The essence of spatial strategy-making is the link that it establishes between, on the one hand, the knowledge about the urban context and on the other intervening actions, plans and strategies. The specifics (the how) of linking knowledge and action in current spatial strategy-making processes has been the object of much academic debate. Both in theory and practice, the debate revolves around what constitutes right, relevant or rigorous knowledge and who has the power to make this distinction. In response to theoretical, political and practical flaws of the classical approach of technical rationality (with professional/systematised/expert knowledge at its centre), there is a growing emphasis in planning research on various communicative and collaborative approaches. These aim to include other, more contextualised and personal types of knowledge from all the involved actors. Despite important differences, most of these approaches share the idea that planning should be first and foremost a social process of ‘reasoning together’, based on communicative rationality. (Author/publisher)
Abstract