![Sample our Built Environment journals, sign in here to start your access, Latest two full volumes FREE to you for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5926/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Built-Environment.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
There is a wide gap between planning ideology and planning practice in some regimes. In planning practice, contextual differences and traditional practices affect urban spatial configurations and their related societal dimensions, and also influence the legislative and administrative systems that dictate the process and production of the built environment. This is linked to situations where hidden practices and power relations among key actors may limit democratic participation in the planning process and challenge ethical practice. This paper focuses on the emerging traditions of planning practice in Turkey. We argue that by understanding the role(s) of the key actors in the process and investigating approval processes in detail, it can become evident that planning ‘on the ground’ is often tokenistic and circumvented by hegemonic power relations and tactical actions. These latter in turn side-step a requirement for democratic participation and encourage a ‘loosening’ of planning ethics.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1 By referring to the word ‘praxis’ in some parts instead of practice we aim to refer to the synthesis of theory with practice.
2 Concept proposed by Flyvbjerg Citation1998–Citation2002 for exploring the relations between power and rationality.
3 This term is used by various scholars to distinguish the idealized steps and stated intentions of the decision-makers from what is happening in reality in planning.
4 Other than economic capital, other forms of capital are also prominent, for example, social capital, which, as Bourdieu argues, represents networking capacity and relationships, and ‘which provides each of its members with the backing of the collectively-owned capital, a credential’ capital that is a dynamic reserve to be used later when needed in practice (Citation1986, p. 248).
5 See Roy (Citation2009, p. 7) for discussion about planning theories where ‘a theory’ is promoted as ‘the theory’ yet is not capable of encompassing the situation for all cultures at all times.
6 The significance of law no. 5216 for this research is its widened scope, whereby some of the main areas of authority belonging to district municipalities are transferred over to metropolitan municipalities (i.e. for plan preparation – approval and implementation). The significance of law no. 5393 lies in its article 73, regarding TA declarations, where municipalities are given the authority of declaring sites of at least 50,000 m² within their border as ‘Urban Transformation and Development Areas’. The significance of law no. 5998 is in its proposal of some changes to Municipality Law on issues such as the declaration of urban transformation sites, authorizing metropolitan municipalities to overrule district municipalities on this matter.
7 Both by-laws are concerned with the organization and duties of the new ‘Environment and Urbanism Ministry’ and widening the scope of the Ministry’s powers. From the date of these new by-laws onwards, the Ministry would have the authority to carry out plan preparation, approval, implementation, issue building licenses and occupation licenses, thereby giving the Ministry all levels of authorization for urban development and according to some commentators, turning it into a second TOKI (Mass Housing Administration – have been quite popular on the matters of housing and land provisions) that acts like a one big municipality for the whole country. In this regard, there is an interesting link where the previous head of TOKI became the head of the mentioned Ministry (CUP, Citation2011) who was later (in 2013) accused of corruption and resigned in relation to these claims.
8 While Kemalism is associated with secularism and modernism, anti-Kemalism is usually identified with Islamist and conservative thoughts and therefore this line of thought is associated with anti-Kemalists.
9 Not only Metropolitan municipalities but also ministries and TOKI (Mass Housing Administration) that was initially established to provide affordable housing yet became a land provision office for private projects or luxurious profit-oriented projects more particularly 2000 onwards.
10 Each, when faced with opposition, was superficially redesigned as a tactical move.
11 Especially in the Turkish case, where corruption claims emerged in 2013 involving significant government figures, including the former Minister of Environment and Urban Planning, who was pressured to resign, after which he stated that ‘a significant proportion’ of the construction projects and state bids under legal investigation after the corruption claims had been approved by the former Prime Minister; therefore, according to him, the Prime Minister should also resign (BBC Euro News, Citation2013).
12 Within the given time of the fieldwork and pilot study analysis, Armada I and II, and Kentpark came to the fore. Armada in its initial project (opened in 2002) represented the mid-term in the history of the city’s malls, which begun in 1989 with Atakule mall. Kentpark (opened in 2010) and Armada II (in 2012) were selected as representatives of the recent historical period; both were subject to challenges in their development process. Therefore, these two provided temporally and practically rich material for investigation. We also considered other selection criteria including location, size and theme. It should be noted that after the completion of the field work, other mall developments came to light with the potential to provide interesting insights, namely the malls known as Next Level, Taurus, Podium and the upcoming “New Atakule”.
13 The NGO called Contemporary Capital City Ankara Association is a civil association consisting of lawyers who aim to follow up planning decisions in the city, and present themselves as the representatives of the public interest.
