Urban politics and strategies

The orthodox theories of urban policy and urban planning have mainly been conceived and thought out in a situation where the major cities were loci of power and economic activities. Hence the orthodox ‘monocentric’ models of urban morphology had a parallel in theories of urban policy and planning were cities and their town halls were considered to be rather undisputed ‘powerhouses’. The literature on urban policy is ripe with observations that challenge this orthodoxy: Elitist theories have been giving away to pluralist theories; urban regime theory have been supplanted, or at least supplemented with, discourse theory and/or regulation theory; and last but not least theories of governance have been applied to the field. The formulation of a new theoretical ‘heterodoxy’ within urban policy and planning builds to a large degree on theoretical and empirical observations that support the view that the ‘monocentric’ view on the city and city-region will have to be abandoned. Some of the buzz words here are: Zwischenstädte (Sieverts), metapoles (Ascher), porous cities (Amin and Thrift), network cities, and citta diffusa.

In our research projects we use the term “the city without limits” to indicate similar trends in urban development and policy.

The city without limits is a part of a societal context in which fragmentation and differentiation generally mark the economy, commercial structure, culture, social relations and politics in society. The city without limits, with its new economic conditions for development and complex urban challenges, therefore presents fundamental challenges to the traditional urban management and urban policy strategies. A new political form of regulation and co-ordination is required that is capable of dealing with the complex challenges. Proactive urban policy strategies are also required that are capable of creating growth in the urban centres and society in general. The research theme deals with studies of the organization of urban policy and its processes (the form), as well as the strategies and results (the content).

“Urban policy” is dealt with as a concept for compromise or conflict between more or less antagonistic opposing forces in terms of interests or values, as well as a normative-critical concept. Regarding the latter, the concept encompasses the boundary between institutionalised politics and non-institutionalised micro-politics, as well as the (mutually opposed) conceptions of justice, values and ideals – political, ethical and aesthetic – that are asserted and can be maintained in relation to the unlimited urban entity. In this regard, research projects are mounted, which strategically aim to develop new models for the design of urban political processes.

Proactive urban policy strategies

Urban policy has become an element on the political agenda, both nationally and internationally. New divisions of labour between town and country and the establishment of new urban hierarchies in the global economy increase the competition between cities and place focus on metropolitan centres as the locomotives for development in the direction of the knowledge and service society. The unlimited city and polycentrism are concepts used to label this urban development and the concept of glocalisation stresses the potentials of urban local policy to influence the consequences of globalisation. The chances of the urban centres to survive depend greatly on the way that the local actors are capable of exploiting the local political manoeuvring room within the given economic-geographical framework. Urban politics becomes a strategic mean to promote the development towards the new service and knowledge society (Sassen 1991, Brenner 1999, Jessop 1998).  

Hence, the proactive urban policy becomes an urban growth policy especially in the Anglo-American context. In the Continental-European context we find a combination of growth policies with the traditional welfare policies. Urban policy concerns both economic and social tasks. In a Nordic context urban policy is furthermore characterised by a decentralised, user-oriented and welfare policy (Letho 2000). In the Danish context, however, a two-tracked urban policy can be observed: a dualistic urban policy in which the one track is policy regarding growth, with emphasis on growth and innovation strategies, while the other track regards welfare policy with emphasis on strengthening weak local communities within the urban centres. The two tracks are based on very different organisations and processes and they rarely meet – except in conflicts and “crashes”. 

The purpose of theme F is to analyse the relationship between the local capacity for action and the general conditions of economy and geography in cities and regions. How do cities and regions cope with this relationship and accordingly develop urban strategies? What do the strategies look like and what is the result? The strategies are studied at both regional and local level concerning growth and welfare policies. Focus is also on the definitions of “the city” and “the regions” in these policy processes. Furthermore the structural reform of Danish municipalities and counties will have special attention in the studies.

The fragmented urban policy

The politics and management of the urban centre has undergone marked fragmentation and differentiation to solve the increasingly complex urban challenges. The concept of governance is employed to illustrate a situation in which urban policy is created in various policy network populated by numerous urban actors involved on both sides of the boundaries between political decision-making levels (vertical governance) and across the lines of division between the public and private sectors (horizontal governance) (Rhodes 1997, Heffen, Kickert and Thomassen 2000, Pierre and Peters 2000, Stoker 1998/2000). The urban policy is spread out in an unlimited field of political organizations without an apparent centre and without an unambiguous hierarchical relationship between the numerous networks and parties. No single agent has a comprehensive overview or the overall governing capacity.

