ABSTRACT
In his most recent book, Insurgencies: Essays in Planning Theory, published in 2011 as part of this Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) series, John Friedmann begins by describing his first overseas teaching assignment in Brazil in 1956. There he was, as a 30-year-old American academic, charged with the responsibility of instructing a group of Brazilian students on how to plan for regional development. In the first two decades following the end of World War II, ‘planning’ and ‘development’ were extremely popular words, used in all sorts of contexts and often conflated with each other. Nations everywhere needed development and development needed planning. John recounts a ‘field trip’ with his group of students in a boat up the Amazon River during which he felt compelled to address a question that puzzled everyone: “What is this new-fangled soft technology called planning?” (p.1) Now, as John turns 90 years of age, one thing is certain. Planning is neither
new-fangled nor a vague, all-purpose term. It has a clear identity as a vibrant field of study and profession in various parts of the world. And it is so, in large part, due to John’s persistent efforts to answer this question through his work over the past 60 years. Planning, as his work has shown, is not simply a technique or technology, nor a narrowly defined profession defended by hefty experts, but a vocation that seeks to open up, navigate, and shape the collective purpose of human flourishing in place while being buffeted by the forces of change and uncertainty. Despite being criticised for whatever actions they undertake, planners prevail and thrive as they contend with new forms, constituencies, and contexts that challenge them in unforeseen ways. They can be in the private or public sector, radical practitioners, community activists or anarchists, but above all, they show that planning is a resilient practice that constantly questions and seeks new ways to ensure human flourishing in place to the fullest extent. For many years, I could not understand John’s enthusiastic adoption of
the term ‘insurgency’ in relation to planning. It seemed bizarre because the word, in my mind, evoked images of armed militants rising up against the state, of constant disruption and danger in the everyday lives of people who would have to bear the consequences of the violent encounters between the insurgents and the government army. One can, of course, plan insurgencies
against the state and execute them, but I didn’t think that was what John was proposing in his use of the term. More recently, when I was reading Insurgencies, something caught my eye. It was from the preface to The Good Society. John responds to the question, “The Good Society then seeks to eliminate the state?” by answering,
Neither to eliminate nor to replace it. The Good Society refuses hegemonic power, it does not wish to totalize itself. In attempting to do so, it would cease to be the Good Society and would transform itself according to the principle of hierarchy which is opposed to it.
