The notion that there is some crisis of public sector planning is common, and a
literature review reveals this concern extends across the social sciences, and even to
the conception and working of the modern welfare state. The dissertation links
political science and philosophy with organisation theory to explain the parameters
and tensions governing planning by the state, and proposes an agenda for liberal
democratic planning theory for the 1990s. It is argued that these notions of crisis
have a common basis in endemic tensions in the modern state which define the
planning context. The instability of this context is heightened by increased
turbulence in organizational relations at all levels and in the world economic system,
and by readjustments in political values reflected in the election of conservative
governments in many countries.
The idea of crisis provides a useful beginning for analysing the problem of planning,
an understanding of which requires a broad view of the socio-political and
epistemoiogical context in which planners operate. The concept of planning crisis is
broken down into constituent parts from which, it is argued, a more profound view of
the context of planning is rebuilt, and from which more appropriate responses to
societal problems are likely to arise. By devising a formulation that generalizes
expectable constraints across various planning situations, an original contribution is
made towards a partial theory of the institutional and professional contexts of
planning action.
First, planning is defined as an instrumental expression of the role of the state in
society which attempts to assert the preeminence of the future in the present, in
terms of control over scarce resources and private property for some greater good fostered by the state. Then the historical and philosophical basis for the role of the
state is discussed in terms of factors which both underlie, and undermine, planning
action: state power and individual freedom, social control for state stability, and the
role of markets in terms of broader social objectives. The problem of planning is
examined in terms of tensions between centre and periphery, economic objectives and
political aspirations, opposing and confused trends to centralization and
decentralization, and inter-organizational conflict and re-adjustment which seems an
inevitable consequence of state intervention in society.
In organisation theory, planning is seen as an attempt to manage change in turbulent
environments characterised by uncertainty, inconsistent and ill-defined values, and an
inability to predict the cumulative consequences of action. Analytic tools for
understanding the planning dilemma are discussed, particularly conceptions of
organizational learning, resources, networks, and capacity to innovate. The
usefulness of static models for understanding dynamic planning situations is
questioned.
The discussion of the crisis of planning is concluded by turning to its epistemoiogical
dimension, termed a crisis of rationality. This refers to the inability of social
scientists to model complex social systems, and their seeming failure to devise theory
useful to social action. The legacy of positivism and the concept of rationality in
planning thought are examined. Three influential planning theories are analysed in
terms of their contribution to an understanding of the crisis of planning and extent to
which they can offer practical guidance.
The conclusion relates the main themes to the current theoretical task, which is to
build up a series of useful, partial, conceptions of the possibility for planning action from a realistic understanding of its socio-political context. It is argued that the
crisis of planning is rooted in the inevitable lack of consensus about the state's role,
and the efficacy of intervention in the workings of the market in terms of human
benefit and social justice. This lack of consensus is also set in a fundamental
relationship to the crisis of rationality.
First, it is argued that planning theorists have a responsibility to explore the
practical implications of organizational options at the state-market conjuncture.
Further, as any conception of the future is an interactive fusion of fact and value,
theorists have a responsibility to develop ethical frameworks and principles, which
may help combine the practical benefits of market mechanisms in terms of feedback
with a conception of the transcending social responsibility of the state and the need
to 'embed' ethical principles in political culture. Second, appropriate organizational
responses to uncertainty are proposed, in particular action learning, inter-agency
ventures, negotiation, cooperation, and risk taking.
Third, the implications for planning theory of the boundaries of social scientific
inquiry are examined, in light of endemic uncertainty, the drive to unified social
theory which distances theoretical abstractions from reality, and the lure of
academic structures and rewards which inhibit the required holistic and
interdisciplinary approach. A policy model is proposed which reflects the centrality
of values in the planning context, the non-revolutionary nature of planning action,
and the position of planning knowledge as a lever on the distribution of societal
power, requiring ethical norms.
In an appendix, analytic elements derived from the work are used in a case study of
urban decline and planning response in the UK. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UBC/oai:circle.library.ubc.ca:2429/41443 |
| Date | January 1989 |
| Creators | Carley, Michael |
| Publisher | University of British Columbia |
| Source Sets | University of British Columbia |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis/Dissertation |
| Rights | For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use. |
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