Speaker
Description
**The paper is more of a reflection than a conclusive answer to the question “Should planning and politics converge around the concept of “communities of disagreement”?
The field of planning, both in theory and practice, often has consensus building as a guiding inspiration for its normative theoretical and practical development. Politics, on the other hand, is an activity characterized by disagreement and competition over ideology, values, what is legitimate knowledge and what are good planning solutions. In politics, the aim can often be to cultivate disagreement and dividing lines, more than to find consensus.
Since we in the planning field today are concerned with giving politics and politicians the leading position that normative planning theories and planning legislation say they should have, the planning field must to a greater extent recognize and make room for the need for politics/politicians to highlight disagreement, also in planning processes. Only then will planning become a tool for both political governance and an activity to strengthen democracy.
In this paper, we will present some main positions in the field of planning theory regarding handling professional and political disagreements. We will then introduce the concept «communities of disagreement», as it is defined and discussed in the book Uenighetsfellesskap: blikk på demokratisk samhandling. (Iversen 2014) (Communities of disagreement: perspectives on democratic interaction – own translation).
Iversen argues that the term can refer to a group of people who gather around a common theme, problem or goal, but have different or conflicting views on how this theme, problem or goal should be handled (Iversen 2014). People share problems and discussion arenas, but we share values to a much lesser extent. Our democratic communities are often communities of disagreement, meaning that agreement is far from a necessary condition for functioning communities. Iversen is concerned with various ways to normalize and make disagreement harmless, including disagreements over values, so that in the future we individually and collectively become better at living with all this disagreement.
This is far from new reflections within the field of planning, including within communicative and collaborative planning. However, we as planners notice that Iversen claims that his concept marks a difference to Habermas. Iversen disagrees with Habermas in his view of rationality. Habermas argues for freedom of power in a public conversation because the best arguments will then prevail. This is not necessarily the starting point in a community of disagreement” (Iversen 2014:138). Within communities of disagreement, the arguments for open, free, real discussions are more that more voices provide a greater diversity of ideas, more innovative thinking.
Iversen therefore draws on Chantal Mouffe's theory of political leadership and agonistic politics (Mouffe 2000 and 2005, in Iversen 2014:145 -156). This is an approach to planning that has recently emerged as a critique of, and an alternative to, communicative planning theory. The agonistic perspective recognizes that conflict is an inevitable part of democracy. Thus, the idea that the goal of democracy is to achieve consensus between members of society is rejected. On the contrary, disagreement is something like an inherent necessity in a vibrant, engaging democracy. In an agonistic model, both for politics and planning, the conflicting parties recognize each other as legitimate, even if they disagree. They accept common premises and procedures for political struggle and for planning discussions, which enables a more constructive form of conflict and increases the likelihood of innovative thinking.
We will conclude the paper with some reflections on how the use of the term – with its theoretical anchoring – can contribute to recognizing political disagreement as a necessary, and often creative, element in planning
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References
Iversen, L .L. 2014. Uenighetsfellesskap. Blikk på demokratisk samhandling. Universitetsforlaget
Mouffe, C. (2000). The Democratic Paradox. London: Verso.
Mouffe, C. (2005). On the Political. London: Routledge.
Mouffe, C. (2013). Agonistics: Thinking the World Politically. London: Versco.
| Keywords | Communities of disagreement; politics in planning; agonistic planning |
|---|---|
| Best Congress Paper Award | Yes |
