From consultation to deliberation?: tracing deliberative norms in EIA frameworks in Swedish roads planning

This paper presents the results of an analysis of deliberative norms in the framework for Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) in roads planning in Sweden. The more specific question is how this framework has responded to the shift towards more deliberative approaches to planning and decision making, advocated in planning theory and policy literature over the last decade. The analysis, which compares the current framework and guidance with an earlier iteration, identifies a shift towards deliberation; deliberative norms are present, and even dominate recent guidance. However, an instrumental norm permeates both the former and the current guidance, suggesting that even as a language of consultation is replaced by one of deliberation, the intention remains to secure and legitimise a smooth development pathway. Evidence from interviews with professionals working in the Swedish EIA system highlights the difficulties of navigating these uncertainties in practice. By opening up critical analysis of deliberative norms as they shape the conditions for practice, this study contributes to the continuous development of planning practice, by supporting a more normatively reflexive approach to framework-design.

[1]  John Forester,et al.  The Deliberative Practitioner: Encouraging Participatory Planning Processes , 1999 .

[2]  Vanessa Watson,et al.  Conflicting rationalities: implications for planning theory and ethics , 2003 .

[3]  Philip Allmendinger,et al.  Planning Futures: New Directions for Planning Theory , 2002 .

[4]  Birgitta Henecke.  Plan & Protest. En sociologisk studie av kontroverser, demokrati och makt i den fysiska planeringen. , 2006 .

[5]  Maarten A. Hajer,et al.  Deliberative Policy Analysis: Contents , 2003 .

[6]  Meinhard Doelle,et al.  Time for a new approach to public participation in EA: Promoting cooperation and consensus for sustainability , 2006 .

[7]  G. Brundtland,et al.  Our common future , 1987 .

[8]  T. Richardson,et al.  Value-driven SEA: time for an environmental justice perspective? ☆ , 2005 .

[9]  S. Arnstein,et al.  Ladder of Citizen Participation , 2020 .

[10]  James A. Throgmorton,et al.  Story and sustainability : planning, practice, and possibility for American cities , 2003 .

[11]  Dennis Owen.  United Nations: World Summit on sustainable development — Johannesburg South Africa 26 August to 24 September 2002 [Report A/Conf 199/20 (as re-issued)] , 2004 .

[12]  J. Innes.  Planning Theory's Emerging Paradigm: Communicative Action and Interactive Practice , 1995 .

[13]  Tim Richardson,et al.  Environmental assessment and planning theory: four short stories about power, multiple rationality, and ethics , 2005 .

[14]  Tim Richardson,et al.  Exclusion: the necessary difference between ideal and practical consensus , 2004 .

[15]  A. Bonn.  Drivers of Environmental Change in Uplands , 2009 .

[16]  M. Hajer,et al.  A decade of discourse analysis of environmental politics: Achievements, challenges, perspectives , 2005 .

[17]  J. Dryzek.  Deliberative democracy and beyond : liberals, critics, contestations , 2000 .

[18]  Bent Flyvbjerg,et al.  Planning and Foucault: In Search of the Dark Side of Planning Theory , 2001 .

[19]  P. Healey.  Collaborative Planning: Shaping Places in Fragmented Societies , 1997 .

[20]  D. Wilcox.  The guide to effective participation , 1994 .

[21]  F. Fischer.  Reframing Public Policy: Discursive Politics and Deliberative Practices , 2003 .

[22]  Ulf Stahre.  Den alternativa staden. Stockholms stadsomvandling och byalagsrörelsen , 1999 .