Being and becoming: Writing children into planning theory

Abstract

This paper offers a framework to redress the neglect of children in planning theory. Noting that children are viewed as both human beings and human becomings, attention is drawn to the role of planning in regulating both aspects of children’s lives through a construction of childhood that emerged in conjunction with planning’s modernist roots. A recovered history of childhood challenges adult-centric accounts that render children invisible or assume their dependence and helplessness. Drawing on Bourdieu’s concept of habitus, the constitutive elements of this recovered history are examined and contrasted with the spatial segregation and regulation of childhood that is the profession’s current normative framework. The paper concludes by identifying ways that planning theory can be further enhanced by a focus on children and childhood.

Keywords

Children childhood post-structural theory planning history United States newsies

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Alexander

(2000) Rationality revisited: planning paradigms in a post post-modernist perspective. Journal of Planning Education and Research 19: 242–256.

American Planning Association (1997) Policy Guide on the Provision of Child Care. Available at: http://www.planning.org/policy/guides/adopted/childcare.htm (accessed 24 January 2012).

Aries

(1962) Centuries of Childhood: A Social History of Family Life. New York: Vintage Books.

Bekken

(1995) The exploitation of ‘Little Merchants’ by the newspaper industry. In: Hardt

Brennen

(eds) Newsworkers: Toward a History of the Rank and File. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, pp.190–22.

Bourdieu

(1992) The Logic of Practice. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Bourdieu

(1993) Concluding remarks: for a sociogenetic understanding of intellectual works. In: Calhoun

Lipuma

Postone

(eds) Bourdieu: Critical Perspectives. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, pp.263–275.

Beauregard

(1989) Between modernity and postmodernity: the ambiguous position of U.S. planning. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 4: 381–395.

Campbell

Fainstein

(2003) Introduction: the structure and debates of planning theory. In: Campbell

Fainstein

(eds) Readings in Planning Theory. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, pp.1–16.

Coleman

(1982) The Asymmetric Society. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press.

10.

Cunningham

(1995) Children and Childhood in Western Society Since 1500. London: Longman.

11.

DiGirolamo

(2002) Newsboy funerals: tales of sorrow and solidarity in urban America. Journal of Social History 36(1): 5–30.

12.

Fattore

Turnbull

(2005) Theorizing representations of and engagement with children: the political dimensions of child oriented communication. In: Mason

Fattore

(eds) Children Taken Seriously in Theory, Policy, and Practice. London: Jessica Kingsley, pp.46–57.

13.

Flax

(1990) Thinking Fragments. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

14.

Flint

(2006) Massachusetts boosts incentives for Smart Growth planning. Planning 72(2): 51–52.

15.

Foucault

(1977) Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin.

16.

Foucault

(1984) What is Enlightenment? In: Rabinow

(ed.) The Foucault Reader. New York: Pantheon Books, pp.32–50.

17.

Foucault

(1994) Two lectures. In: Kelly

(ed.) Critique and Power: Recasting the Foucault/Habermas Debate. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp.17–46.

18.

Freeman

(2006) Colliding worlds. In: Gleeson

Sipe

(eds) Creating Child Friendly Cities: Reinstating Kids in the City. London: Routledge, pp.69–85.

19.

Freeman

Tranter

(2011) Children and Their Urban Environment: Changing Worlds. Oxford, UK: EarthScan.

20.

Gleeson

Sipe

(2006) (eds) Creating Child Friendly Cities: Reinstating Kids in the City. London: Routledge.

21.

Groc

(2007) Family friendly. Planning 73(6): 8–13.

22.

Hall

(2002) Cities of Tomorrow: An Intellectual History of Urban Planning and Design in the Twentieth Century. Oxford, UK: Blackwell.

23.

Hart

(1992) Children’s Participation: From Tokenism to Citizenship. Florence, Italy: Innocenti Research Center.

24.

Hart

(2009) Charting change in the participatory settings of childhood. In: Thomas

(ed.) Children, Politics, and Communication: Participation at the Margins. Bristol, UK: Policy Press, pp.7–29.

25.

Healy

(2007) Urban Complexity and Spatial Strategies: Towards a Relational Planning for our Times. New York: Routledge.

26.

Hendrick

(1997) Children, Childhood and English Society 1880–1990. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

27.

