Shedding Light on the Shades of Strategic Planning

by Jordi Borja [In the last issue of PN, Fabricio Leal de Oliveira criticized the theory and practice of strategic planning in Latin America, in his article “Strategic Planning and Urban Competition: The Agenda of Multilateral Agencies in Brazil.” Leal…

A Breath of Air in Harlem

by Peggy Dye In the 1930s, Robert Moses, master planner for New York, stripped Harlem of potential park along the Hudson River where, further down the river, his engineers preserved land for white Manhattan communities. In Harlem, planners laid a…

Civil Society: A Challenge to Planners

by Gerda R. Wekerle Planning is generally identified with the state or private sector. ‘Citizens’ are often relegated to discussions of citizen participation, which is token and marginal to the real action. Or they are described as “special interests,” one…

Categories: July/August 2000

Mexico’s Pioneer Experiences in Participatory Planning

By Gustavo Romero Fernšndez In the early 1970s, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) began to get involved in urban planning. They were invited to get involved because they weren’t “urban planning professionals” but technicians linked to the social processes of popular urban…

Categories: July/August 2000

Household Information Strategies and Community Responses

by Gwen Urey For progressive planners, the “digital divide” should be thought of as a “digital wedge.” Technology-based strategies to improve the flow of information at the local level may have perverse effects if we don’t really understand the needs…

Categories: May/June 2000

Online for Organizing: The Story of COMM-ORG

by Randy Stoeker In 1994 Wendy Plotkin, a graduate student at the University of Illinois, started an e-mail discussion list on the history of community organizing. She had lined up a nice set of papers to present on-line. But while…

Categories: May/June 2000

Information Technologies and Progressive Planning

by Ann Forsyth For two centuries technological changes in production, transportation, and communications have been reshaping cities and regions; and for around a century people recognizable as planners have been trying to manage those changes. We are currently in the…

Categories: May/June 2000

Proposal for PEO History Project

By Ken Reardon On October 15 and 16, 1999, approximately fifty former members of Planners for Equal Opportunity (PEO) gathered for a 25th Reunion Celebration at Pratt Institute’s Manhattan Center. Following a short set of remarks by Lew Lubka and…

Categories: March/April 2000

Participatory Budgeting In Porto Alegre, Brazil

by William W. Goldsmith In December 1999, seven PNers went to Porto Alegre and São Paulo, Brazil for nine days of conferences, meetings, and tours to exchange information about progressive alternatives for local government. In Porto Alegre, we made presentations…

Categories: March/April 2000

Election 2000: Is It Time for Urban Policy?

Could it be urban policy time again? As Bush and Gore square off, is there a chance the idea of having a national policy governing urban development ð something most other industrialized nations have could catch their attention?   Election…

Categories: March/April 2000

São Paulo Squat

By Barbara Lynch A highlight of the Planner’s Network trip to Brazil was our December 11 visit to a squat on a lively commercial street in São Paulo’s downtown, close to the streets where mass demonstrations assembled in the 1980s to…

Categories: January/February 2000

Self-Determination and Planning

by Eve Baron During the winter of 1990 an Associated Press photograph of a young Mohawk man dressed in camouflage fatigues appeared in the New York Times. He was on his belly commando-style, brandishing an assault rifle at some unseen…

Categories: January/February 2000

7th generation

By Eve Baron Native Americans have been in the news quite a bit in the last few years›striking it rich with casinos; making hefty political campaign contributions; prompting inquiries into the affairs of cabinet members; bringing Las Vegas to its…

Categories: January/February 2000