Insurgent Planning: Situating Radical Planning in the Global South

by Farnak Miraftab, Planning Theory, 2009

This article revisits the notion of radical planning from the standpoint of the global South. Emerging struggles for citizenship in the global South, seasoned by the complexities of state–citizen relations within colonial and post-colonial regimes, offer an historicized view indispensable to counter-hegemonic planning practices. The article articulates the notion of insurgent planning as radical planning practices that respond to neoliberal specifics of dominance through inclusion – that is, inclusive governance. It characterizes the guiding principles for insurgent planning practices as counter-hegemonic, transgressive and imaginative. The article contributes to two current conversations within planning scholarship: on the implication of grassroots insurgent citizenship for planning, and on (de)colonization of planning theory.

A Progressive Policy without Progressive Politics: Lessons from the failure to implement ‘Breaking New Ground'

by Richard Pithouse, Journal of Town & Regional Planning, 2009

This article provides a brief overview of post-apartheid housing policy. It argues that, in principle, ‘Breaking New Ground’ (BNG) was a major advance over the subsidy system but that the failure to implement BNG, which has now been followed by more formal moves away from a rights based and towards a security based approach, lie in the failure to take a properly political approach to the urban crisis. It is suggested that a technocratic approach privileges elite interests and that there could be better results from an explicitly pro-poor political approach – which would include direct support for poor people’s organisations to challenge elite interests, including those in the state, and to undertake independent innovation on their own.