poonam prakash

In the profession of planning, a highly political activity, decisions invariably entail ethical decisions. The sensitization of students toward ethical dilemmas has become more critical as increasing urbanization and large agglomerations require more complex decision making for development. With many actors intervening in planning decisions, planning practice today faces many pressures particularly in the context of privatization and real estate interests influencing decisions related with land use, development controls, etc. This paper, in the first section, provides an introduction to professional ethics. In planning education, articulation of professional ethics is through the syllabi. It reviews syllabi of undergraduate program of selected planning institutes. Many of the curricula invariably include a course on professional practice with a module on code of conduct. Discussion on ethics is not easy because it can easily degenerate into a cliche’ on one hand and is extremely challenging to incorporate into every day life on the other. This is particularly true when the social context in which the planning education and profession is situated places insignificant importance to the question of values. Third section with the help of examples from plan making of Delhi highlights the context of practice and the challenges this practice imposes on teaching of planning ethics. Fourth section suggests moving from mere familiarity to code of conduct to much more intensive teaching of ethics through experiential learning and case study method for the students to develop skills to undertake ethical decision making. This paper concludes that for planning to gain more legitimacy as a profession in the present context, planning education needs to give greater importance to the question of ethics in planning in India and suggests an approach to teaching of professional ethics.

Studio-based Learning is central to architecture and planning education. In terms of assessment and time spent, almost forty to fifty percent of the credits are devoted to the studios courses. Based on real life situations the Studio helps students synthesise various concepts in the process of finding solutions to complex problems. This paper attempts to connect the concepts of Experiential Learning, Reflective Practice and Critical Pedagogy to Studio-based Learning and, argues that, instead of being the ritualistic exercise it is currently perceived as, Studio-based Learning has an untapped potential to provide a transformative experience for the student. Such a transformative experience would include a re-examination of the current teacher- student relationship, nature of studios as physical spaces, system of assessment and transformative nature of the studio exercise.

Participation is usually considered a good thing even if it is unclear how to achieve a meaningful participation for planning purposes. Viewed from different perspectives in literature; efficiency, empowerment, freedom of choice, process of shared learning and solutions, etc. appropriateness of different forms of participation at different levels and for different objectives continues to elude planners. Participation has also been critiqued as a waste of time, simple rhetoric and more strongly as an instrument of cooption and manipulation.

In India, participation has been part of many urban and rural development projects focusing on service delivery particularly for the poor, since mid eighties. In town planning, citizen participation was mandated in some form in most of the town planning laws in India particularly for plan preparation and modification of statutory plans like master plans and zonal plans from the very beginning. In the past few years, in addition to the statutory requirements for participation other participatory planning practices like stakeholder workshops, open houses promoted by international agencies, which are outside the mandated arenas have captured the attention of the policy makers. There is an increasing cacophony on participatory planning particularly through the form of stakeholder workshops. This form of participation in planning is premised on the argument of taking into account ‘preferences’ of the people and the existing ‘ground realities’.

This paper examines some of these participatory planning practices currently ongoing in Delhi with an objective to understand the institutional context in which these practices operate and the nature of interests served by them. With the help of case examples drawn from city level and local level plan preparation (preparation of master plan for 2021 and ongoing process of master plan review in Delhi, process of change of land use and preparation of local area plans), the paper intends to explore how participatory processes are being used as a mechanism to co-opt technical expertise as well as legitimize political agendas. The paper will explore the purpose, extent and nature of participation at the city and local level.

An examination of some of these practices, points towards process of legitimizing priorities and agendas identified through back-door networks and politics of influence in statutory as well as extra-statutory participatory processes. Secondly, increasing emphasis on extra-statutory participatory processes not only subverts statutory participatory processes, but are more open to manipulation and servicing of market interests.