ABSTRACT
The purpose of this chapter is to look at how certain planning ideas become internationally recognized and utilized as institutional policies and practices in a rapid manner, often to the detriment of their original intent. We will be focusing on the history of two recent participatory planning tools. The Women’s Safety Audit Guide was developed in 1989 by a feminist initiative funded by local government, the Metropolitan Toronto Women’s Action Committee on Public Violence Against Women and Children (METRAC). The Walking School Bus developed out of a short passage in Towards an Eco-City: Calming the Traffic, a book written by David Engwicht, an Australian urban designer and ecological activist, in 1992. Both ideas were rapidly adopted by community organizations and governments around the world. Both were characterized by strong emancipatory potential, and driven by the wish to challenge the status quo by empowering a group of people, who were seen as being barred from fully enjoying their rights as citizens to equal access to public space. But at some point, and in some settings, the initial radicalism of these ideas got lost.
