Planning Theory
Date Due: Submission of electronic copies must be onFriday 28th August, 2019.
You should
critically discuss
(i.e. explain and discuss with 1-2 practical examples) what you think are the key arguments of each discussion reading from course weeks 2-5 (8 readings). Each reading should be addressed in a maximum of 100 words.
You should spendone sentence onlyon each key argument you identify. The remainder of the 100 words is to say why you agree or disagree with the author/s, relating the argument to a practice situation if possible.
The reading reference details should form the header for each discussion and are not included in the word count.
Week 5/Phronetic planning research theoretical and methodological reflections-1.pdf Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rptp20 Planning Theory & Practice ISSN: 1464-9357 (Print) 1470-000X (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rptp20 Phronetic planning research: theoretical and methodological reflections Bent Flyvbjerg To cite this article: Bent Flyvbjerg (2004) Phronetic planning research: theoretical and methodological reflections, Planning Theory & Practice, 5:3, 283-306, DOI: 10.1080/1464935042000250195 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/1464935042000250195 Published online: 04 Sep 2009. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 2446 Citing articles: 192 View citing articles https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rptp20 https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rptp20 https://www.tandfonline.com/action/showCitFormats?doi=10.1080/1464935042000250195 https://doi.org/10.1080/1464935042000250195 https://www.tandfonline.com/action/authorSubmission?journalCode=rptp20&show=instructions https://www.tandfonline.com/action/authorSubmission?journalCode=rptp20&show=instructions https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/citedby/10.1080/1464935042000250195#tabModule https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/citedby/10.1080/1464935042000250195#tabModule Planning Theory & Practice, Vol. 5, No. 3, 283–306, September 2004 Phronetic Planning Research: Theoretical and Methodological Reflections BENT FLYVBJERG ABSTRACT This article presents the theoretical and methodological considerations behind a research method which the author calls ‘phronetic planning research’. Such research sets out to answer four questions of power and values for specific instances of planning: (1) Where are we going with planning? (2) Who gains and who loses, and by which mechanisms of power? (3) Is this development desirable? (4) What, if anything, should we do about it? A central task of phronetic planning research is to provide concrete examples and detailed narratives of the ways in which power and values work in planning and with what consequences to whom, and to suggest how relations of power and values could be changed to work with other consequences. Insofar as planning situations become clear, they are clarified by detailed stories of who is doing what to whom. Clarifications of that kind are a principal concern for phronetic planning research and provide the main link to praxis. The way to re-enchant the world … is to stick to the concrete. (Richard Rorty) Letting Rationalism Go An earlier article discussed what was called ‘phronetic planning research’ and offered an example of how this method may be employed in practice (Flyvbjerg, 2002). It is a basic tenet of phronetic planning research that practical examples are typically more effective vehicles of communication than are discussions of theory and methodology. Conse- quently, it was found to be appropriate to first depict phronetic planning research by way of an example. Needless to say, that does not leave theory and methodology unimportant, and this article will argue the case for phronetic planning research from the perspective of its theoretical and methodological underpinnings. The old joke that methodology, like sex, is better demonstrated than discussed, applies here as elsewhere. The author is well aware of the paradox that the article will be arguing theoretically for a methodology that emphasizes practice. Readers who are unwilling to accept this paradox and want to see practical examples up front should refer to Flyvbjerg (1998b, 2002), which demonstrates the methodology in action. How- ever, for researchers who are considering undertaking phronetic planning research, the thoughts below may be useful, not as methodological imperatives, but as possible indicators of direction. In any case, these are the reflections on theory and methodology Bent Flyvbjerg, Department of Development & Planning, Aalborg University, 9220 Aalborg, Denmark. Email:
[email protected] 1464-9357 Print/1470-000X On-line/04/030283-24 © 2004 Taylor & Francis Ltd DOI: 10.1080/1464935042000250195 284 B. Flyvbjerg that have gone into developing the phronetic approach to planning research. The objective has been to help develop a pragmatist, as opposed to normative or utopian, position in planning research. Three things need to be done if planning research is to be taken in this direction. First, the rationalism typical of most of the schools of planning thought that influence planning research should be given up, from the rational planning paradigm to the knowledge/action theory of planning to the communicative paradigm. The taken-for- granted ‘truths’ about the rational and progressive promise of planning should be replaced by an analysis of these truths, and of planning, in terms of power. Second, the problems that matter to groups in the local, national, and global communities in which we live should be addressed, and this should be done in ways that matter. Finally, the results of research should be communicated effectively and dialogically to fellow citizens and their feedback should be carefully listened to. If this is done, with a focus on the values and interests of specific groups in the context of particular power relations, planning research may be transformed more effectively into an activity of import to those involved in and affected by planning, sometimes by clarifying, sometimes by critiquing and intervening, sometimes by generating new perspectives, and always by serving as eyes and ears in ongoing efforts at understanding the present of planning and deliberating about its future. What is Phronetic Planning Research? Phronetic planning research is an approach to the study of planning based on a