3. Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) - All submissions
Permanent URI for this communityhttps://wiredspace.wits.ac.za/handle/10539/45
Browse
Search Results
Item Critical pragmatism in planning : The case of the Kathorus Special Integrated Presidential Project in South Africa(2008-09-18T12:20:18Z) Zack, TanyaContemporary South African planning practice is rich in detail, complexity and innovation born out of a need to fulfil a post-apartheid development agenda. This practice warrants theorising. This dissertation aims to advance the concept of critical pragmatism into an analytical framework that will facilitate the analysis and theorising of one such complex planning case, and its delivery. The case study examines the Kathorus Special Integrated Presidential Project (KSiPP) – an ambitious, large-scale strategic planning programme that was by many accounts successful in achieving a substantial range and scale of outcomes in an exceedingly complex underdeveloped and violence-ridden context. This case provides the material for a deeper analysis of what actually happened in the project, through the application of my framework. Within the dissertation I define critical pragmatism as a concept for exploring planning practice as: An analytical framework for examining the actual processes and outcomes of planning practice that is contextually situated; that operates within and through pervasive power relations, which are exercised through and influenced by multiple rationalities, and practice in which the planning choices that are made are valueladen and mutable. This framework is comprised of five interrelated elements. These are: context, outcomes, power, rationality and ethics. These are derived through a study of the philosophical roots of critical and pragmatic schools of planning. My interrogation of these roots and planning traditions, especially with reference to thinkers such as Dewey, Habermas, Foucault, Harrison, among others, finds that while the critical traditions predominantly foreground power, the pragmatic traditions predominantly focus on action and outcome. Each tradition is limited and a conversation between them, in an integrated critical pragmatism produces a framework that can address the sort of complexities manifest in the KSiPP. Out of this conversation and the identification of ethics as an element somewhat lacking in both traditions, a contemporary critical pragmatic analytical framework is derived and substantiated, with significant implications for the discipline of planning. My own involvement as a practitioner in the project provides close methodological benefits and insights for the thesis. The research methodology employed in this thesis focuses on case study techniques, with a strong leaning on practice writing. An in-depth literature review research into theoretical concepts in planning and philosophy has enabled the development of an appropriate framework for analysis. The application of my framework yields deep and nuanced findings of the KSiPP. These include the extent to which context and circumstances contributed to the project, whose means and ends were multifaceted. The explicit assessment of power in the project illuminates its many faces in its institutional, collaborative and personal forms. A precise examination of the rationalities that were at play finds competing political and technical rationalities, and their relationships with power and action. Finally, an assessment of the project against the ethical question of justice, found it lacking and modified the sense of the KSiPP as an entirely successful endeavour. The value of critical pragmatism is that it enables a conversation between the analytical efforts to understand planning practice and outcome, and the efforts to analyse the power, rationality and ethical choices inherent in planning processes. It also takes what is implicit within such frameworks and particularly in the work of Forester, who has written of a critical pragmatic approach to planning, and makes this explicit and thus available for use in further evaluation.Item The role of planning in mediating conflicts involving tourism development and land access by local communities: The case of the Matutuine district(2008-08-08T10:31:11Z) Nhampossa, Paulo Bento GomesThe Role of Planning in mediating conflicts involving tourism development and land access by local communities in the Matutuine district, south of Mozambique, is the theme of this research report. The aim of the study was to analyse and understand how tourism development in a particular context, the Matutuine district, has impacted on the life of the local communities. Access to land and to the other natural resources as well as associated socio-economic aspects was explored. Present and proposed planning approaches and their role in minimising land use conflicts were also investigated. In order to address the research problem, the following research question has been proposed: Are the problems arising from the conflict of interest that involve tourism development and land access by local communities responsible for land degradation in the district? The following subsidiary questions have been proposed to assist in answering the main question: What type of land use conflicts exist in the district of Matutuine and how has tourism affected the local communities? Has tourism been beneficial to local communities in terms of land access, participation and tourism spin-offs? To what extent do land use conflicts influence land degradation and how does planning respond to this? After developing the theoretical and conceptual framework of the study, a combination of methods such as documentary analysis, sampling and interviews, participant observation and spatial observation was used to collect primary and secondary data under analysis. Data collection mainly focused on the main land use types and land use conflicts, participation