Using Social Media and Mobile Technologies to Foster Engagement and Self-Organization in Participatory Urban Planning and Neighbourhood Governance

Reinout Kleinhans, Maarten van Ham and Jennifer Evans-Cowley

Planning Practice & Research, 2015, vol. 30, issue 3, 237-247

Abstract: This editorial explores the potential of social media and mobile technologies to foster citizen engagement and participation in urban planning. We argue that there is a lot of wishful thinking, but little empirically validated knowledge in this emerging field of study. We outline key developments and pay attention to larger societal and political trends. The aim of this special issue is: 1) To offer a critical state-of-the-art overview of empirical research; and 2) to explore whether social media and mobile technologies have measurable effects on citizens' engagement beyond traditional mobilization and participation tools. We find that wider engagement only 'materializes' if virtual connections also manifest themselves in real space through concrete actions, by using both online and offline engagement tools. Another requirement is that planners do not seek to marginalize dissenting voices in order to promote the interests of powerful developers.

Date: 2015
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (15)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/02697459.2015.1051320 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:cpprxx:v:30:y:2015:i:3:p:237-247

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/cppr20

DOI: 10.1080/02697459.2015.1051320

Access Statistics for this article

Planning Practice & Research is currently edited by Vincent Nadin

More articles in Planning Practice & Research from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().