Local Community Participation in the Planning Process: A Case of Bounded Communicative Rationality

Abstract

The article contributes to the discussions of the relationships between planners and the local community, with a focus on the intervention of the planner in reaching reflexivity and just decisions. In spite of the commonly acknowledged phenomenon of local communities that protest against “unwanted” risk facilities, the principal contradiction in the problem formulation between their lifeworld and the structure of modern institutions has received little attention. This is the focus of the following case study, which explores the communicative activity of the local community within a planning process of mining in a new EU member state. In the theoretical section, I discuss the theory of Habermas to re-investigate the widely criticized foundations of communicative planning. I approach the statements of Habermas with the help of Luhmann to reveal that their different viewpoints may be complementary rather than oppositional. The empirical analysis focuses on the lifeworld of the affected community members and the decision-making process by institutions. The analysis reveals preconditions embedded deeply in the planning process that prevents community members from the introduction of their vision of the issue.

Acknowledgement

This work is sponsored by Estonian Science Foundation (grant No 8347).

Notes

The debate between Habermas and Luhmann is often regarded as their joined book from 1971 (Habermas & Luhmann, 1971), or a relationship that ended at least with Habermas's theory of communicative action (1981). Kjaer (2006) and Knodt (1994) describe Luhmanns relationship with Habermas as a mutual irritation that lasted until Luhmanns death in 1998.

For example, Innes (2004, p. 14) claims that conflict is what makes consensus building capable of producing robust results.

Habermas (1989, pp. 124–125) interprets lifeworld as a stock of interpretive patterns that is culturally transmitted and linguistically organized. Individuals find the relationships between the objective, social and subjective worlds already preinterpreted. Luhmann provided in his discussion with Habermas, his own system theoretical reformulation of lifeworld, by suggesting “meaning” that is conceived through reiterated selections within the horizon of the activated events.

Several studies have indicated that Ida-Virumaa is separated from the rest of Estonia psychologically (Hallik, 1999) and in terms of media (Vihalemm et al., 2004).