IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/envirc/v33y2015i2p428-444.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Formal Institutional Change and Informal Institutional Persistence: The Case of Dutch Provinces Implementing the Spatial Planning Act

Author

Listed:
  • David Evers

    (PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, PO Box 30314, 2500 GH The Hague, The Netherlands)

Abstract

Conscious attempts to affect planning practice by reforming the statutory planning system are a common form of institutional design. Despite this, the effectiveness of institutional design as a strategy has not been sufficiently addressed in the planning literature. The Dutch case has been monitored thoroughly and provides a good opportunity to assess the extent to which the instruments introduced under the new legislation were used according to the stated intent of lawmakers. As the national level has largely devolved responsibility to provinces, these comprised the objects of study. The empirical evidence covering the 2008–11 period reveals remarkable variation between provinces in applying the law, including applications that run directly counter to the law's objectives. These findings point to the difficulty of institutional design in planning practice, and suggest that lawmakers should rethink their approach to influencing behaviour of planning agents.

Suggested Citation

  • David Evers, 2015. "Formal Institutional Change and Informal Institutional Persistence: The Case of Dutch Provinces Implementing the Spatial Planning Act," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 33(2), pages 428-444, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envirc:v:33:y:2015:i:2:p:428-444
    DOI: 10.1068/c1391
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1068/c1391
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1068/c1391?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Brenner, Neil, 2004. "New State Spaces: Urban Governance and the Rescaling of Statehood," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199270064.
    2. Martin Jones, 2001. "The Rise of the Regional State in Economic Governance: ‘Partnerships for Prosperity’ Or New Scales of State Power?," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 33(7), pages 1185-1211, July.
    3. Maarten Hajer & Wil Zonneveld, 2000. "Spatial Planning in the Network Society-Rethinking the Principles of Planning in the Netherlands," European Planning Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(3), pages 337-355, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Federico Savini, 2013. "The Governability of National Spatial Planning: Light Instruments and Logics of Governmental Action in Strategic Urban Development," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 50(8), pages 1592-1607, June.
    2. Andrew Beer & Terry Clower, 2009. "Specialisation and Growth: Evidence from Australia's Regional Cities," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 46(2), pages 369-389, February.
    3. Anouk Patel-Campillo, 2011. "Forging the Neoliberal Competitiveness Agenda: Planning Policy and Practice in the Dutch and Colombian Cut-Flower Commodity Chains," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 43(11), pages 2516-2532, November.
    4. Krisztina Varró, 2012. "Reconsidering the English Question as a Matter of Democratic Politics and Spatial Justice," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 30(1), pages 29-45, February.
    5. Geneviève Zembri-Mary & Virginie Engrand-Linder, 2023. "Urban planning law in the face of the Olympic challenge: Between innovation and criticism of exceptional urban regeneration," Local Economy, London South Bank University, vol. 38(4), pages 369-388, June.
    6. Steven Tufts, 2007. "Emerging Labour Strategies in Toronto's Hotel Sector: Toward a Spatial Circuit of Union Renewal," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 39(10), pages 2383-2404, October.
    7. Navé Wald & Douglas P. Hill, 2016. "‘Rescaling’ alternative food systems: from food security to food sovereignty," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 33(1), pages 203-213, March.
    8. Kevin Fox Gotham, 2014. "Racialization and Rescaling: Post-Katrina Rebuilding and the Louisiana Road Home Program," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(3), pages 773-790, May.
    9. Simin Yan & Anna Growe, 2022. "Regional Planning, Land-Use Management, and Governance in German Metropolitan Regions—The Case of Rhine–Neckar Metropolitan Region," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-24, November.
    10. Andrew Clarke & Lynda Cheshire, 2018. "The post-political state? The role of administrative reform in managing tensions between urban growth and liveability in Brisbane, Australia," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 55(16), pages 3545-3562, December.
    11. Juliana Hurtado Rassi, 2020. "Gestión conjunta de ecosistemas transfronterizos: la importancia del trabajo articulado entre los Estados para la conservación de los recursos naturales. Análisis del caso particular de la “Reserva de," Books, Universidad Externado de Colombia, Facultad de Derecho, number 1241, htpr_v3_i.
    12. Xiaobo Su, 2013. "From Frontier to Bridgehead: Cross-border Regions and the Experience of Yunnan, China," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(4), pages 1213-1232, July.
    13. Tsu Lung Chou & Yu Chun Lin, 2007. "Industrial Park Development across the Taiwan Strait," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 44(8), pages 1405-1425, July.
    14. Bernard Jouve, 2007. "Urban Societies and Dominant Political Coalitions in the Internationalization of Cities," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 25(3), pages 374-390, June.
    15. Natalie Papanastasiou, 2017. "The practice of scalecraft: Scale, policy and the politics of the market in England’s academy schools," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 49(5), pages 1060-1079, May.
    16. Fricke, Carola, 2014. "Grenzüberschreitende Governance in der Raumplanung: Organisations- und Kooperationsformen in Basel und Lille," Arbeitsberichte der ARL: Aufsätze, in: Grotheer, Swantje & Schwöbel, Arne & Stepper, Martina (ed.), Nimm's sportlich - Planung als Hindernislauf, volume 10, pages 62-78, ARL – Akademie für Raumentwicklung in der Leibniz-Gemeinschaft.
    17. Naomi Prachi Hazarika, 2020. "Spaces of Intermediation and Political Participation: a Study of KuSumpur pahadI redevelopment project," CSH-IFP Working Papers 0016, Centre de Sciences Humaines, New Delhi, revised Jul 2020.
    18. Cavicchia, Rebecca, 2023. "Housing accessibility in densifying cities: Entangled housing and land use policy limitations and insights from Oslo," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    19. Jacob Salder, 2020. "Spaces of regional governance: A periodisation approach," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 38(6), pages 1036-1054, September.
    20. Liu, Yansui & Zhou, Yang, 2021. "Territory spatial planning and national governance system in China," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:envirc:v:33:y:2015:i:2:p:428-444. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.