In the Continental European context there is no straight development from the traditional government to governance in urban policy. Rather we find a combination of government and governance placing urban policy in between hierarchy and network or as Scharpf puts it: governance in the shadow of hierarchy (Scharpf 1994, Pollitt et al. 2000, Premfors 1998). In the Nordic countries we also find another important characteristic of governance. The Nordic government organisations use governance as a strategic mean in urban policy to integrate urban actors and interests in the policy process. The consequence is a restriction of the autonomy and self-steering capacity of the policy networks (Bogason and Toonen 1998, Bogason 2001, Sehested 2003, Sørensen og Torfing 2005). 

Studies of the new network organizations illustrate a broad variety of policy network and governance processes. Some are closed and elitist, others are open and integrative – it differs especially accordingly to policy fields. In growth policies we often find closed processes, while welfare policy is characterised by more open processes. Studies also illustrate a number of governance failures (Jessop 1998) related to the fragmented urban policy. The governance failures prevail in the form of problems dealing with e.g. an unequal distribution of power in the networks and conflicts in and around networks, the lack of co-ordination and integration in the urban policy, and the lack of legitimacy and responsibility in relation to the general management of the urban centre.

At the same time, new governing forms are under development, which are intended as an attempt to solve some of these governance failures: meta-governance is the new concept that encompasses these governing forms. Meta-governance can be interpreted as “hierarchy strikes back”. Metagovernance is an attempt to regulate self-regulating governance networks by shaping the conditions under which they operate (Rhodes 2000, Jessop 1998, Kickert, Klijn and Koppenjan 1997, Bruinj and Heuvelhof 2000, Torfing and Sørensen 2005). Different forms of metagovernance emerge, e.g. network design, network framing and network participation. In praxis and research the present work concerns the development of meta-governance “tool boxes” and meta-governance rules.

The purpose of theme F is to make a contribution to the discussions of urban governance and meta-governance. The projects addressing this theme will include a critical-normative perspective on 1) governance failures in urban policy processes, 2) the quality of policy products in governance processes, 3) conflicts and exclusion and inclusion in policy networks and governance processes – the distribution of power in cities and regions, 4) the development of new forms of urban meta-governance. Finally the discussion of democratic governance will be dealt with. Is governance good or bad news for democracy? How to democratise governance processes?

References

Bogason, Peter og Theo A. Toonen (1998): Comparing Networks. I: Public Administration. Vol 76 No 2. p. 205-227. 

Bogason, Peter (2001): Fragmenteret forvaltning. Herning: Systime. By- og Boligministeriet (1999): Fremtidens by. Bypolitisk perspektiv- og handlingsplan. København: By- og Boligministeriet. 

Brenner, N. (1999): Globalisation as Reterritorialisation: the Re-Scaling of Urban Governance in the European Union. I: Urban Studies, årg. 36, nr. 3: 431-451. 

Bruijn, Hans og Ernst ten Heuvelhof (2000): Process Management. I: Heffen, Kickert og Thomassen (red.): Governance in Modern Society. Kluver Academic Publishers. Holland. 

Heffen, Oscar van og Kickert, Walter, Thomassen, Jacques (2000): Governance in
Modern Society. Effects, Change and Formation of Government Institutions. Kluwer Academic
Publishers. 

Jessop, Bob (1998): Globalisation, Entrepreneurial Cities and the Social Economy. I: Hamel, Lustiger- Thaler og Mayer (red.): Urban Movements in a Global Environment. Urban Studies Yearbook 1998. Sage.  

Kickert, Walter og Klijn, Erik-Hans, Joop F.M. Koppenjan (1999): Managing Complex Networks. Strategies for the Public Sector. Sage Publications. 

Lehto, J (2000) Different cities in different welfare states. In: Bagnasco, A & Le Galès, P (red.) Cities in Contemporary Europe, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp.112-130. 

Pierre, Jon og Guy B. Peters (2000): Governance, Politics and the State. Houndsmill: Macmillan. 

Pollitt, C og G. Bouckaert (2000): Public Management Reform. A Comparative Analysis. Oxford University Press.  

