Introduction: An Invitation to Inquire the Relations Inside Planning

Material flows as Earth politics: Concepts, methods, and approaches for transdisciplinary diagnostics and repair at Muizenberg East, Cape Town

“…The official City promotional document for FBEP justifies this with the argument that waste is part of urban metabolism— ergo it provides environmental services; ergo it is compatible with conservation. Countering that argument, urban planning scholar Jonathan Metzger (2018:15) notes “Ecosystem services approaches generate calculative infrastructures that provide affordances for simplification and unwarranted reductionism, which then paves the way for unthoughtful action underpinned by illusions of commensurability, substitutability and tradability where this simply is not.” This is particularly dangerous, he continues, “because of its projected veneer of scientificality, universality and comprehensiveness—but without any regard for how a wider application of an ecosystem services approach, without a humility in the face of wicked ecological complexity, will in all probability lead to a series of successful operations leading to the eventual death of the patient” (Metzger, 2018:15).…”

“…Social science, however, observes that action is not predicted by rules and that dissent holds transformational capacity in the face of inequity. Given its poor capacity to characterize everyday life, “the social system” is rarely an analytic used in peer-reviewed social science journals, where it is associated with the outdated theory of structure-functionalism (Wellstead et al, 2017; Stojanovic et al, 2016), which fails to characterize empirical realities. Economics as mediator of nature and society: The financialized bridge between society and nature proposed by ecosystem services approaches is criticized by leading social scientists, as dollar-based valuations of ecosystem services advance relations of commodification (Sullivan, 2010; Metzger, 2018). The translation of ecological processes into accounting frameworks may undermine local value regimens that previously protected local ecologies—unwittingly encouraging new regimes of financialized natural resource exploitation. Theories of personhood : The idea that all people are motivated by financial gain and therefore may have their choices changed by financial incentives is criticized as “Homo economicus” in social science literature for misrecognizing its advancement of inequality and for misrecognizing the multiplicity of human values, commitments, motivations, and attachments. The above discrepancies reduce the ecological presence of the human to matters of mind and financial exchange.…”

“…Economics as mediator of nature and society: The financialized bridge between society and nature proposed by ecosystem services approaches is criticized by leading social scientists, as dollar-based valuations of ecosystem services advance relations of commodification (Sullivan, 2010; Metzger, 2018). The translation of ecological processes into accounting frameworks may undermine local value regimens that previously protected local ecologies—unwittingly encouraging new regimes of financialized natural resource exploitation.…”

Effective Methodologies to Study Affects: New Tools for Engaging With Socio-Spatial Relations

“…Amidst global urbanization processes, the digitalization of cities, and growing diversity in cities, a substantive quest for tools, vocabularies, theories and explanations for transformations in the urban arena occupy contemporary urban scholars. Particularly in the discipline of urban planning, recent discussions explore concepts, methods, and thinking tools, which can accommodate uncertainties, transformations, and dynamic relations, for use in planning research and practice (see, e.g., Brenner et al, 2011; Buser, 2014; Kurath et al, 2018; McFarlane, 2011; Purcell, 2013; Rydin & Tate, 2016; Sachs Olsen & Juhlin, 2021; Shilon & Kallus, 2018). A disciplinary shift in this regard has been made by notable planning scholars such as Robert Beauregrad, Jean Hillier, Jonathan Metzger, and Yvonne Rydin in calling to draw on relational approaches (e.g., actor network theory and assemblage thinking).…”

“…That is, today’s cities encapsulate generic and standardized global places (e.g., airport cities, convention centers, banks, and train stations) (Lecomte, 2013), growing verticality that includes large-scale urban planning directed towards volumetric cities (e.g., increased developments of high-rise complexes) (Drozdz et al, 2018), and growing dependence on technology for planning and policymaking (Rose, 2017), while with the increased mobility and immigration of people all around the world, present-day cities are also very diverse (Sandercock, 2000; 2004). These dynamic characteristics of present-day cities invite us to reconsider the tools and methods with which we can discern contemporary socio-spatial relations, and recent planning literature questions the methods and tools used to studying socio-spatial relations, cities, and urban planning today (Brenner et al, 2011; Buser, 2014; Kurath et al, 2018; Rydin & Tate, 2016; Sachs Olsen & Juhlin, 2021; Shilon & Kallus, 2018).…”