Conclusions: the technocratic logics of contemporary planning

Abstract

This concluding chapter re-assesses the core propositions set out in the first chapter. Succeeding chapters have drawn on these core characteristics to examine and assess the emergence of technocratic logics in contemporary urban environments and the interweaving of new modes of technocracy with political projects and agendas following the financial crisis. While the term ‘technocracy’ is associated with particular, and very specific, historical conjunctures, this chapter argues that by focusing on technocratic logics and conceptions of technocracy it is possible to develop more powerful insights into contemporary planning processes and governance dynamics. At the heart of this discussion lies a dialectical tension between political projects that seek to implement technocratic modes of governance in the pursuit of broader aims, on the one hand, and the complexities of places and place-politics that often lie beyond the limits of technocratic calculation and control on the other. The tensions between these dialectical perspectives are on-going, subject to multiple influences, and prone to forms of incompleteness and contestation at various scales.