A new role for citizens’ initiatives: the difficulties in co-creating institutional change in urban planning

Abstract

In this paper, we analyze the institutional work that underlies the attempt to institutionalize a more active role of citizens in urban planning. We draw on a case in which a group of citizens aims to redevelop a brownfield site into a vital urban area. This citizens' initiative is co-creating a new form of urban planning with the municipality, private organizations and individual citizens. The study shows how citizens' initiatives can be a driver for institutional change, but that uncertainties about new institutions tend to reinforce the maintenance of existing ones. This paradox explains why even if the ambition for a new form of planning is widely shared, actually realizing institutional change can still be difficult and time-consuming.

Institutional work in environmental governance

“…Beunen and Patterson 2016;Bergsma et al 2017;Van Assche, Gruezmacher, and Deacon 2018). We do not argue that the concept necessarily has direct analytic value for explaining meso or macro patterns of institutional change and stability, although it does contribute novel insights, not least through emphasising the micro-dynamics underpinning broader patterns of institutional change (Bisschops and Beunen 2018;Vasile 2019). The primary added value is in complementing existing explanatory frameworks, such as discursive approaches (see e.g.…”

“…On the other hand, it also provides a lens by which to consider unintentional actions which have significant effects for institutional stability and change (e.g. Bisschops and Beunen 2018). This second aspect is vastly under-studied, yet likely to be a major 'invisible' force shaping effects such as institutional maintenance (e.g.…”

“…These processes may, at first glance, seem to be entirely different; the first being about change and the second being about stability. However, an institutional work lens reveals that both are likely to arise from underlying activities by actors who create, maintain, or disrupt institutional orders (Bisschops and Beunen 2018;Bergsma et al 2017).…”

“…On the first point, institutional work demonstrates that successfully realising institutional change is not just about introducing and promoting new innovations or reforms. It also crucially involves relating the proposed changes to existing structures, and the ideas of others (something particularly explored in Bisschops and Beunen 2018;Van Assche, Gruezmacher, and Deacon 2018;and Pittman 2019). In this regard, a focus on institutional work can provide creative and sometimes indirect ideas about actions that could be taken to promote an agenda (e.g.…”

Planning in uncharted waters: spatial transformations, planning transitions and role-reflexive planning

“…Seen from a broader perspective on planning in transition, playful and game-like settings provide hope for change across established thoughts. This may bridge existing but as yet unintegrated approaches to fostering urban transformations and related roles from art (Holub/ Hohenbüchler 2014;Aßmann/Bader/Shipwright et al 2017), cultural science (Reinermann/Behr 2017), governance and institutional change (Loorbach/ Wittmayer/Shiroyama 2016;Bisschops/Beunen 2018) and planning (Lamker 2016;Loepfe/Eisinger 2017;de Roo 2018;Knieling/Klindworth 2018). Planning research would benefit from extending role-based thinking to include more elements of reflexivity and openness towards emerging roles and flexible uses thereof.…”