contemporary interpretation of the classical Greek concept phronesis, variously translated as practical wisdom, practical judgement, common sense, or prudence. Indeed, other planning research has focused on practical judgement and could be said to contain elements of phronesis in this sense (Forester, 1993, pp. xi, 32; 1999; Throgmorton, 1996). The main difference between such research and the approach developed here lies in the concept of power. Previous research with a focus on practical judgement has been steeped in the communicative, Habermasian tradition. Elsewhere it has been argued that this tradition is not the most effective for thinking about power in planning (Flyvbjerg, 1998a). In order to understand power it would be better to take a point of departure in thinkers who focus on power instead of in thinkers who focus on communicative rationality. Therefore, the point of departure in the current study is in the work of Machiavelli, Nietzsche, and Foucault, who have all written canonical texts on power. Like previous thinking about practical judgement in planning, the classical interpret- ation of phronesis is strong on values but weak on issues of power. The interpretation presented in what follows attempts to balance values and power. Here practical wisdom involves not only appreciative judgements in terms of values but also an understanding of the practical political realities of any situation as part of an integrated judgement in terms of power. First, the article will clarify what phronesis and phronetic planning research is. Second, an attempt will be made to tease out the methodological implications of this research approach. Aristotle is the philosopher of phronesis par excellence. In Aristotle’s words, phronesis is an intellectual virtue that is “reasoned, and capable of action with regard to things that are good or bad for man” (The Nicomachean Ethics, 1976, hereafter abbreviated as N.E., pp. 1140a24–b12, 1144b33–1145a11). Phronesis concerns values and goes beyond analyti- cal, scientific knowledge (episteme) and technical knowledge or know how (techne) and it involves what Vickers (1995) calls “the art of judgement”, that is to say decisions made Phronetic Planning Research 285 in the manner of a virtuoso social actor. It will be argued here that phronesis is commonly involved in practices of planning and, therefore, that any attempts to reduce planning research to episteme or techne or to comprehend planning practices in those terms are misguided. Aristotle was explicit in his regard of phronesis as the most important of the three intellectual virtues: episteme, techne, and phronesis. Phronesis is most important because it is that activity by which instrumental rationality is balanced by value-rationality. The distinction between instrumental rationality and value-rationality follows Max Weber (1978, p. 85ff.). Instrumental rationality is sometimes also called ‘means-rationality’ and value-rationality is also called ‘substantive rationality’. According to Aristotle and Weber, the balancing of instrumental rationality by value-rationality is crucial to the viability of any social organization, from the family to the state. However, a curious fact can be observed. Whereas episteme is found in the modern words ‘epistemology’ and ‘epistemic’, and techne in ‘technology’ and ‘technical’, it is indicative of the degree to which scientific and instrumental rationality dominate modern thinking and language that there is no modern word that similarly incorporates the classical word for the one intellectual virtue, phronesis, which Aristotle and other founders of the Western tradition saw as a necessary condition of successful social organization, and as its most important prerequisite. Therefore, for lack of a satisfactory modern word, the term ‘phronetic’ is used to denote planning research that emphasizes phronesis. Aristotle on Episteme, Techne, and Phronesis The term ‘epistemic’ derives from the intellectual virtue that Aristotle calls episteme, and which is generally translated as ‘science’ or ‘scientific knowledge’. Aristotle defines episteme in this manner: Scientific knowledge [episteme] is a demonstrative state, (i.e. a state of mind capable of demonstrating what it knows) … i.e. a person has scientific knowl- edge when his belief is conditioned in a certain way, and the first principles are known to him; because if they are not better known to him than the conclusion drawn from them, he will have knowledge only incidentally. This may serve as a description of scientific knowledge. (N.E., pp. 1139b18–36) Episteme concerns universals and the production of knowledge that is invariable in time and space and achieved with the aid of analytical rationality. Episteme corresponds to the modern scientific ideal as expressed in natural science. In Socrates and Plato, and subsequently in the Enlightenment tradition, this scientific ideal became dominant. The ideal has come close to being the only legitimate view of what constitutes genuine science, such that even intellectual activities like planning research and other social sciences, which are not and probably never can be scientific in the epistemic sense, have found themselves compelled to strive for and justify themselves in terms of this Enlightenment ideal (for the full argument, see Flyvbjerg, 2001, Ch. 3–4). Planning research practiced as episteme would be basic science aiming at universality and searching for generic truths or laws about planning. Historically, this type of research has contained strong elements of positivism and rationalism. Today, many planning researchers consider positivism a long-dead phenomenon of the 1960s and 1970s. This is the view of Judith Innes, for instance, who in a recent debate about post-positivism held that, “to keep worrying about the positivist model seems to be beating a dead horse”.1 Positivism and the rational model of planning have been 286 B. Flyvbjerg relegated to a corner of the curriculum rather than the center, which is now occupied by communicative planning theory, according to Innes. But, as pointed out by Frank Fischer in a reply to Innes, it is only on the surface of things, in discourse, that positivism has declined. Studies show that in practice the positivist tenet is still very much with us (Morcol, 2001). Fischer therefore concludes: In short, the ideology wanes, but the practices [of positivism] remain embed- ded in our educational and governmental institutions. And, because