On Spatial Planning and Marxism: Looking Back,Going Forward

The renewed interest in Marxism that occurred in social sciences and humanities after the 2008 economic crisis has not yet found its counterpart in spatial planning. This paper examines what Marxist planning theory and practices could mean in the current conjuncture. It does so through scrutinising (1) the vibrant Marxist discourse in planning that existed in the late 1970s and early 1980s, (2) the recent history (since the 1980s) of planning theory and its relation to the political economy, and (3) the current political economic context (not least defined by the diabolic crisis). Where previous Marxist approaches to planning were very strong on analysing the political economy, I argue there is currently a need—with old hegemonies losing ground, communicative approaches losing support, and neoliberalism in the political economy losing legitimacy—to also discuss establishing alternatives.     

Looking Forward by Looking Back: May Day Protests in London and the Strategic Significance of the Urban

This paper deals with the question of how oppositional movements can adapt their protest strategies to meet recent socio-spatial transformations. The work of Lefebvre provides several clues as to how an alternative discourse and appropriation of space could be incorporated in such protest strategies. One of the central themes in Lefebvre's work is that the appearances, forms and functions of urban space are constitutive elements of contemporary capitalism and thus that an alternative narrative of urban space can challenge or undermine dominant modes of thinking. What exactly constitutes the "right" kind of alternative discourse or narrative is a matter of both theoretical and practical consideration. The paper analyses one case: the May Day protests in London in 2001, in which a protest group, the Wombles, managed to integrate theoretical insights into their discourse and practice in a highly innovative manner. Since cities, and global cities in particular, play an ever more important role in maintaining the consumption as well as production practices of global capitalism; they potentially constitute local sites where global processes can be identified and criticised. It is shown that the Wombles effectively made use of these possibilities and appropriated the symbolic resources concentrated in London to exercise a "lived critique" of global capitalism. Since the Wombles capitalised on trends that have not yet ended, their strategies show a way forward for future anti-capitalist protests.     

An Anatomy of Spatial Planning: Coming to Terms with the Spatial Element in UK Planning

“Spatial planning” is a phrase that now resonates throughout many planning systems across the globe. It is being used as a label to describe pan-national, regional, strategic and even aspects of local planning processes. Within the UK, spatial planning is being utilized alongside, or even in place of, more traditional phraseology associated with planning, such as “town and country planning”. It is being used by a range of institutions of the State, professional groups and academic commentators to describe the processes of planning reform, modernization, policy integration, and strategic governance that politically are now required to make planning fit for purpose in the 21st century. The precise meaning and definition of spatial planning remains difficult to pin down, as does its origins within the UK. This paper attempts to dissect the various components of the spatial planning phrase and set out the meaning and origins of the term in the UK context. It covers re-territorialization, Europeanization and integration origins of spatial planning thinking and provides a conceptual, rather than practical, debate on the anatomy of spatial planning, situated within ongoing processes of institutional transformation, through the lens of governance and distinctiveness in state policy development.