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Collaborative Decision-Making Processes in Planning: Opportunities and Challenges in the City of Rafaela, Argentina

There is a large body of literature in the planning field on the topic of collaborative processes of decision-making, particularly in the United States and Europe. However, there appears to be less debate on the subject of complementing these ideas with contributions from urban governance. This research aims to contribute to that complementary work. In order to accomplish that, this thesis presents first a theoretical analysis of collaborative rationality and urban governance contributions. This analysis focuses on the articulation of those aspects that can offer a more holistic framework for addressing urban issues in a more inclusive way. Second, it provides a case study that takes place in the City of Rafaela, Argentina. The case study consists of an assessment of the regulatory and institutional framework that affects planning and the exploration of two contentious recent processes. One of them is the ‘Downtown Revitalization’ project and the second one is the ‘Future use of the Old Bus Terminal’. Several interviews with key actors were conducted in order to gather the information, which was combined with public and media documentation available. These two processes help to understand how significant decisions regarding uses and renovation of urban space are made and the opportunities to implement more collaborative processes in planning. The results show that the combination of the aspects highlighted by both bodies of theory can help to better address conflicts that arise regarding urban space, while increasing citizen participation and addressing issues of inequality in the process of decision-making.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:UMASS/oai:scholarworks.umass.edu:theses-2248
Date01 January 2013
CreatorsAlfaro, Maria Belen
PublisherScholarWorks@UMass Amherst
Source SetsUniversity of Massachusetts, Amherst
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
SourceMasters Theses 1911 - February 2014

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