14 Although in the Turkish planning system, there are several scales of plans, master plans and implementation plans, starting from the national scale and continuing with the regional scale, the general custom for the operation of planning in practice is through ‘plan modifications’. This is where a new plan is proposed to represent the modifications and the changes for the existing approved previous plan, usually on a parcel scale, aiming for an increase in building rights or a plan border extension or a land use change.
15 The selection of the councillors can be explained in relation to the two-tier mode of the local government system (district municipalities and metropolitan municipalities), whereby mayors are elected through a majoritarian system, and council members are elected through a proportional representation system (with regard to local elections). There is, however, a 10% threshold and quota member calculation to strengthen the executive power, namely that of the mayor (as the members belonging to the mayor’s party hold the majority while the other party members stay as minorities). The basic qualification for eligibility as a candidate for election as a council member is to be over 25 and to have a minimum degree of education (to be at least a primary school graduate).
16 The Chamber of Urban Planners (CUP) has a legal status emanating from The Union of Chambers of Turkish Engineers and Architects (UCTEA). By law, the UCTEA and institutions affiliated to UCTEA are defined as corporate bodies and professional organizations acting in the form of a public institution.
17 For different cases such as higher scale regional plan approvals, decisions against such as mining activities or against to the changes in the planning regulations, other chambers, that is, Civil Engineers, Landscape Architects, Environmental Engineers Forestry Engineers, Survey Engineers, have also been entering lawsuits.
18 Among the very few regulations that refer to public meetings as a requirement are Environmental Assessment Projects, Conservation Law and Municipality Law (asking for ‘City councils’ to be established that are distinct from municipal councils; contrary to the latter, they would have no powers of authorization). Other legislation usually focuses on taking into consideration the opinion of the other public institutions in order to avoid any unintentional damage to their interests. Therefore, there is no obligation in obtaining public opinion in the planning process, only after the process completed approved plans are usually announced.
19 Experts are usually selected among planning academics or planners working in other public institutions.
20 It has been recognized by the researcher that the recent plans for the Armada and Kentpark, which have been subjected to opposition and continued court processes, were prepared by the same planner.
21 The Turkey Trade Registry Journal is a journal for investor groups and companies and some of the information they share is related to who are the investors and if the investment group is merging with another group and similar items.
22 SA enables the uses of public institutions, tourist, health, cultural, recreational and commercial facilities, showrooms and dormitories.
23 Red marked area is where Armada located yet whole TA Project is hatched in black and bordered with black dots.
24 Planning notes are particular notes and need to be presented with the plan proposal and in the report of the plan, and in some cases, confer higher validity than relevant legislation.
25 Here the condition was that the company should build a school in one of the transformation projects run by the Metropolitan Municipality in a different district, on a ‘turn-key’ basis. The ‘turn-key’ basis implies that the company would have to complete and hand in the key to the new building, as agreed with the municipality (in this case the school of the other TA project), before they can be granted an occupation permit for the mall.
26 The CUP challenged a number of issues, namely, the linking bridge between Armada I and Armada II; the note that provided the freestanding transfer of the building rights between the plots and excluded the underground construction from the overall construction calculations; the misuse of the ‘plan modification’ option in the legislation; and the appropriateness of the scale of the plan.
27 Note that the two plans seem almost identical, the only difference in the plan drawings are the SA hatching and TA title: ‘Kentsel Donusum ve Gelisim Proje Alani’. Within the current planning system, although there are different scales and purposes of planning, most of them have the same spatial language on paper, while the planning notes (which can be easily changed and can be context-specific) may be the only element making a difference between planning levels.
28 However, each of the new plan proposals usually includes either the same the planning notes or similar ones with minor changes, even though these had been the main focus of objections for the lawsuits.
29 This term was used against squatter areas in 1990s to legalize their condition via reclamation plans. Since then it has become a life-jacket for municipalities, that can be used to legalize an already constructed site.
30 It is also important to emphasize here that if the researcher herself had not had her own personal network (her own social capital) in the planning community at the municipal level, it would have been almost impossible to collect all the data for this research.
31 CA published 600 on their website (some for the same place) and CUP published 637 in their bulletin by 2016; while a number of others were opened by other engineering chambers.
32 The Mayor, speaking of a different urban transformation project, stated that ‘within in this new site conservative families will live’. CA claimed that this was a term of hatred. As for them this statement refers to segregation within society, through valuing conservatives over non-conservatives.
33 The recent event where the Mayor stated that if CUP enters one more lawsuit against any plan he will claim a denunciation and CUP’s reply ‘he shouldn’t wait a moment and should claim that denunciation he mentions with regard to the 637 lawsuits that are already in process’, (CUP, Citation2017) clearly presents an antagonistic relation between the two actors, where one side is a politically powerful individual and the other side is an institution with semi-public status.