Speaker
Description
The contemporary planning paradigm emphasises the importance of communication, collaboration, and public participation, reframing planners as facilitators and communities as key stakeholders in decision-making processes. This approach seeks to create equitable inclusive spaces for dialogue among diverse stakeholders, focusing on citizens and communities as central players in shaping spatial policies. However, economic and political pressures have increasingly led to the diminishing of public participation, including Ireland.
In Ireland, legal amendments to the planning framework have prioritised private sector interests, often at the expense of public involvement, making current participation models inadequate for democratic practice (Healy et al., 2012; Lennon & Waldron, 2019; Perić et al., 2024). This trend threatens the democratic foundations of planning, emphasising the urgent need for alternative mechanisms to support public interests, and creating opportunities for the introduction of non-statutory approaches. Novel participatory practices emerged as a potential solution for advancing public interest, with digital tools increasingly facilitating public engagement and promoting inclusivity. Among these approaches, geodesign emerged as a framework that merges collaborative planning and GIS technologies. Although it utilises a modern approach to planning, its implementation is not without criticism. Some of the concerns in the literature include the lack of focus on qualitative aspects of participation, limited capacity to address inclusive public participation, and barriers to collaboration between stakeholders (Tulloch, 2017; Debnath et al., 2022). As a result, achieving a fully communicative, collaborative, and inclusive planning process remains an ongoing challenge, particularly in contexts where statutory frameworks fall short of safeguarding public interests.
To address these challenges, deliberative democracy has been proposed as a critical component of participatory planning. By integrating diverse perspectives, recognising differences among participants, and incorporating expert knowledge, deliberative democracy offers a more robust framework for decision-making. This approach offers an opportunity to surpass traditional participatory models by fostering transparency, accountability, and inclusivity. While deliberative democracy has been applied in Ireland for shaping national policies, such as abortion rights, gender equality, climate challenges, etc; its integration into the planning process remains largely unexplored.
This study explores the potential for integrating deliberative democracy and geodesign into non-statutory participation, drawing on initial insights from a pilot conducted in Fingal County, Ireland as part of the H2020 project NBSInfra. A structured participatory framework was developed, incorporating deliberative and geodesign methods with digital tools. The process is unfolded in four phases: (1) broad community input, (2) targeted discussions, (3) expert facilitation, and (4) negotiation among the groups. Each of them reflects a step in the deliberative process, serving as a filter for refining or reimagining planning solutions. Participants reported satisfaction with the inclusive and structured nature of the process, though some challenges were noted. Specifically, some participants highlighted issues of individual dominance during discussions and emphasized the need for facilitators and experts to develop a deeper understanding of local contexts. Despite these limitations, the process demonstrated significant potential for empowering local communities and authorities.
By fostering meaningful dialogue and collaboration, this integration of methods and tools from both approaches represents a crucial first step toward defining a new framework for community engagement, particularly in contexts where statutory participation is limited. In conclusion, the findings from this study suggest that integrating deliberative democracy with geodesign and participatory digital tools could play a pivotal role in reshaping planning practices, ensuring they remain inclusive and aligned with the public interest in the face of shifting economic and political dynamics.
References
Some of the relevant references:
Debnath, R., et al. (2022) Geodesign Approaches to City Resilience Planning: A Systematic Review. Sustainability 14, DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/su14020938
Farrell, D. M. and L. Field (2022). "The growing prominence of deliberative mini-publics and their impact on democratic government." Irish Political Studies 37(2): 285-302.
Forester, J. (1999). The deliberative practitioner: encouraging participatory planning processes. London, MIT Press.
Healy, N., et al. (2012). "Collaborative Tourism Planning in Ireland: Tokenistic Consultation and the Politics of Participation." Journal of Environmental Policy & Planning 14(4): 450-471.
Lennon, M. and R. Waldron (2019). "De-democratising the Irish planning system." European Planning Studies 27(8): 1607-1625.
Perić, A., et al. (2024). "The financialisation of contemporary urban planning policy discourse: insights into Serbian and Irish planning legislation." European Planning Studies: 1-20.
Peric, A. and M. Miljus (2017). "Spatial and urban planning in Serbia: A look through the lens of deliberative approach." Spatium(37): 49-57.
Staffans, A., et al. (2020). "Communication-Oriented and Process-Sensitive Planning Support." International Journal of E-Planning Research 9(2): 1-20.
Suiter, J. and M. Reuchamps (2016). Constitutional Deliberative Democracy in Europe.
Tulloch, D. (2016). "Relinquishing a bit of control: Questions about the computer’s role in geodesign." Landscape and Urban Planning 156: 17-19.
| Keywords | Collaborative Planning; Planning Support System; Geodesign; Deliberative Democracy; Non-Statutory Participation |
|---|---|
| Best Congress Paper Award | No |
