Urban-Planning Tactics and Strategies in New Decision-Making Process

The basis on which the main economic and social p institutions are situated, which until a few years ago we believed to be solid, began to waver dangerously, spreading in the public and scholars an atmosphere of uncertainty and concern that could hinder the seeking rigorous and convincing interpretations and therapies to deal with a particularly negative picture. According to Ulrich Beck, the systemic crisis triggered by the failure of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. definitively immersed us in a “global capitalism of uncertainty” such that the climate we are experiencing is characterized by a widespread awareness that unmistakable changes are about to arrive. Their direction, however, is still unknown. In this clearly problematic state, the disciplines that contribute most to the development of urban-planning practices are suffering even more evidently from a crisis of visibility and legitimateness due to which the role of planning tools is subject to rapid objection and substantial resizing. Over the years of feverish growth that pre- ceded the economic collapse in 2008, local administrators increasingly restricted planners’ field of initiative, limiting them to ensuring the feasibility of transformation initiatives that were promoted by private operators. And now that urban dynamics have experienced an almost unprecedented setback, the tasks assigned to planners will be drastically marginalized even more. A survey of the most important writings dedicated to the current socioeconomic crossroads encountered in many Western countries indicates that this planning crisis is situated within a more general decline in the social sciences. Furthermore, this dual setback represents an important reflection on the extraordinary difficulty encountered, especially in Europe, by the welfare system and the system of representative democracy. Therefore, the proposal for a new planning paradigm cannot help but direct, at least in part, a more general reconsideration of the conditions under which, even before the market and society, the governmental functions of the territory are exercised along an analytical path that finds a particularly meaningful intersection in the operation of decision- making processes. Faced with the intensive research programme illustrated in this volume, the reflection presented below offers a restricted contribution. Its utility resides not so much in the presentation of an original, mature theoretical/critical apparatus but in indicating a promising line of reasoning that aims to investigate the existing connection between new decision-making processes, the ways in which it is possible to favour public participation in territorial government, and, finally, the changes in the market economy and social context. The latter inevitably constitutes the background to and reference for innovations introduced as much in participatory processes as in the practice of urban planning. In particular, the first part aims to highlight the presence of the common roots of the economic crisis, society, and the settlement formations that have been produced in this first glimpse of the third millennium. The second part instead examines the conditions presiding over the identification of integrated solutions, i.e. those capable of favouring the search for a common way out of this particularly difficult situation. Finally, the third part derives the main consequences for a change in the planning tools that allow their effectiveness to ultimately unfold