Austerity Urbanism

By Sacha Hasan

The word austerity was defined by Merriam-Webster as a condition of enforced or extreme economy. Since 2010, austerity became the key word to describe the post-crisis times and to index the ongoing notions of stern economic measurements, as the meaning exceeded its classical association with self-discipline, thrift and scarcity to further describe the distinctively neoliberal changing matrixes that are often referred to as ‘these economic times’ (Peck, 2012).

Austerity budgeting in the public sector is promoted by neoliberal script as a ‘common sense’ and a ‘necessity’ to respond to the market conditions and failures (Peck, 2012; Fanelli and Paulson, 2010). In this, the state maintains a cult-like privileging of individual economic liberties and personal responsibility, rolling privatisation as fiscal necessities, shifting from the universal, public provision of social services to market provision with attached user fees, lowering of taxation between jurisdictions, and tax-shifting from businesses to consumers and from property owners to the users of city services (Peck, 2012; Fanelli and Paulson, 2010; Harvey, 2005).In other words, austerity contributes to press for "yet smaller small-state settlements at the urban scale" where the most vulnerable social groups are affected (Peck, 2012, p. 626), and this is the terrain of neoliberal urbanism, which is defined by Fanelli and Paulson (2010, p. 4)as:

"... a range of uneven urban processes taking place simultaneously in the communities where we live and work. This includes the privatization, restructuring, or elimination of public goods and municipal services; the shifting of the cost of maintenance of public resources onto the working class; the increasing precariousness of work; the devolution of responsibilities onto local governments without matching fiscal supports; the scaling of regulatory capacities upwards to regional or international institutions (characterized by little transparency, accountability, or public consultation); the reining in of the power of municipal unions and community groups; the scaling back of social entitlement programs; and expansion of so-called 'public-private partnerships' that shift some of the responsibility for urban governance to corporations".

Changing governance and downloading responsibilities have always been the key results of neoliberal government, as it sees governance to be a potential threat to individual rights and constitutional liberties, and democracy to be a luxury and hardly guarantees political stability (Hackworth, 2007; Harvey, 2005; 2012; Peck, 2011; 2012). Alternatively, neoliberals prefer governance by experts and elites, where issues are governed by executive order and judicial decisions rather than democratic and parliamentary decision-making (Harvey, 2005). These are seen to help create and promote a business climate and stable political system. However, practice has shown that neoliberal measures have biases especially at the time of crises. These arise in particular out of "the treatment of labour and the environment as mere commodities" (Harvey, 2005, p. 70). With more focus during times of conflict, like the current fiscal crisis, the typical neoliberal state sides with a good business climate at the expense of collective rights of labour and the capacity of the environment to (re)generate itself. Furthermore, the neoliberal state favours "the integrity of the financial system and the solvency of financial institutions over the well-being of population or environmental qualities" (Harvey, 2005, p. 70-71). When doing this, the neoliberal state aims to restore class power, by limiting state action and focussing on privatisation (‘rolling-back’ of the state) and individual power. However, once again there is a contradiction between theory and practise, as the neoliberal state, especially at the time of conflict, has showed great intervention to create institutional reforms for the benefit of the economic recovery of the elite, through accumulation by dispossession (see Harvey, 2005).Therefore, it is accepted to say that fiscal cutback is a recurrent condition of neoliberal government, despite its proven frequent episodes of over-reach, failure and crisis (see Peck et al., 2010; McBride and Whiteside, 2011).

Reflecting on this and when examining the effects of austerity, since the contemporary crisis began in 2008, and reaching its peak in 2010 when David Cameron came to power, the state, local government, and cities in particular are exposed to the full force of extreme economy. However, the applied austerity measures are not a mere rerun of the 1980s fiscal cutbacks, but a selective consolidation and intensification of their underlying logics and contradictions, resulting in cumulative political, social, institutional and fiscal effects. Thus, more than being a temporary fiscal fasting, austerity economy has led to the cumulative incapacitation of the state; this is driving the current urban crisis (Peck, 2012). This is due to the deeper resulting patterns of structural imbalances between cities governments' revenuesand their ongoing commitments to public services and workforce which are greatly renegotiated, as the preferred targets of austerity programmes are the poor, minorities and marginalised populations, public-sector unions and bureaucratised infrastructures (Peck 2012).

