ABSTRACT
The advent of democracy in South Africa in April 1994 presented both the country and the institutions created during the colonial and apartheid years with an opportunity for a rebirth and a new beginning. Planning was not only offered a chance to shed its tainted past, but also to redeem itself, by contributing to the healing of the deep spatial, social, and economic wounds it was complicit in inflicting. Literature on the perceptions of planners, specifically regarding their motivations, behaviour, and the challenges they face, is limited in scope and depth, even more so when it pertains to young planners. Planning education was a popular area of discussion in the interviews. References were often made to planning education and educators, often in highly unflattering terms. In many of the interviews, young planners became cynical and even sardonic when referring to or prompted about ethics.
