Planning futures of the past: Contradictory temporalities in the governance of water scarcity in Germany’s transitioning coal-mining region

Abstract

This article inquires how proposed urban futures are stuck in the past. Dwelling on the ponderous nature of bureaucratic planning systems in the governance of urban water scarcity, it illuminates situations where the pace of climate change overtakes planning’s sustainability visions, rendering planned futures obsolete. Which temporal dynamics characterise this process? And what are the democratic stakes embedded in the making of these temporalities? Combining literatures on temporalities and planning, water as a temporal factor and the plural politics of emergencies, the article breaks new ground in urban future studies. It investigates the contradictory temporalities employed by different actors in the governance of water scarcity, and the role of hydrological time in the emergency politics associated with it. Building on the work of political theorist Jonathan White in particular, it attends to the democratic stakes in this process. Empirically, the article focuses on Germany’s planned Lusatia Lake District, which is set to become Europe’s largest artificial lake district through the flooding of abandoned coalfields. However, the region is now characterised by depleting water resources because regional plans failed to anticipate the combined effects of mining and climate change on water. Based on qualitative case study research in two towns, I argue that planning in Lusatia produces past futures, that is, visions no longer adequate for the contemporary moment. My line of argument unfolds through highlighting the contradictions inherent in the making of past futures by examining three sets of temporal dynamics: futures near and far, futures calculated and imagined and calls for speeding up and slowing down. They emerge from authorities holding on to outdated plans and growth-driven forecasts, entailing economically motivated projections of the future that skew decision making towards economic rationales at environmental costs.