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Commercialisation, Professionalism and the Public Interest in the UK

Spatial planning is at a crossroads, with government reform undermining the traditional vision of state-employed planners making decisions about urban development in a unified public interest. Nearly half of UK planners are now employed in the private sector, with complex inter-relations between the sectors including supplying outsourced services to local authorities struggling with centrally-imposed budget cuts.

Drawing on new empirical data from a major research project, ‘Working in the Public Interest’, this book reveals what it’s like to be a UK planner in the early 21st century, and how the profession can fulfil its potential for the benefit of society and the environment.

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Dilemmas and Lessons from London and Hong Kong

Increasingly, public space provision and management are being transferred from the public sector to real estate developers, private sector organisations, voluntary groups and community bodies. Contrasting the more historical, horizontal character of London with the intense street life of high-rise Hong Kong, this book tells the story of the two cities’ relationships with non-traditional forms of public space governance.

The authors consider the implications for the ‘publicness’ of these complex spaces and the challenges and impacts that different forms of provision have on those with a stake in them, and on the cities as a whole.

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Transitions Built on Justice

This collection pays unique attention to the highly challenging problems of addressing inequality within decarbonisation – particularly under-explored aspects, such as high consumption, degrowth approaches and perverse outcomes.

Contributors point out means and possibilities of the transition from high carbon inequalities to post-carbon inclusion. They apply a variety of conceptual and methodological approaches in all-inclusive ways to diverse challenges, such as urban heating and retrofitting.

Richly illustrated with case studies from the city to the household, this book critically examines ‘just transitions’ to achieve sustainable societies in the future.

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Timescapes, Power and Democracy
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A deep exploration on how questions of time and its organisation affect planning practice, this book is aimed at public and private planning practitioners, national and local politicians and policymakers involved in planning, academics and students studying planning and related disciplines.

It presents time as a pervasive form of power that is used to shape democratic practices, and questions ‘project speed’: where time to think, deliberate and plan has been squeezed. The authors demonstrate the many benefits of slow planning for the key participants, multiple interests and planning system overall.

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Reforming Spatial Governance in England

This topical, edited collection analyses the state of the planning system in England and offers a robust, evidence-based review of over a decade of change since the Conservatives came into power. With a critique of ongoing planning reforms by the UK government, the book argues that the planning system is often blamed for a range of issues caused by ineffective policymaking by government.

Including chapters on housing, localism, design, zoning, and the consequences of Brexit for environmental planning, the contributors unpick a complicated set of recent reforms and counter the claims of the think-tank-led assault on democratic planning.

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Growth and Change in a Financialised World
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The private rental housing market plays an important and growing role in the advanced economies. Providing accommodation for a wider range of households than before the global financial crisis, rental housing is also a key asset class for private individuals and companies, while the rise of Airbnb lettings has pushed up rents and reduced the number of homes available to residents.

This edited collection by leading experts in the field analyses recent changes in the private rental market, using case studies from the UK, Europe, Australia and the USA, and assesses the initial impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Are There Trends towards an Inclusive City?
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Detroit is the first city of its size to become bankrupt and some policy makers have argued that, since then, it has entered a ‘new beginning’. This book critically examines the evidence for and against this claim.

Joe Darden analyses whether Detroit’s patterns of race and class neighborhood inequality have persisted or whether investments have led to improvements in academic achievement, homeownership, employment, and reductions in poverty and violent crime. He measures, quantitatively, the benefits and disadvantages of staying in urban Detroit or moving to the suburbs, and provides evidence to answer whether Detroit, after bankruptcy, is becoming an inclusive city.

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Critique and Alternatives in the Urban Cultural Economy

A buoyant, creative economy can be seen as the saviour of many cities, but behind such ‘urban makeovers’ lie serious problems such as widening inequalities, job precarity, gentrification and environmental issues. In light of the pandemic and climate crisis, how well are city economies, based largely on culture, nightlife and tourism, meeting basic societal needs?

Blending lively case studies of alternative cultural practices and spaces with broader theoretical debates, this book explores the opportunities for a more just and sustainable urban future.

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Knowledge, Care, Legitimacy
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The past three decades have seen an international ‘turn to participation’ – letting those who will be affected by neighbourhood planning outcomes play an active role in decision-making – but there is widespread dissatisfaction with actual instances of citizen-state engagement.

This innovative analysis brings theory, research and practice together and gives insights into how and why citizen voices either become effective or get excluded. Using ethnographic data to illustrate a wide range of participatory and localist governance practices and social movements, the book concludes with recommendations to re-invigorate community involvement in planning.

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The Digital-Molecular Convergence
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A wave of innovation driven by the convergence of digital and molecular technologies is transforming food production and ways of eating in the US, Western Europe and Australasia. This book explores a range of contemporary agri-food issues, such as the digitalisation of farm production, aka Precision Agriculture, farmer independence, gene editing, alternative proteins and the rise of app-based home food deliveries.

This is the first book to provide a systemic analysis of technological innovation and its socio-economic consequences in modern food systems, including the ‘hollowing out’ of rural communities and pronounced industrial concentration. The food system is under growing public pressure to respond to global climate change, but this book finds little evidence of transition to sustainable low-carbon trajectories.

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