Learning from Mistakes: Reflective Planning, Simple Junctures, and Institutional Change

Abstract

This article examines how planners move from reflection to action in pursuit of institutional change. Building on the literature on reflective practice and historical institutionalism, and using Medellín as a case study, I build a framework for analyzing how planners go from reflecting on a problem and identifying its institutional origins to devising solutions based on experience, knowledge, or innovation. Those solutions are then mobilized through “simple junctures,” which are opportunities distinct from everyday processes. The findings, based on interviews, documents, and observations, show the importance of training planners to reflect on institutional factors and of leveraging simple junctures.

Keywords:

• Historical institutionalism
• reflective practice
• Global South
• gradual institutional change
• planning mistakes

Acknowledgements

I thank John Forester and three anonymous reviewers for comments on earlier drafts. I also benefited from discussions on historical institutionalism and reflectivity with Theo Milonopoulos and postdoctoral fellows and faculty at Perry World House. I am grateful to the planners interviewed for this research who shared with me their knowledge and experiences.

Notes

1 The term planner is used in this manuscript to denote individuals working as part of the municipal bureaucracy. These “state-planners” are distinct from ‘citizen-planners’ as identified for example by Beard (2012).

2 For more on the history of Medellín see Hermelin Arbaux et al. (2012) and Pérez (2020)

3 Spatial plans (planes de ordenamiento territorial) and development plans (planes de desarrollo) are the two most important formal instruments at the municipal level in Colombia. For more on mechanisms to enforce nascent progressive planning institutions see Restrepo-Mieth (2023).

Additional information

Funding

A portion of this research was funded by the Department of City and Regional Planning at Cornell University.

Notes on contributors

Andrea Restrepo-Mieth

Andrea Restrepo-Mieth is an Assistant Professor at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy, Rutgers University. Her research examines the emergence and institutionalization of environmentally sustainable and socially progressive planning practices in cities in the Global South, the politics of planning for water services, and grassroots involvement in urban governance.