IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/eurpls/v14y2004i2p239-252.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Towards justice in planning: A reappraisal

Author

Listed:
  • Heather Campbell
  • Robert Marshall

Abstract

The concept of justice is central to a political activity such as planning. This is reflected in the initial influence of consequentialism, particularly utilitarian conceptualizations, in planning thought and more recently in the application of Rawls' notion of “justice as fairness” and Habermas' “discourse ethics”. However, contemporary normative planning theory has been vigorously criticized by studies which take as their starting point the material realities of planning practices. In this paper it is argued that notwithstanding the crucial contributions of Habermas and Rawls to political philosophy their constitutional level conceptualizations were never intended to be applied to the task of situated judgement associated with the highly contested decisions at the heart of the planning activity. Consequently, the issue for the planning community is not so much can the concepts of justice embodied in Rawls' “justice as fairness” or Habermas' “discourse ethics” be found in practice but could they ever. More generally it has been argued that the inevitable abstraction in liberal theories of justice comes so close to idealization that their ability to help individuals and societies to address the question of “what is to be done?” is seriously called in to doubt. This in turn has led to concern that an adequate account of justice should be able to link abstract principles to context sensitive judgement of particular cases. The paper explores some implications of these debates for the future development of theory and practice in planning.

Suggested Citation

  • Heather Campbell & Robert Marshall, 2004. "Towards justice in planning: A reappraisal," European Planning Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 14(2), pages 239-252, October.
  • Handle: RePEc:taf:eurpls:v:14:y:2004:i:2:p:239-252
    DOI: 10.1080/09654310500418192
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09654310500418192
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/09654310500418192?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. John F. Forester, 1999. "The Deliberative Practitioner: Encouraging Participatory Planning Processes," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262561220, April.
    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. E. Melanie DuPuis & Brian J. Gareau, 2008. "Neoliberal Knowledge: The Decline of Technocracy and the Weakening of the Montreal Protocol," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 89(5), pages 1212-1229, December.
    2. Makena Coffman & Karen Umemoto, 2010. "The triple-bottom-line: framing of trade-offs in sustainability planning practice," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 12(5), pages 597-610, October.
    3. te Brömmelstroet, Marco, 2017. "Towards a pragmatic research agenda for the PSS domain," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 77-83.
    4. Primmer, Eeva & Kyllonen, Simo, 2006. "Goals for public participation implied by sustainable development, and the preparatory process of the Finnish National Forest Programme," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(8), pages 838-853, November.
    5. Liz Barry, 2022. "Community science and the design of climate governance," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 171(3), pages 1-17, April.
    6. Crystal Legacy & Ryan van den Nouwelant, 2015. "Negotiating Strategic Planning's Transitional Spaces: The Case of ‘Guerrilla Governance’ in Infrastructure Planning," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 47(1), pages 209-226, January.
    7. Peter Dithan Ntale & Jude Ssempebwa & Badiru Musisi & Genza Gyaviira Musoke & Kimoga Joseph & C. B. Mugimu & Ngoma Muhammed & Joseph Ntayi, 2020. "Gaps in the structuring of organizations in the graduate employment context in Uganda," Journal of Organization Design, Springer;Organizational Design Community, vol. 9(1), pages 1-10, December.
    8. Czarnecki, Adam & Nowak, Maciej J., 2024. "Spatial conflicts. Between the geographical-economic and legal dimensions," International Journal of Agricultural Sciences and Technology (IJAGST), SvedbergOpen, vol. 203(2), July.
    9. Patricia Molina Costa, 2014. "From plan to reality: Implementing a community vision in Jackson Square, Boston," Planning Theory & Practice, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(3), pages 293-310, September.
    10. Ratka ÄŒolić & Ä orÄ‘e Milić & Jasna Petrić & NataÅ¡a ÄŒolić, 2022. "Institutional capacity development within the national urban policy formation process – Participants’ views," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 40(1), pages 69-89, February.
    11. Jongwng Ju & Jaecheol Kim, 2023. "Applying the Delphi Approach to Incorporate Voiceless Stakeholders in Community Planning," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(10), pages 1-23, October.
    12. repec:lib:000cis:v:5:y:2017:i:1:p:26-34 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Richard Apatewen Azerigyik & Michael Poku-Boansi & Justice Kuffour Owusu-Ansah, 2024. "Herders’ Haven or Farmers’ Foe? Exploring Multi-Stakeholder Perspectives on Grazing Reserves and Transhumance Corridors," World, MDPI, vol. 5(3), pages 1-24, July.
    14. Peter Wilshusen, 2009. "Social process as everyday practice: the micro politics of community-based conservation and development in southeastern Mexico," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 42(2), pages 137-162, May.
    15. David Brain, 2005. "From Good Neighborhoods to Sustainable Cities: Social Science and the Social Agenda of the New Urbanism," International Regional Science Review, , vol. 28(2), pages 217-238, April.
    16. Mickey Lauria & Mellone Long, 2017. "Planning Experience and Planners’ Ethics," Journal of the American Planning Association, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 83(2), pages 202-220, April.
    17. Kenneth M. Reardon, 2005. "Empowerment planning in East St. Louis, Illinois," City, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(1), pages 85-100, April.
    18. Malene Freudendal-Pedersen & Sven Kesselring, 2016. "Mobilities, Futures & the City: repositioning discourses – changing perspectives – rethinking policies," Mobilities, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(4), pages 575-586, August.
    19. Gaber, John & Gaber, Sharon L., 2010. "Using face validity to recognize empirical community observations," Evaluation and Program Planning, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 138-146, May.
    20. Shlomit Flint Ashery & Carl Steinitz, 2022. "Issue-Based Complexity: Digitally Supported Negotiation in Geodesign Linking Planning and Implementation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-19, July.
    21. Vanessa Watson, 2009. "Seeing from the South: Refocusing Urban Planning on the Globe’s Central Urban Issues," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 46(11), pages 2259-2275, October.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:taf:eurpls:v:14:y:2004:i:2:p:239-252. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/CEPS20 .

    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.