In the US, the majority of cities were bites for austerityare now evident ,they begun to fashion their own fiscal arrangements of reductions in staffing and service levels under the circumstances of falling revenues and structural deficits. While ordinary austerity is encouraging city governments to cut budgets and attempt innovative models of sourcing and privatisation (Peck, 2012).

Nonetheless, it is argued that austerity has failed, as it contributed to worsen and lengthen the crises rather than solve it (Fanelli and Paulson, 2010; Peck 2012). In relation to the geographical context of the proposed research, austerity budgeting showed no signs of success in Europe (Peck, 2012), as growth has slowed (e.g. the UK) or failed all together (e.g. Greece and Spain), protests have been provoked along with opposing movements on both the right and the left, and the hopes for pro-austerity government succession have collapsed (Peck, 2012).Furthermore, this 'severe economy' does not seem to be a passing moment, but a proposed institutional system designed for years to come (Pew Charitable Trust, 2012),because the resulting signs show that cities are expected to fall into line in the age of austerity (Edsall, 2012; Featherstone, et al., 2012).

However, the rationale of austerity starting to take effect since 2008 is defining a new terrain to neoliberalism. This is because it is being examined under distinctive historical and geographical conditions, in the context of already neoliberalised models of local state power and urban politics (Peck, 2012). Therefore, the proposed research suggests the importance to critically examine the features of the emerging ongoing institutional landscapes systemised by the current neoliberal government, as rather than a target, the crisis could be seen to serve as an excuse for  neoliberal governments to achieve two key goals: "the subjection of all workers to strict market discipline, and the political disorganization of the Left" (Fanelli and Paulson, 2010 drawing from Evans, 2009; Rosenfeld, 2009; Alboand Rosenfeld, 2009). This agrees with Krugman's argument (2012, p. A27) which points out that, "the austerity derive... isn't really about debt and deficits at all; it's about using deficit panic as an excuse to dismantle social programmes... economic recovery was never the point; the drive for austerity [is] about using the crisis, not solving it".

Therefore, the impacts of austerity extreme economy has started to take an urban dimension, highlighting certain features that can define austerity economy as an emergent form of neoliberal urbanism, which is austerity urbanism (Peck, 2012).This is because the cumulative effects of austerity extreme end are immediately revealed in the downsizing of public sector workforces, resulting in "back-office and front-line cuts in fields like education, healthcare and welfare [, ]and this will likely be spatially concentrated and socially regressive, compounding the effects of service withdrawals themselves" (Peck, 2012, p. 648). Furthermore, austerity urbanism has started to reach more deeply into ‘hard to reform’ fields (e.g. the welfare state, comprising grant-dependent institutions engaged in service-delivery roles in the community, non-profit and faith-based sectors) (Peck, 2012). This is in addition to the massive privatisation of the public sector (including land and property sites, user fees and service management). This will result in infrastructure development to become more highly dependent on public-private partnership, favouring projects that promise attractive returns. This is while leaving the public-sector developments to face intensifying management and financing difficulties, shifting responsibilities to local city governments that are expected to be 'creative' as to solve the mismatches and imbalances between the local capacities and what is expected from them, leading to hollow urban development policy-making initiatives in order to fill the resulting credibility vacuum (Peck, 2012). For local city governments to absorb these institutional shortcomings and their unaffordable costs, they tend to 'offload themselves'; reductions in social- service delivery and the adoption of fee-based systems will especially affect low-income populations, women and minority groups (Peck, 2012).