of local communities in tourism development, socio-economic benefits that accrue from tourism development, land degradation and planning and management of tourism, land and the other natural resources. The resulting data and information were organised and analysed through out the chapters in order to answer the research questions. The research revealed that tourism development has not been beneficial to the local communities. Institutional fragmentation and overlapping of mandates, a lack of common understanding and enforcement of legislation, corruption, and a lack of capacity building and legal status of the local communities are the main reasons for a dysfunctional tourism system in the study area. In order to contribute for the management and resolution of land use conflicts in the study area, it is recommended that planning and planners should introduce new planning processes such as collaborative and communicative approaches, facilitation and mediation techniques as well adaptive processes to address power relations among stakeholders.Item The role of civil society in promoting greater social justice for forced migrants living in the inner city of Johannesburg(2008-04-03T12:12:17Z) Mbombo, Dieudonne BikokoABSTRACT This paper analyses what has arguably become a salient feature of a ‘just city’ and social development on an international level, namely social justice. Specifically, it focuses on the role of the Johannesburg’s civil society organisations in promoting greater social justice for forced migrants (refugees and asylum seekers) living in the downtown Johannesburg. For this purpose, a case study was carried out, particularly with Africa’s forced migrants living in the inner city of Johannesburg (in Hillbrow and Yeoville). The research makes use of in-depth interview and participant observation methods to uncover the perspectives of a group of refugees and asylum seekers and members of seven civil society organisations, working with forced migrants in Johannesburg. The main research question that the study addresses is: What role can civil society organisations play in facilitating greater social justice for Africa’s asylum seekers and refugees living in the inner city of Johannesburg? I have concluded that Johannesburg’s civil society organisations have the potential, which may allow them to bring social transformation and create a just city by promoting a greater social justice for forced migrants living in the inner city. To achieve this goal, they should play a reformative and transformative role in the inner city, by challenging government exclusionary policies and decisions relating to the forced migrants; and, at the same time, they should mediate between the government and forced migrants at the local and national levels. To conclude this report, I recommended civil society organisations to develop strong collaboration with the city’s planners for a better improvement of the quality of life of forced migrants in the inner city. I also recommend the national government to decentralise its decision-making power on international migration issues by conferring to the provinces and local governments certain power which can allow them to develop internal structures (taking into account the context of each province), which can allow them to protect the basic rights of refugees and asylum seekers, such as the rights to work, to study, and to access free health care.Item Re-generating the culture factory: deconstructing interpretations of culture in the hybrid city(2008-03-06T14:06:32Z) Dinath, YasmeenABSTRACT: What is culture? What is the culture of the city? The premise of this study is that the construction of an official rationality of culture, as a concept that underlies culture-led urban regeneration and place-marketing, is often limiting and exclusionary. The official concept of culture often overlooks the important political nuances and complexities that are involved in the representation and appropriation of cultural identities. It also neglects the value of the symbols and practices that are produced in the everyday life of the city, which may provide a real inclusionary, socially relevant understanding of identity and difference in the city. The study explains the need to prompt urban practitioners and theorists to begin to deconstruct prevailing interpretations of urban culture so that we may begin engaging with alternative interpretations of identities, cultures and difference to more authentically reflect the fluid meanings produced in the realm of urban everyday life. Beginning with a brief glimpse into the various meanings constructed for culture over time, the study then proceeds to analyse the official documented discourse on culture constructed for the city of Johannesburg. These ideas are then distilled into four critical themes acting as a conceptual framework relating to the interpretation of culture in the city. These four themes lead to an exploration of the space of everyday life as an alterative source of the multiple shifting meanings and identities being formed daily in the everyday life of the city. This study extends an invitation to urban theorists and practitioners to embark upon the task of critically deconstructing the realities and political complexities of prevailing interpretations of culture in the city that underlies urban regeneration. In this way the study aims to stimulate the development of alternative rationalities in urban planning about the nuances and representations of social life, identities and difference in the city, urging a 9 critical review and critique of urban decision making and its consequences for the everyday social experience of the city. This research concludes by suggesting that the concept of culture be deprivileged in the context of urban regeneration and that a new direction in practising urban regeneration and place-marketing be explored in the spaces of everyday life.