The challenges to public participation in planning are numerous. Inclusive and equitable processes are recognised as an ideal in much planning theory and practice, yet this ideal is increasingly difficult to realise in today's societies that comprise diverse and multiple publics. Within the wider sustainability debate, 'New Urbanism' has emerged as a pragmatic alternative to conventional low-density development. Concomitant with a range of prescribed physical outcomes, the New Urbanism movement advocates a process of 'citizen-based participatory planning and design'. Charrettes, with urban design workshops, are the favoured tools for achieving this goal. However, it is argued that the adherence to a single type of participatory tool can be inconsistent with accepted ideals of participation processes and has several implications. Of particular concern is the role of the charrette planner or facilitator, a figure who has the potential to manipulate the public because of his/her inevitable allegiance to the New Urban agenda. In addition, the examination of a charrette process in a small New Zealand town raises several broader questions about the ability of the approach to address issues of inclusiveness and the recognition of difference, two fundamental elements of good participatory processes.
The term 'social licence to operate' (SLO) is relatively new to public discourse in Aotearoa New Zealand. It is increasingly being used in the aquaculture, dairy and mining industries due to their rapid intensification and consequent impact on natural resources. For Indigenous New Zealanders, Māori, there has been contestation about land and water usage since the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840. Māori have struggled to have their voices recognised. However, since 1975, the country has been developing a process that recognises Māori rights. For Māori, the Treaty of Waitangi is the prime 'social licence'. In this paper, we contextualise the notion of SLO in light of the Treaty of Waitangi, specifically in the case of mineral extraction. We examine the extent to which Māori values, as expressed through Māori resource management plans, cultural impact assessments and submissions on legislation, articulate the Māori SLO and what, in turn, this offers the wider field of impact assessment.
Solicited diaries/journals are increasingly popular as an innovative qualitative method in the social sciences for better understanding people's everyday lived experiences. In this article we create a framework for maintaining rigour while using such diaries. First, we systematically evaluate 43 research papers focusing on the method, drawing on Baxter and Eyles' (1997) seminal evaluation of rigour in qualitative human geography research. We ascertain that significant improvements could be made to procedures for obtaining and analysing diary content. Second, we develop a framework to encourage rigour in diary research. We test our framework by evaluating research conducted by two of our authors who employed solicited diaries with street vendors in Vietnam. We propose that our analysis and framework can help social scientists improve the rigour of solicited diaries as a research method, and provide a model for enhancing rigour in other emerging qualitative approaches.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.