These features altogether have gone beyond being of immediate neoliberal characteristics (similar to those of the 1980s), but becoming an indirect drive of ongoing organisational transformation named austerity urbanism. This form of urban politics is defined by Peck (2012, p. 651),

"... to be understood as a particular mutation of neoliberal urbanism, unevenly realized and still no more than emergent in some respects, it is also important to acknowledge that the systemic imposition of fiscal discipline hardly represents a ‘new’ departure in the context of the shape-shifting, nonlinear dynamics of neoliberalisation. [...] however, this does not define a sustainable course. Beyond its internal contradictions, austerity urbanism has already become a site of struggle in its own right, though it remains to be seen whether the latest wave of occupations, pro- tests and resistance efforts will mutate into a politics of transformation".

However, it is important to note that the concept is very contested, as despite a number of emergent features of the concept can be highlighted, these greatly vary from one context to another in terms of severity and effect (Peck, 2012). Thus, having and end abstract definition can be unrealistic, and is not the purpose. The aim here is rather to develop an understanding of the concept and its relation to the examined context.

The role of democracy, decentralisation and planning legislation in defining urban governance context

The governance context in any society is widely affected by the political system which is the main determinant of the size and nature of the sphere of interaction between society forces. One political system widely adapted by a large number of countries is democracy (Weber, 2007). Democracy is an ambiguous concept with no pinned down definition (Abrahamson, 2000 p. 67). However, one side of the concept, and this is related to this thesis context, looks at how it organizes the state and civil society participation.

Literature defines a number of components of democracy. These are, first, broad competition among individuals and groups for the major positions of power; a highly inclusive level of political participation in the selection of leaders and policies; and a level of civil and political liberties in order to guarantee the reliability of political competition and participation (Weber, 2007, drawing from Dahl, 1971; Martinussen, 2003 p. 195).

Nonetheless, many contemporary democracies in the South have adopted only minimalist form of participatory models, arguing that applying participation in wider ways is unrealistic (Abrahamson, 2000). Participation is limited to elections, leaving other areas of society administration exclusively in the hands of the state. This indicates that participation is not a given result of democracy. Rather, any democratic system under study should be analysed in order to identify the existence and functioning of participation spaces within its institutional context. However, despite the minimal participatory model within the democracies of the South, many of these have increasingly shifted towards decentralisation, enabling a potential space for participation at the local level (Weber, 2007, drawing from McCarney, et al., 1995 p. 121).

Decentralisation is not a new concept within international development circles and is increasingly adopted by the democracies of the South as the tenet of ‘good governance’. Furthermore, government decentralisation is considered a gradual process of reform where powers, functions, responsibilities and resources (administrative, political, economic, and land issues) are transferred from central to local governments - and/or to other decentralized entities howsoever defined – which are closer, better understood and more easily influenced by the public. This is because decentralized governance is believed to provide a structural arrangement that secures better interaction among society forces to promote development. This has the potential to enhance the level of civil society participation in local governance and development process (Wekwete, 2004; Kauzya, 2004).

The increasing belief in this connection between decentralised governance and civil society participation is due to the fact that decentralisation has the potential to address key obstacles to sustainable development such as “the severe limitations of centralized planning and management; the over-concentration of power, authority, and resources at the centre; the weak contact between government and local people, including civil society and the private sector; the lack of equity in the allocation of resources; the insufficient representation of various political, religious, ethnic and tribal groups in the decision-making process; the inadequate exchange of information; and the inefficiency of service delivery modalities” (Wekwete, 2004 p. 5). Moreover, government decentralisation is believed to be able to place power within the level of government that is most knowledgeable about the needs of the public. Thus, this government has the potential to produce and implement far more responsive development policies and outcomes than the government of the centre which is politically, physically, and mentally distant from the people (Wekwete, 2004).

However, although many countries of the South are promoting decentralisation as a measurement of ‘good governance’ and ‘democracy’, it is important to note that there is only little evidence that decentralization has performed positively at all times and in all places. Some countries have put in place policies of decentralization but they lack the essential capacities for their implementation. Others are still politically hesitant, not sure of, or maybe not willing to acknowledge, the role of decentralized governance in democratization, people empowerment, and poverty reduction (Kauzya, 2004). Therefore, it is restrictive to assume the existence of a definite relationship between democratic decentralization, local governance and poverty reduction, or between democratic participation and allocative efficiency (Wekwete, 2004; Weber, 2007).

