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The purpose of this paper is to discuss the ways that the top-down and the bottom-up approaches to planning can be combined in the practice of planning standards. In the first part, the paper examines the utilization of planning standards through time, while in the second part it aims to unravel the relationship between the use of planning standards and the top-down as well as the bottom-up planning approach. In the third part, the paper focuses on the limitations of bottom-up approaches, in order to demonstrate that they can only be used in a certain planning scale, leaving all other scales to top-down approaches. Last but not least, the paper proposes a framework for the use of planning standards in a combined top-down and bottom-up planning approach.

Abstract:The classification of uses is one of the central issues of urban planning, since it is only by referring to groups of uses that we can achieve the simplification and, ultimately, the understanding of urban space. However, contemporary planning theory has shown very little interest in a theoretical approach to this issue. The present paper addresses the issue by integrating it into the development of an analytical theory of urban uses which it calls urbanology. Specifically, the paper starts with the description of the basic concepts and processes of classification, which are then employed to produce a general theoretical classification of urban uses. Since the classification of uses is not only a question of theoretical importance, but directly related to applied planning, the paper concludes with the elaboration of a second, alternative classification which satisfies the needs of contemporary planning practice.

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Social Economy (SE) has been praised for contributing to a humane and sustainable economic growth, whilst effectively tackling the detrimental effects of economic, ecological, and other types of crises. With many of its member states experiencing a heap of such problems, the EU has actively facilitated the setting up and operation of social enterprises. The paper at hand offers a theoretically-grounded empirical analysis of SE in four South EU countries (Spain, Italy, Greece, and Cyprus), and specifically, it examines the pertinent policies and their post-implementation impact. To do so, it employs a mixed-methods approach comprising a critical scrutiny of national policy frameworks, a quantitative analysis of secondary regional data on SE workforce and enterprises, and an interview-based fieldwork focused on SE stakeholders and experts. Highlighting the crucial differences among national policy frameworks lays the groundwork for deciphering the uneven dynamics in SE development across the study regions. Our analysis underlines that, albeit SE is often presented as a viable alternative to neoliberalism, it is bound by the latter’s intrinsic characteristics. Specifically, not only SE fails to limit (youth) unemployment and inactivity drastically, but on the contrary, it often becomes a fertile ground for labor practices that are exceedingly precarious.

Although the tradition of surveying and analyzing urban land uses for town planning purposes dates back to the 19th century, the evolution of survey methods has not been studied in detail. With the intention of filling this gap, the present article reviews the pertinent Anglo-American literature on survey methods, published from the beginning of the 20th century to date, and highlights the key contributions. Additionally, it proposes a periodization of the methodological evolution in three phases and identifies the main discussions developed on survey methodology, so as to provide a basis for more structured research on the subject matter.

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