Proactively Effecting Community Engagement in PPP Projects: Lessons from the Tama Plaza Redevelopment Project, Yokohama

Shrinking revenues and increasing costs of delivery for health and welfare services prompted the City of Yokohama to undertake redevelopment of Tama Plaza as a model public–private partnership (PPP) for next-generation suburban redevelopment, aligned with relevant Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). Although the implementation of PPP projects is shaped by locally prevalent socio-political factors and the cultural context, a dearth of case studies describing PPP governance processes from a cultural perspective impede the development of relevant governance theories and praxis. It is contended that contextual factors could be capitalized upon to develop effective project governance mechanisms that ensure community engagement and promote sustainable lifestyles. However, as PPP redevelopment projects are a product of neoliberalization that is manifested differently from place to place due to locally prevalent socio-political contextual factors, theories about good governance of PPP projects remain rudimentary. The Tama Plaza case study thus provides empirical evidence of how the local contextual reality can shape PPP projects. Qualitative analysis of semi-structured interviews with project staff revealed some standout governance mechanisms and community-building initiatives, such as the autonomous, jointly resourced ‘core team’ tasked with managing community engagement, and the jumin sohatsu project comprising numerous small community-building project grants. The paper describes how these successes benefited from contextual and cultural factors. Lessons drawn from the Japanese case study could have validity in countries in the Global South that share some of the major factors constituting their contextual reality.