Hence, it is important to recognise the limits of increasing adoption of decentralisation in the countries of the South as a measurement of good governance and democracy. More power, responsibilities and resources are allocated at the local level of the government and this, sometimes, has the potential to increase civil society participation and development efficiency. However, it is important to acknowledge that increased participation is not a definite outcome of decentralised government, but the local governance institutional context is an important determinant of the existence and function of civil society participation.

The governance characteristics within any given context are usually determined by a legal framework that organises the social actors’ relations and those of their institutional forms. This applies to the urban context where urban development, urban management and the processes of urbanisation are enabled via certain regulatory frameworks (formal or informal) which form the urban development mental models in any given context. In this, the urban development legal framework is the determinant of levels of participation in urban development process. Giving participation institutional characteristics shaped by a legal framework is fundamental to creating space for civil society to participate in urban development within the governance context examined. This was introduced in the countries of the North during the late 1960s and early 1970s by laying down laws that made public consultation a statutory requirement for urban decision-making (Sewell, et al., 1977).

However, decision-making within the urban context, and other governance areas, is not fully structured by the formal legal framework. Many countries of the South have experienced dramatic political, social and economic changes which have translated into a high pace of urbanisation, hence urban development frameworks and their related institutional structures, where they were embedded, became out of date (Azevedo, 1998 p. 260). Consequently, informal approaches to urban development decision-making have prevailed, establishing a new framework of urban institutions. According to Healey (1997), systems of clientelism and patronage are two examples of these approaches where legal and non-legal factors of urban development decision-making overlap via socially based interactive relations between politicians and officials (Healey, 1997). These informal practices of urban development decision-making are often hidden from democratic scrutiny and are usually considered a form of corruption. Nonetheless, informal practices have also proven capable of enabling a wider space of civil society participation, and in some cases control, in/over urban development decision-making.

It is important to recognise the vitality of institutionalising participation in a formal legal framework to create a space for civil society input in land-use urban decision-making. Having said this, it is also important to acknowledge and understand the existence and efficiency of informal approaches to land-use decision-making and the socially-based linkages of these with the formal institutionalism of urban decision-making.

Quantitative and qualitative research methods

This review is drawn from (Hasan, Sacha. 2012, Civil Society Participation in Urban Development in Syria)

Since the Enlightenment, deductive quantitative research has been the foundation of the advancement of natural science. This basically relies on objectivity in observations, statistical analysis tools and on the numerical measurement of indicators (Smith, 1999).  This was criticized by the constructive view of knowledge especially in relation to social research where “perception, memory, emotion and understanding are human constructs, not objective things. Yet, this construction is not a chaotic process because it takes place within cultural and sub-cultural settings that provide a strong framework for extracting meaning” (McClelland, 2006 p. 8). Therefore, qualitative research methods were introduced in 1920s and 1930s in the areas of sociology and anthropology (Mark, 1996).

Qualitative methods are understood to produce accounts of human thoughts, feelings and actions, recognizing that those accounts do not apply to all people and that they do not allow predictions to be made in the way that they are in the positivist natural sciences. This argument was emphasised by Rubin & Rubin (1995) who characterised qualitative research to be “not looking for principles that are true all the time and in all conditions, like laws of physics; rather the goal is understanding of specific circumstances, how and why things actually happen in a complex world” (Rubin, et al., 1995 p. 38).

Qualitative research methods are understood to overcome the shortcomings of the quantitative ones in relation to social science. This is due to the difficulty of measuring the outcomes of qualitative objectives and outcomes of, for example, the social development projects and programmes funded by international agencies, where neither quantitative nor qualitative measurements are sufficient to give accurate evaluation (Smith, 1999 pp. 69-70). For example, Family Health International (fhi, 2010) introduced an overview of the differences between quantitative and qualitative research approaches. This was an attempt to provide basic knowledge for those involved in proceeding with its development programmes towards the design of proper research methods that can respond to their objectives. Table ‎bellow illustrates the difference between the two approaches in relation to their general framework, analytical objectives, question format, data format and flexibility in study design. It is clear that each approach has several benefits, yet also shortcomings, when considered abstractly, at least in relation to the purpose of this research.

