ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the nature of contested societies, and the paradoxes of localism they generate, before finally considering an alternative paradigm that might offer a means to tap into the best of local civic governance within a more global and transcultural framework. The traditional land use planning model has struggled to deliver a more shared society in places like Northern Ireland, tending to airbrush out the pertinence of division and segregation to the planning process, as if such issues are beyond the remit and competence of planners. Despite the greater potential of this placelessness attending the erosion of traditional collectivities and the advance of social media and other features of globalisation, the dominant characteristics recurring in the literature concern the binding solidarities of customary daily life that induces interdependence, loyalty and quality sociability. Indeed, the long-standing patronage system is rooted in pork-barrel spending, which brings largesse to local constituencies for electoral dividend.