Premfors, Rune (1998): Reshaping the Democratic State: Swedish Experiences in a Comparative Perspective. I: Public Administration, 1998, 76 (1), 141-159. 

Rhodes, R.A.W. (1997): Understanding Governance. Policy Networks, Governance, Reflexivity and Accountability. Buckingham: Open University Press. 

Rhodes, RA.W. (2000): The governance narrative: key findings and lessons from the ESCR's Whitehall Programme. I: Public Administration, årg. 78, nr. 2: 345-364.  

Sassen, S. (1991): The Global City. New York, London, Tokyo. Princeton University Press. Princeton, New Jersey.  

Scharpf, F.W (1994): Games Real Actors could Play: Positive and Negative Coordination in Embedded Negotiations. I: Journal of Theoretical Politics, årg 1, nr. 6: 27-53.  

Stoker, Gerry (1998): Governance as theory: five propositions. I: International Social Science Journal. March 1998, 155: 17-28.  

Stoker, Gerry (2000): Urban Political Science and the Challenge of Urban Governance. I: Jon Pierre (red.): Debating Governance. Oxford University Press. London.  

Sehested, Karina (red.) (2003): Bypolitik mellem/hierarki og netværk. København: Akademisk Forlag.  

Torfing, Jacob og Eva Sørensen (2005): Netværksstyring – fra government til governance. Roskilde Universitetsforlag.

Sub-Projects:

Sub-project 1: Development strategies in the regionalised city

Niels Boje Groth, Senior Researcher, Centre for Forest, Landscape and Planning, KVL. 

The purpose of the project is to typologies the regionalised (unlimited) city by the variety of local development strategies in medium sized cities.  

The project is based upon the assumption that urban development strategies reveal the position of urban communities in the regional geography. Recent research findings from the centre indicate that general development trends such as de-industrialisation, growth in service and high-tech industries and expanding local labour and housing markets creates a different development conditions in metropolitan, self-sustaining and peripheral regions.  

As a consequence of being integrated in the metropolitan labour market medium sized cities in the metropolitan regions tend to focus their development strategies on the metropolitan housing market and on sustaining large sports, entertaining and cultural institution of the new event economy in order to turn the city to a residential place rather than a place for production.  

In the self-sustaining regions outside the metropolitan regions, development strategies are focused on restructuring and modernisation of the local business life. Often, cities respond on outsourcing of manual production by substituting the loss of manual production by knowledge intensive and market related functions in the value chain. The upgrading and modernisation of industrial production is feasible especially in regions with strong production clusters or specialised sectors.   

The peripheral regions are the most vulnerable. The loss of work-places is often dominated by single firms outsourcing or simply closing down. In peripheral regions the decreasing number of jobs in the industrial sector is accompanied by decreasing jobs in the primary sectors. Usually, it is not possible to substitute the loss of work-places by upgrading clusters, due to the lack of such regional specialisations. Often the peripheral regions have to focus their development strategies on re-placing lost industrial production with new ones able to profit on the local work-force and to exploitation of potentials such as tourist sites. Finally, to be peripheral in some instances means to be on the border of transnational regions with options to develop as gateways in such regions. A minority of peripheral municipalities, i.e. those with special attractions for living and housing may try to attract people on the threshold of the ”third” age. When leaving the labour market they become able to give priority to housing in milieus attractive for living.  

Recent research findings on development strategies in medium sized cities thus indicate that development strategies respond on general development trends in production and housing in manners that reveal the character of regions they are located in such as the metropolitan, the self-sustaining and the peripheral regions. This in turn reveals a diversity of the urban regionalisation processes. Cities in metropolitan regions are focusing on regional labour and housing markets, cities in self-sustaining regions are trying to upgrade and modernise the economic base and to become further integrated in international chains of production, whereas some cities in the peripheral regions try to establish in new roles in the national housing markets. Accordingly, it is supposed that regional, national and international relations with different strengths characterise the opening of the borders between the city and the surrounding world, which is a core issue in the research program of CSB.  

Further, it is supposed that the urban development strategies do not reveal any deterministic relation between the regional settings and the strategies. Different “castings” of local decision agencies are decisive for how cities respond on challenges from the outside world. Accordingly, the examination of local decision strategies takes as a point of departure the interplay between the local situation of opportunities and local capacities for action.  