Source: Family Health International (fhi, 2010 p3)

Therefore, it is acceptable to say that both quantitative and qualitative research methods, when considered solely (when confusing data as ends where the emphasis is on data format rather than its outcome and contribution to understanding) have shortcomings in relation to understanding research questions. This raised the consideration of the dichotomy of these two approaches to be false (Smith, 1999). Consequently, there has been “a marked shift away from the dominance of quantitative and experimental methods toward a paradigm of choices emphasising multiple methods, both qualitative and quantitative, and matching evaluation methods to specific evaluation situations and stakeholder questions” (Patton, 1987 p. 18, in Smith, 1999 p. 70). In this, Oakley (1990) suggests that the results of social research can be considered quantitative while the processes are qualitative. In other words, a combination of two types of data collection and analysis methods can be considered when studying a social phenomenon.

Participation and sustainable development

This review is drawn from (Hasan, Sacha. 2012, Civil Society Participation in Urban Development in Syria)

Sustainable development has become a ‘must present’ concept in contemporary planning theory, development studies and international development policy and practice. Development literature has viewed sustainable development to have three dimensions - social, environmental and economic (Campbell, 2003). The social dimension of the concept looks at social justice, economic opportunity, income equality and the provision of services among different social groups. It further concerns levels of social inclusion and exclusion as indicators of sustainable development. The economic dimension looks at issues of production, consumption distribution and innovation with the competitive market. Moreover, this dimension relates to access to adequate income and issues of poverty, while the environmental dimension focuses on natural resources, waste management and possible threats to nature in general (Campbell, 2003 pp. 437-438).

Another dimension has been added to the concept and this concerns the political area in society. This includes issues of administration and institutional capacity, “arguing that sustainability is reflected by the levels an organization is capable to function over the long term, providing services or assuming tasks that lie within its responsibility” (Weber, 2007 p. 37, drawing from Romaya, et al., 2002 p. 4 and Edén, et al., 2000 pp. 260-261). The political dimension further includes issues of procedural equity, participation and public engagement in decision-making processes, arguing that participatory development leads to more sustainable outcomes (Weber, 2007, drawing from Kothari, 2001 and Rydin, 2003 p. 263). In this, and according to Folger et al (1995), “for a society to function effectively, it must keep its membership, engage in efficient and effective production, and sustain the well-being of its members”.

In agreement with this, it is recognised by the international development policies that “good urban governance is characterized by the interdependent principles of sustainability, equity, efficiency, transparency and accountability, security, civic engagement and citizenship” (UN-HABITAT, 2008). Thus, the UN emphasises that “participation is a fundamental prerequisite of sustainable development” (UN, 2011c). Furthermore, UN development experts agree that a non-transparent, closed style of policy making “could threaten the consolidation of the new democracies of the developing world”. In contrast, “a more inclusionary approach involving, at a minimum, consultation with affected groups was thought to affect the sustainability of policies and improve the prospects for their design and implementation” (Bräutigam, 2004 p. 4).

Institutional analysis of urban development governance context: a conceptual framework

This review is drawn from (Hasan, Sacha. 2012, Civil Society Participation in Urban Development in Syria)

Institutional issues are present in every urban development debate, as it concerns the planning and management of resources in order to potentially achieve the aspects of sustainable development. However, to achieve this, it is important to define who is the planner and the manager, their capacities, the legal framework within which they function. Furthermore, it is important to define areas for possible improvement within this framework and its resulting organisational structure, in order to increase the efficiency of the planning system within any given governance context (Devas & Rakodi, 1993; Haddad, 2009).

