Public-private entanglements: consultant use by local planning authorities in England

Matthew Wargent, Gavin Parker and Emma Street

European Planning Studies, 2020, vol. 28, issue 1, 192-210

Abstract: Despite intermittent recognition of the input of private planning consultants in the UK planning system, there remains a paucity of empirical studies into their roles and influence in contemporary practice. Drawing on interviews with both public and private planners in England, this paper explores the nature of the public-private entanglements that increasingly define local planning practice. These include the heterogeneity of the consultant market, the rationales employed to justify consultant use, the nature of the expertise being deployed, and the asymmetrical nature of public/private relationships. The paper argues that the demands made on the public planning system and the planners that operate it are driving teleological explanations of the use of private expertise, displaying an ambivalence to the fact that Local Planning Authorities are in a position of critical dependency with private sector consultants. In concluding, it is argued that the knowledges that underpin planning practices are increasingly shaped by the market, with the potential to undermine planning’s public interest purpose.

Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09654313.2019.1677565 (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:eurpls:v:28:y:2020:i:1:p:192-210

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/CEPS20

DOI: 10.1080/09654313.2019.1677565

Access Statistics for this article

European Planning Studies is currently edited by Philip Cooke and Louis Albrechts

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