Justice as Parity of Participation

Gwendolyn Blue, Marit Rosol and Victoria Fast

Journal of the American Planning Association, 2019, vol. 85, issue 3, 363-376

Abstract: Problem, research strategy, and findings: Social justice is often considered the goal of participatory planning, yet justice is typically not operationalized, broadly defined, or clearly linked with participatory practice. We expand on Sherry Arnstein’s concern with the redistribution of power between the state and citizens by juxtaposing her ladder of participation with Nancy Fraser’s framework of justice. Fraser’s approach to justice seeks parity—defined as the social arrangements that enable people to participate as peers in public life—across economic, cultural, and political domains. Fraser provides principles to guide planners in determining what is just and unjust in participatory initiatives. Principles include ensuring proper participatory procedures, recognizing minority viewpoints and perspectives, attending to the framing of public issues, and remediating inequitable social structures. We illustrate the practical application of Fraser’s justice framework by drawing on examples from public engagement with climate change.Takeaway for practice: Although Fraser does not provide a tool kit for action, we offer suggestions for how planners can apply a justice framework to improve participatory practice. Planners can a) require appropriate procedures to ensure that all relevant people and perspectives are represented at the appropriate scale; b) ensure all perspectives—not just dominant ones—are recognized and valued; and c) respond to and mitigate the inequitable distribution of wealth and resources.

Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/01944363.2019.1619476 (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:rjpaxx:v:85:y:2019:i:3:p:363-376

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/rjpa20

DOI: 10.1080/01944363.2019.1619476

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of the American Planning Association is currently edited by Sandi Rosenbloom

More articles in Journal of the American Planning Association from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().