Institutions can be defined as ‘organizations or sets of conventions, policies or legislation which regularize social behaviour. Institutions operate at all levels from the household to the international arena and in all spheres from the most private to the most public’ (Matsaert, 2002, 2). In social sciences, institutional analysis  ‘responds to the question of which organizations carry out policy reforms, and what are their characteristics. It can be conceived as the stakeholder analysis of the government agencies, non-government organizations and firms that implement or support the public action choices that underlie a policy reform studies’ (WB, 2009, 1).

In this context, institutional analysis is used to ‘assess the capacity and behaviour of organizations that carry out reforms. This helps identify constraints within an organization that may undermine policy implementation. Such constraints may exist at the level of internal processes, relationships among organizations, or system-wide’ (WB, 2009, 1). Furthermore, this analysis ‘evaluates formal institutions, such as rules, resource allocation, and authorization procedures. It also evaluates soft institutions, such as informal rules of the game, power relations and incentive structures, that underlie current practices. In the latter sense, it identifies organizational stakeholders that are likely to support or obstruct a given reform’ (WB, 2009, 1).

In the context of urban planning, literature has emphasised the linkage between a comprehensive institutional approach and good planning governance, for more sustainable outcomes. For example, Healey (1997) acknowledged the emergence of a paradigm shift in understanding planning from the 1970s rational comprehensive model using political economy analysis, to an institutional and communicative approach in the late 1990s. In this, Healey (2007) emphasised the importance of examining the spheres of relations and institutional sites that link different groups in society together as they interact through a diffused urban governance context. Governance, in this sense, was defined by Healey (2007) to be the landscape that ‘focuses on strategies that treat the territory of the urban not just as a container in which things happen, but as a complex mixture of nodes and networks, places and flows, in which multiple relations, activities and values co-exist, interact, combine, conflict, oppress and generate creative synergy’ (Healey, 2007, 18).

To analyse urban planning governance, Healey (2007) provided a three-level analytical framework. The first level examines the interactions which occurred in a specific event of spatial strategy-making. The second level is an institutional approach which looks at the routines of practices and discourses of the formal government, established agencies and the informal groups and networks (Healey, 2007). These two levels provide an analysis of the society actors and their spheres of relations. The third level of Healey’s analytical framework is concerned more with the ‘cultural assumptions’ of those involved in ‘doing governance’ and their prioritising achieve a more suitable governance module (Healey, 2007). In other words, the third level examines the urban mental models/frameworks (formal or informal) that shape the structure of the given governance context.

Another example of institutional analysis of urban development governance was introduced by Jenkins and Smith (Carley et al, 2001), who proposed three paradigms to label the stages of planning evolution during the 20th century, to shift from a rational to a relative perspective of viewing planning. The first is the command and control paradigm which is of a fixed vision of urban development translated in ‘master plans’ or ‘blue-prints’. In this, planning was of a central nature where the government was in full power over decision-making. This model of planning, however, was widely criticised in the 1960s leading planning to shift to the second paradigm of planning as ‘a process of conflict mediation’. In this, a range of interest started to find their opportunity for a voice within the system reducing the government control over decision-making. This challenged the political-administrative nexus to keep control of both processes and agendas during the 1980s (Healey, 1994, 253). This new model of interaction led planning to further shift to the third paradigm of  ‘inter discursive policy formation’ – which is based on embedding planning practice within its social context, where planning policies are based upon the wide range of interests of society actors via a collaborative consensus building rather than competitive interest bargaining.

In the paradigm shift described above, Jenkins and Smith (Carley et al, 2001) used an institutionalist analytical framework to describe the evolution of the planning process. This consists of three themes. The first examines the key actors, the state, the market and the civil society, who affect the process and their interest and spheres of relations. The second theme – and this is very much dependent on the results of the first one – is an institutional analysis which concerns with the mental models – and this includes the formal legal frameworks and the informal socially accepted frameworks – which shape the relations of the actors into an organisational structure of interaction in relevance to the given urban context. The third theme focuses on the local/global relationship, ‘how local action can act within global context and how global forces adjust to local needs’ (Haddad, 2009).

Civil society – a broader sphere than the community

This review is drawn from (Hasan, Sacha. 2012, Civil Society Participation in Urban Development in Syria).