The project is carried out by combining theoretical, statistical studies and case-studies. This research layout is supposed to facilitate the hypothesis that development strategies are formed in interplays between general and specific conditions.  

The project is carried out in close cooperation with theme A: the concept of the city and the city without limits, sub-project 6: Planning concepts and paradigms of the regionalised city.

The two project are going to use the same case-study cities and hence to coordinate interviews and background data.  

Three policy related issues

The research agenda on urban strategies and policies includes some general research questions, three of which shall be briefly drafted.  

The regional typologies

The unlimited city as a concept was developed at the back-cloth of recent findings of regional enlargement, globalisation and local policy responses logically connected with the new development trends. Cities in the metropolitan hinterland took the advantage of being integrated in the metropolitan labour markets and set up urban development strategies focusing on the metropolitan housing and event markets. However, to fully understand the processes of regional enlargement and globalisation we need to further examine the situation of cities outside the metropolitan regions. For further discussion see table below. 

Actor versus geography

Research on urban strategies and policies seems to ask for an actor-oriented understanding of geography. Thus, recent research on polycentricity reveals shortages on explanation of urban cooperation. The paradigm of polycentricity suggests that urban cooperation is based upon functional complementarities and proximity. However, cities seem to an increasing extent to cooperate with the most relevant – distant or local - actors in a diversity of policy areas. Thus, to look for just regionally embedded policies seem to ignore the broader palette of the co-operation capacities of cities.  

From mediator to initiator

During the processes of urban restructuring, cities have been enforced to pave new roads outside the traditional areas of urban planning and policies. Often cities have to take risky decisions to cope with the impacts of restructuring and to follow their own strategies. Formerly, cities acted as mediators of national strategies and programs for building the welfare state. No national programs have been set up for the restructuring of the welfare state. Thus, the cities have to be the initiators in order to deal with the local consequences of globalisation. A follow-up is needed to adjust legal rules and codes of conduct to the challenges that local authorities meet.  

Sub-project 2: Urban and regional meta-governance
Karina Sehested, Senior Researcher, Centre for Forest, Landscape and Planning,KVL. In cooperation with Prof. Sørensen, Institute of Social Science, Roskilde University and Ass.Prof. Anne Reff Pedersen, IOA, Copenhagen Business School.

The impending government structure reform in Denmark and a new planning legislation contribute to shifting the regulation of cities and regions towards governance and meta-governance. The 275 municipalities become 98 larger municipalities, and the former 14 counties are now replaced by 5 large regions. The new regions are still responsible for one major welfare task: the hospitals. But in most other policy areas like special social institutions, environment and planning the regions are no longer in a hierarchical position above the municipalities. The municipalities take over a lot of the counties former tasks and the regions are now vested with a new role as counsellors, coordinators and strategy makers. They do not have the hierarchical authority in relation to the municipalities anymore.

At the same time a lot of new policy networks, boards and other governance organisations are introduced at both regional and local level in order to cope with e.g. the former county tasks and new tasks. Especially in the area of planning and growth policy we find a myriad of old and new policy networks with the task of creating strategies and growth in and between the regions and municipalities. The formal regional councils have to find they own meta-governance role in this governance situation.     

The project aims at contributing to knowledge regarding the strategic use of political governance and meta-governance in the new regions in connection with the impact of the structure reform. The project will follow the role of the regional councils in two years from the start of January 1996. The purpose is to investigate: 1. How do the actors/organisations and policy network interact (or not) in growth policy? How does each of them contribute to the political task? 2. What are the governance successes and the failures and how are failures dealt with? 3. How is meta-governance performed and by whom? 4. What are the conflicts and the mechanism of exclusion and inclusion in the process of making growth policy? 5. How do the regional councils handle conflicts and how can they improve their role as meta-governors?

The theoretical background is the newest discussions about meta-governance and democracy (see the introduction) and the aim of the project is to contribute with debate and development of the meta-governance of urban centres and regions, meta-governance rules, and concrete forms of meta-governance (tool boxes). Denmark is one of the countries in Europe representing an integrative governance development and with a strong tradition for cohesion and integration in the cities and regions. Therefore the Danish case might make an important contribution to the international meta-governance discussions.

