ABSTRACT
Capitalism has experienced throughout its history similar economic 'shocks' on an almost regular basis every 30 years. The subsequent aftermath of the global financial crisis offers, an opportunity for us to pause and rethink the relationship that is said to exist between the urban development process and urban planning. This chapter explores the relationships that can be found to exist between urbanisation processes, cyclical tendencies in capitalism and shifts in urban planning practice. Economic historians of varying persuasions agree that cyclical tendencies 'have been, and continue to be, an intrinsic characteristic of capitalism'. Corresponding changes in an economy and its supporting social structures of accumulation gives rise to distinct stages in the historical evolution of capitalism at both global and nation-state scales. The antecedents of modern urban planning are to be found in the emergence of industrial capitalism in Britain and the first economic long wave that lasted from the early 1770s to the late 1840s.
