invent a new city planning theory, one more compre-hensive in scope, addressing the concerns of this article, and concerns to beadded by others. This new city planning theory integrates our object, urbanplaces, with planning theory, and serves functional and normative roles.

In so doing, we may find that we will return to our roots for inspiration,at least in part, to the seminal ideas of our founders, practitioner-theoristssuch as Frederick Law Olmsted Senior and Junior, John Nolen, DanielBurnham, Patrick Geddes, Ebenezer Howard, and Raymond Unwin; tomention only the English-speaking ones. They conceived of urban spaceand how to intervene in it as a piece. These pioneers were so good in plansand words that they established a profession nearly from scratch and insti-tutionalized it in plans, conferences, planning commissions, laws, regula-tions, professional associations, university curricula, etc. in a mere decadeor two on two continents. This was not incidentally owing to their abilitiesto justify planning, which they were particularly conscious of, since it was anew profession they sought to establish. When one reads their plans, andtheir public speeches, one is struck by the eloquence and simplicity of theirlanguage on one hand, and the depth and conviction of the message on theother. I am not surprised at their achievements in connecting with theiraudiences and clients. They really knew how to sell planning in a deep senseand to justify its value to the purchaser. They not only told the planningstory, they wrote the script, at least for back then.

Today, with the exception of the new urbanists, planners, at least in theUSA, have abdicated many functions that were formerly the profession’sbread and butter: infrastructure, transportation, and public works (to civil,transportation, and environmental engineers); housing (to developers); andurban design/physical form (to architects and landscape architects). Theseare specific, tangible, and identifiable contributions that address many of theconcerns of sustainable development, and which justifiably could once againbe centerpieces of practice, and consequently, theory. It must be highlightedthat in continental Europe, and increasingly in the UK, the spatialcomponent of planning is taken for granted; a condition largely absent fromplanning in the USA between about 1960 and 2000, with the exception ofsite plan review (government agency staff reviews which react to real estatedevelopers’ proposals), and again, new urbanism. Notably, this abdicationhas left planners to be process mavens, so perhaps we cannot fault theoristsfor truncating their objects of study, as process design and management islargely what occupies planners’ time, again, in the USA and wherever theinfluence of American planning practice and theory is felt.

If we are to answer affirmatively the question of enlarging the scope ofcity planning theory, and if theory is to be a powerful device that can explainand justify planning’s contribution to urban development, then the scopeand purposes of city planning theory need to expand accordingly. If we areto answer ‘yes’ to the question ‘Is Planning Theory Urban?’, then the scope



of planning theory ought to expand as well. A theory that incorporatessustainability in its widest reading, including equity and inclusive demo-cratic participation, as normative precepts, and that incorporates the spatialfacet of practice, would yield a revitalized theory that we can legitimatelycall good urban planning theory. Only then will it be rich and useful to prac-titioners. After all, isn’t making good, or at least better, places the reasonwhy most planners got into the planning profession in the first place? Andisn’t making good practitioners in the classroom, and understanding howplanning practice really works, why theorists got into the academy and intotheorizing in their first place?

Notes

1. I use city and urban interchangeably, while recognizing that there aredistinctions among them. For the purposes herein, outlining the uses and scopeof city planning theory, this precision or distinction is not relevant.

2. Beth Moore Milroy provided these formulations of the questions in a session atthe AESOP 2004 conference.

3. All planning practitioners are ‘practical ethicists’, as John Forester has pointedout (Forester, 1999: 31). Planning theorists soon struggle with broaderintellectual horizons as they tackle their work. One reviewer of this manuscriptpointed out that ‘you can’t get very far [in planning theory] without comingupon Aristotle (Flyvbjerg), or Kant or Dewey and their contemporaryexponents, such as Rorty in Dewey’s case’.

4. This statement is based on my own lengthy conversations with hundreds ofprofessional practitioners in the USA and Spain about this specific question.Moreover, whenever I asked appointed planning commissioners or real estatedevelopers about this, most never heard of planning theory or theorists,although they operate with their own usable theories, cobbled from disparatesources over time, even if implicitly. An interesting survey of academic theorycourse syllabi and of practicing planners would query what students andpractitioners read, and more specifically, what are their sources of knowledgeand guidance for the conduct of professional practice. To what extent do theyread planning theorists? In the USA, to what extent do they read, and moreimportantly use in practice, Land Use Planning by Chapin and Kaiser (a newedition coming out in 2005 by Berke, Godschalk and Kaiser) or the ICMA(International City Management Association) The Practice of LocalGovernment Planning (Hoch et al., 2000)?

5. It is revealing to look at the business card advertisements in the back ofPlanning magazine (US) and see how many of the firms advertise urban designand new urbanism services today, and how few did as recently as 1995.

6. A valuable exercise would be for a historian or theorist of urban planning toconduct a genealogy of how and why the normative was eased out of planningtheory in the first place.

7. See Susan Fainstein (forthcoming). Patsy Healey, Andreas Faludi, LouisAlbrechts, and their colleagues have steadily addressed the spatial in the



context of planning theory and practice for close to two decades. See alsoHarris and Hooper (2004).

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Michael Neuman is Associate Professor and Founder and Chair of theSustainable Urbanism Program at Texas A&M University. He consults andhas practiced widely throughout the USA and Europe. His current researchis on institutions of metropolitan governance and sustainable infrastructure.His interdisciplinary studios in sustainable urban design have won nationalawards and he established the interdisciplinary Barcelona Program at TexasA&M.

Address: Department of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning,Texas A&M University, MS 3137, College Station, TX 77843–3137, USA.[email: [email protected]]


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