The method will be regional case studies based on bottom up policy analysis and organisational studies. The study will take form as an interaction research process in close cooperation with key actors in the regions. 

The project period is two years from January 2006-2008.
 

Sub-project 3: Strategic cultural planning and development policies in the city without limits

Ph.D-fellow Søren Smidt-Jensen, Centre for Forest, Landscape and Planning,KVL  

This project set sights on the strategic development policies and plans in cities with different locations in the regional city (the city without limits). The main objective is to examine why and how cities use cultural resources and cultural assets as strategic tools in order to increase the attractiveness of the city. Especially, focus will be on what role urban planning and various local development initiatives can have in generating a local environment favourable for cultural industries and which at the same time contributes to the liveability of urban space. The study will take form as an interaction research process in close cooperation with key actors in selected Danish municipalities. Project website: www.strategiskby.dk >>

Sub-project 4: The ”City without limits” and the ”Regional City” . A changing urban concept applied on the “Regional City”.

Morten Daugaard, Associate Professor, Aarhus School of Architecture 

The main purpose of the project is to investigate the city as a regional phenomenon in the light of the change of the urban concept also in an architectural/urban discourse. What are the consequences according to structure, politics and ways of living in the different parts of the regional city. How are the differences between so called central and more peripheral places played out? Are we looking at a continuation of the pattern from the old dichotomies between town and country, centre/periphery, public/private, open/closed now at another level or do we see completely new relations evolving?  

Focus of the project is a continuation of an ongoing project on some architectural aspects of the urban concept argued through a substantial part of newer urban discourse now with a regional concretization:” The city without limits. A multidisciplinary challenge to the concept of the city with an architectural urban perspective”. 

The relatively non-problematic change of the municipality and county organization which is taking place in DK right now indicates that the regional aspect in a way is regarded as actual given circumstances. If it is true that a growing internalisation of the regional perspective is taking place, what are the effects of this on a parallel existing local and global perspective? What does that mean for the way the old dichotomies are regarded? Will you be able to discover some consequences regarding the spatial–physical ‘footprint?’ or lack of ‘footprint?’ concerning building program as well as form in relation to infrastructure, recreational planning of the landscape, styles of life and way of living? 

A substantial part of the material for answering of some of these questions is provided from a teaching program taking place at the Aarhus School of Architecture. A program named ‘The Regional City’ and ‘Landscape Urbanism’ with assignments dealing differently with some of the questions. At the moment in collaboration with Kronjyllands Erhvervsråd and Randers Erhvers- og Udviklingsråd (Randers Business & Development Council dealing with Trade and Industry in an area corresponding to the new Randers Commune). The main title for the current work is “Randers as place for housing and living in a larger regional context”. The projects are on different scales dealing with housing and living in relation to primarily landscape and infrastructure. Some of the projects from the first phases dealt with ‘Marginalisation as a position of strength’, ‘The Strategic Potential for the Super Forest’, ‘Shrinking Cities’.

The project is partly based on these studies, mappings, investigations and projects, partly as a continuation of an ongoing project on a reading of central parts of a current architectural /urban discourse. 

Even if the project is not about regional planning, it is about the physical footprint of architecture in a regional context and in that sense also about awareness towards well known planning instruments. An awareness that might occur by presenting different optics on well known phenomena and thereby making an offer for a changed approach towards planning. The conditions for daily life, leisure, work, recreation, production are changing rapidly these years, and it is no given thing that the ‘toolboxes’ and tools we used to work with in our efforts to structure town and landscape still are the most adequate ones to use. 

Apart from the literature of the current architectural /urban discourse the project is based on the rhizomatic networks-thinking as formulated by among others Deleuze/Guattari , Manuel Castells, Francois Ascher with studies of some of the work of Stefano Boeri with his investigations of Multiplicity in ‘USE – uncertain states of Europe’ (2001) as well as the works of Chora/Raoul Bunschoten on larger urban agglomerations and the pinpointing on some of the design aspects as made by Bruce Mau and ‘The Institute without Boundaries in ‘Massive Change’(2004) . In a minor case study the project will present a reading on different views on some of the current tendencies in North American dispersed urban agglomerations, compared with European sprawl as described in Xaveer de Guyter AfterSprawl.  