The word ‘community’ is densely used in planning theory, policies and legislation. The most common use of ‘community’ is to refer to a territorial group (Johnston, et al., 2000 p. 101), while the more accurate use is to refer to a group which shares the same interests (Jenkins, 2007).

In ordinary speech, according to Young (1990), the term ‘community’ refers to “the people with whom one identifies in a specific locale. It refers to neighbourhood, church, schools. It also carries connotations of ethnicity, race, and other group identifications. For most people, a ‘community’ is a group that shares a specific heritage, a common self-identification, a common culture and set of norms” (Young, 1990 p. 343)

Healey (1996) gave two meanings to ‘community’.  “The first is spatially based, all those in a place who share a concern and/or are affected by what happens there. The second is stake based, that is, all those who, directly or indirectly, have an interest in or care about what the people in the first community are doing in a place” (Healey, 1996 p. 244).

But, there is still a less common usage of the word ‘community’ in de-constructing power relations, as “the second image carried in the word ‘community’ is as an opposition to a dominating force”. This image “draws individuals into a place-based moral order”.  It “draws individuals together into an aggregate interest, the citizens or ‘ordinary people’, versus powerful external force” (Healey, 2006 p. 124).

However, the concept of ‘community’ is now more difficult to pin down because of the broader spatial nature of planning issues and the fact that there is wider spatial interaction between places (Healey, 2006 pp. 122-126). Thus, the appeal of ‘community’ “can be reinterpreted to mean the assertion of the concerns of accomplishing life strategies and everyday life in the context of the forums and arenas in which political community finds expression, and in which collective activities are organized” (Healey, 2006 p. 126).

This researcher uses the term ‘community’ to refer to the group of people who share a spatial territory targeted by a certain development (the scale of the territory is decided by the scale of the development e.g. a local neighbourhood targeted for a regeneration project, a region targeted for a new transportation network,… etc), taking into consideration all the social differences this group may have (differences of interest). This definition is less complex and more relevant to the research purpose. This is because the research adopts a case study approach, where two developments are chosen for analysis and those are targeted to two areas. Thus, ‘community’ here refers to those targeted by the chosen developments. However, the social differences of people included are taken into account due to the effect these differences impose on the structure of society, formal and informal. Furthermore, they affect the institutional structure of the related urban development decision-making. These relations between the structure of civil society and urban development decision-making are further explained in this chapter.

On the other hand, the concept of ‘civil society’ is a much broader concept which might have been initiated by the recent complex spatial nature of planning under the circumstances of state disability and market competitiveness and self-interest vision of service production (Carley, et al., 2001; Douglass, et al., 1998). For Hall (1998) it is “a form of societal self-organization which allows for co-operation with the state whilst enabling individualism” (Johnston, et al., 2000 pp. 84-85; Hall, 1998).

Civil society exceeds the limits of the concept of ‘community’, to include all society segments which, in theory, lie outside both the sphere of production (private sector) and the state (Johnston, et al., 2000; Alexander, 2008). However, civil society economic components of non-profit and voluntary organisations form an active part of the production sphere of society, to an extent it is considered in some literature as an extension of the private sector (see Figure ‎2 1). Furthermore, civil society has a strong effect on the supply and demand of goods and services and, consequently, on the shape and function of the market. Thus, in practice, the boundaries between state, civil society and market are often complex, blurred and negotiated (LSE, 2004). As such, civil society embraces “a diversity of spaces, actors and institutional forms, varying in their degree of formality, autonomy and power” (LSE, 2004).

Civil societies are often populated by organizations such as registered charities, development non-governmental organizations (NGOs), community groups, women's organizations, faith-based organizations, professional associations, trade unions, self-help groups, social movements, business associations, coalitions and advocacy groups (LSE, 2004). Against this, civil society organizations are classified in many ways—by sector, focus, origins, scale, level of formality, values, or theoretical perspectives. These function in representation , technical expertise , capacity-building , service delivery  and various social functions . However, it is important to recognize that civil society organisations (CSOs) and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) differ in the degree to which they provide these functions (WB, 2000).