Heywood

(2001). A History of Childhood. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.

28.

Innes

Booher

(2010) Planning With Complexity: An Introduction to Collaborative Rationality for Public Policy. London: Routledge.

29.

Iveson (2006) Cities for angry young people? From exclusion and inclusion to engagement in urban policy. In: Gleeson

Sipe

(eds) Creating Child Friendly Cities: Reinstating Kids in the City. London: Routledge, pp.49–65.

30.

Jackson

Tester

(2008) Environment shapes health, including children’s mental health. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 47(2): 129–131.

31.

Jacobs

(1961) The Death and Life of Great American Cities. New York: Random House.

32.

James

(2004) Constructing Childhood: Theory, Policy and Social Practice. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave-Macmillan.

33.

Klosterman

(1985) Arguments for and against planning. Town Planning Review 56(1): 5–20.

34.

Knowles-Yánez

(2005) Children’s participation in planning processes. Journal of Planning Literature 20(1): 3–14.

35.

Kulynych

(2001) No playing in the public sphere: democratic theory and the exclusion of children. Social Theory and Practice 27(2): 231–264.

36.

Lewis

Baldassare

(2010) The complexity of public attitudes towards compact development: survey evidence from five states. Journal of the American Planning Association 76(2): 219–237.

37.

Louv

(2005) The Last Child in the Woods: Saving our Children from Nature Deficit Disorder. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin.

38.

Marten

(2005) Childhood and Child Welfare in the Progressive Era: A Brief History with Documents. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s.

39.

McDonald

Aalborg

(2009) Why parents drive children to school: implications for safe routes to school programs. Journal of the American Planning Association 75(3): 331–342.

40.

McMillan

(2005) Urban form and a child’s trip to school: the current literature and a framework for future research. Journal of Planning Literature 19: 440–456.

41.

Mott

(1962) American Journalism, A History: 1690–1960 3rd edn. New York: Macmillan.

42.

Nasaw

(1985) Children of the City: At Work and at Play. Garden City, NY: Anchor Press/Doubleday.

43.

Oakley

(1994) Women and children first and last: parallels and differences in children’s and women’s studies. In: Mayall

(ed.) Children’s Childhoods: Observed and Experienced. London: Falmer Press, pp.13–32.

44.

Peterson

(2005) New Jersey suburb plans a housing project it hopes is unfriendly to children. New York Times, 30 May, p.5.

45.

Prilleltensky

Nelson

Peirson

(2001) The role of power and control in children’s lives: an ecological analysis of pathways towards wellness, resilience and problems. Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology 11: 143–158.

46.

Qvortrup

(1994) Childhood Matters. Aldershot, UK: Avebury.

47.

Rooke

Schnell

(1983) Discarding the Asylum: From Child Rescue to the Welfare State in English-Canada, 1800–1950. Landham, MD: University Press of America.

48.

Sandercock

(1998) Towards Cosmopolis: Planning for Multicultural Cities. Chichester, UK: Wiley.

49.

Sandercock

(2003) Cosmopolis II: Mongrel Cities of the 21st Century. London: Continuum.

50.

Senior

Webster

Blank

(2006) Residential relocation and sustainable urban form: statistical analysis of owner-occupiers’ preferences. International Planning Studies 11(1): 41–57.

51.

Steiner

(2009) We knew it all along. Planning 75(7): 48.

52.

Strife

Downey

(2009) Childhood development and access to nature: a new direction for environmental inequality research Organization and Environment 22(1): 99–122.

53.

Trattner

(1970) Crusade for the Children: A History of the National Child Labour Committee and Child Labour Reform in America. Chicago, IL: Quadrangle Books.

54.

Valentine

(1996) Angels and devils: moral landscapes of childhood. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 14: 581–599.

55.

Vice Commission of the City of Chicago (1911) The Social Evil in Chicago: Study of Existing Conditions with Recommendations. Chicago, IL: Gunthorp-Warren.

56.

Warner

Anderson

Haddow

(2007) Putting child care in the picture: why this service is a critical part of community infrastructure. Planning 73(6): 16–19.

57.

Woolcock

Gleeson

Randolph

(2010) Urban research and child-friendly cities: a new Australian outline. Children’s Geographies 8(2): 177–192.

58.

Young

(1990) Justice and the Politics of Difference. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.