Subproject 5: Regulating the urban fringe
Anne Gravsholt Busck, Assistant Professor, Institute of Geography, University of Copenhagen 

The aim of this project is to analyse current regulation of the urban fringe, and use this insight to guide future regulation of the multitude of functions in the urban fringe. The project analyses both the current development and the processes involved – focusing on Danish case studies but in the perspective of experiences from other European countries. 

The Danish legal act of rural and urban zones divides the country into three zones: rural, urban and summerhouses. The boarders are, however, less clear-cut when the actual changes in urban fringe areas are considered. The traditional picture of rural areas dominated by agriculture land use and associated housing and social structure is being transformed. Non-agricultural enterprises are established in the former farm buildings, while other properties are bought by countryside dwellers (commuting to nearby big cities) or used as second homes.  

These changes may be characterised as an insidious urbanisation, which has consequences for the use of land and buildings but equally impacts the social structures and relationships between the citizens and the public authorities. Thus urban culture and economy has an increasing impact in the urban fringe areas. Especially in metropolitan areas the urban fringe is a highly dynamic zone with unique development potentials and challenges for the planning authorities. This challenge is actualised by the fact that the Danish planning system is presently undergoing mayor transformation. From the planning reforms in the 1970s until today a division of labour (not intended in the original reform) between municipalities and counties has developed with municipalities being the primary planning and regulating authority within the city boarders whereas the counties ruled in the countryside. After the reform, from 2007, regional planning will disappear and the municipalities will become the primary public authority in both urban and rural areas. This means that the municipal planning must be broadened and change perspective on planning and regulation. Concurrently, the present change towards more focus on governance approaches in planning may induce new challenges to the planning authority in the multifaceted urban fringe areas where a great variety of interests are involved.   

The empirical work will focus on case studies of the development in urban fringe areas of Greater Copenhagen – supplemented by experiences from abroad. Copenhagen is an example of the socalled ‘Fingercity’ in which the objective is to aggregate urban functions including housing and transport in slender fingers radiating from the inner city (the palm) - leaving green ‘rural’ areas in between the fingers. Following this principle all urban citizens have easy access to the infrastructure leading to the centre city and at the same time easy access to open green space even close to the city centre. The case studies will be selected purposely to give a varied perspective concerning distance to centre Copenhagen and how the municipalities relate to the insidious urbanisation. The international experiences will be found e.g. in Great Britain, The Netherlands and Belgium. Great Britain has a long tradition of ‘Green Belts’ (surrounding cities), in which specific legislation is adapted. In the Netherlands the concept of ‘Green heart’ is developed as a green area connecting the cities in the ‘Randstad’ of West Holland, and keeping a clear-cut distinction between rural and urban areas. Finally, urbanization in Belgium is characterized by urban sprawl where the boarder between rural and urban is relatively diffuse.  

In the project the development in the urban fringe areas will be described using existing material such as topographical maps, public statistics and planning documents. The current development will be compared to the municipal plans and regulation and national directives. Secondly the processes behind and consequences of the current development will be analysed – including conflicts and relationships between formal and informal actor in the urban fringe. Here interviews with key informants (planners, politicians, entrepreneurs and other actors) at the municipal level will be a primary source of information. The international experiences will be analysed using a combination of literature review and interviews with key informants in the respective country. 

Finally, based on the analyses, new ideas for regulating the fringe areas of Greater Copenhagen will be developed in collaboration with the key persons at the municipal and regional level. 

Subproject 6: Imagineering urban identity for territorial cohesion. Negotiating growth and decline in urban transformation processes

PhD student Anne Tietjen, Aarhus School of Architecture

My project investigates the potential of strategic identity development under growth and decline conditions. The research is based on two comparative case studies in an economically and demographically growing urban territory, the municipality of Aarhus, and in a declining territory, the municipality of Ny Hjørring. By means of research by design possibilities to re-invent urban identity in order to negotiate uneven spatial development are explored. Imagineering of place identity is tested as one possibility to re-think socially, economically and environmentally cohesive urban development. Imagineering (imagination + engineering) works with the construction of images in order to enable a discussion of possible futures between citizens, planners and decision makers. To this end the notion of place identity is examined in relation to present physical and discursive changes taking place in the case study areas. A central question is whether it is possible to perceive changes in the study areas that point to the emergence of a new kind of identity. And if so, what are these changes, how do they occur and not least how can they come into play in future development?