The diversity of places, actors, institutional forms, formality and power CSOs have and the differences in the degree of function provision is very much related to the structure of civil society. Carley et al (2001) identified two types of civil society structure, vertical (formal) and horizontal (informal). The first type is usually formally recognised among the other society forces and functions in the economic (cooperatives, companies limited by guarantee, not for profit organisations), social (trusts, charities, NGOs) and cultural (sport clubs, religious groups, music and cultural clubs) areas. However, the areas of function of formal CSOs intertwine and it is hard to define end boundaries of each area of function to such an extent that the economic based CSOs are considered in some literature to be an extension of the private sector sphere (Carley, et al., 2001).

The informal, or horizontal, structure of civil society has no formally recognised organisational form but is based on the relations of kinship among members of the society (Carley, et al., 2001). This form of civil society is very active especially in the countries of the South and provides all five functions discussed previously. However, (and this applies to this research case study context) this form is specifically active in the area of service provision especially when the formal CSOs are of limited power. This structure of civil society has proven to be well connected with the other two forces in the society, the state and the market, and also the formal structure of civil society, reflecting Jenkins (2007).

Governance as a concept

This review is drawn from (Hasan, Sacha. 2012, Civil Society Participation in Urban Development in Syria).

The dictionary of human geography identified two different uses of the term ‘governance’.  The first is consistent with the nature of organizations as it refers to “the involvement of a wide range of institutions and actors in the production of policy outcomes, including non-governmental organizations, quangos, private companies, pressure groups and social movements as well as the state institutions traditionally regarded as a formal part of the government. Here ‘governance’ is a broader category than ‘government’, with government being one component of governance among many” (Johnston, et al., 2000 pp. 316-317).


The second definition refers to the nature of the organizations’ relationships. Here, governance “refers to a particular form of coordination. In contrast with the top-down control in coordination through hierarchy and the individualized relationship in coordination through markets, governance involves coordination through networks and partnerships” (Johnston, et al., 2000 pp. 316-317).

International agencies, which promote ‘good’ governance (for example: the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank), tend to adapt a normative definition which is confined in its focus on economic management issues rather than a more analytically and socially oriented one. Michel Camdessus (IMF managing director), for example, suggested that “good governance is important for countries at all stages of development. . . . Our approach is to concentrate on those aspects of good governance that are most closely related to our surveillance over macroeconomic policies—namely, the transparency of government accounts, the effectiveness of public resource management, and the stability and transparency of the economic and regulatory environment for private sector activity.” (IMF, 1997).

In contrast, UN agencies see good governance from a more socially oriented perspective . The UN defines ‘good governance’ as promoting “equity, participation, pluralism, transparency, accountability and the role of law, in a manner that is effective, efficient and enduring” (UN, 2011a). The UN system promotes good governance through many avenues. For example, The UN Development Programme (UNDP) actively supports national processes of democratic transition.  The programme focuses  on “providing policy advice and technical support and strengthening the capacity of institutions and individuals” by boosting advocacy and communications, public information campaigns and brokering dialogue. It also facilitates ‘knowledge networking’ and the sharing of good practice (UN, 2011a).

It is now widely accepted that “governance is much more than the formal institutions of government. Governance includes the whole range of actors within society, such as community based or grass-roots organizations, NGOs, trade unions, religious organizations and businesses, both formal and informal, alongside the various branches of government and governmental agencies, both national and local” (Devas, 2001 pp. 5-6). Here it is important to note that governance is different from government as it goes beyond governmental organisations to include other actors in society such as civil society and the private sector. Besides, it is more concerned with the nature of the relationships between these actors rather than being limited to the state’s way of managing the country. In recent research, governance is seen as the sphere of relationships between government, actors of civil society and the private sector, also referring to the processes of interaction between these (Carley, et al., 2001 pp. 16-30).

To conclude, ‘governance’ is an evolving and contested concept, which is a healthy issue as it invites the possibility for further development towards a wider definition of it.