Against two extreme forms of thinking, which have influenced planning theory, this article argues, in the context of a looming amount of literature generated in a movement for private planning, that the distinction between private planning and public planning is a valid one, but one in need of tweaking. However, the plan–market dichotomy (i.e. the assumption that state and private planning is mutually exclusive) is fallacious. Informed by the neo-institutional economic assumption of rational decisions and the stance of contractual solutions, it rides on the surge in private planning by proposing a taxonomy of planning that combines two modes of planning with two types of planning agent and discusses their possible interrelationships using some neo-institutional economic reasoning informed by the ideas of Coase. Some pedagogical and theoretical implications are also discussed.
AlexanderER (1981) If planning isn’t everything, maybe it is something. Town Planning Review53(1): 131–142.
2.
AlexanderER (2001) Why planning vs. markets is an oxymoron: Asking the right question. Planning and Markets4(1): 1–8.
3.
AlexanderER (2008) Between state and market: A third way of planning. International Planning Studies13(2): 119–132.
4.
AlexanderERFaludiA (1989) Planning and plan implementation. Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design16: 127–140.
5.
AlexanderERMazzaLMoroniS (2012) Planning without plans? Nomocracy or Teleocracy for social-spatial ordering. Progress in Planning77: 37–87.
6.
AllenDW (1991) Homesteading and property rights or ‘How the West was Really Won?’Journal of Law and Economics34(1): 1–23.
7.
BeuscherJH (1958) Private zoning on Milwaukee’s metropolitan fringe—A preface. Wisconsin Law Review1958: 610–611.
8.
BrunettaGMoroniS (2012) Contractual Communities in the Self-Organising City: Freedom, Creativity, Subsidiarity. London: Springer.
9.
CherryG (1996) Town Planning in Britain Since 1900. London: Blackwell.
10.
CoaseRH (1937) The nature of the firm. Economica4: 386–405.
11.
CoaseRH (1959) The federal communications commission. Journal of Law and Economics2: 1–40.Coase RH (1960) The problem of social cost. Journal of Law and Economics3: 1–44.
12.
CoaseRH (1974) The lighthouse in economics. Journal of Law and Economics17: 357–376.
13.
ColeS (2001) Dare to dream: Bringing futures into planning. Journal of the American Planning Association67(4): 372–383.
14.
DahlmanCJ (1979) The problem of externalities. Journal of Law and Economics22: 141–162.
15.
FoldvaryF (2009) Urban planning: The government or the market. In: HolcombeRGPowellB (eds) Housing America. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 323–342.
16.
FoldvaryF (2011) Contract, voice and rent: Voluntary urban planning. In: AnderssonDEMellanderCAnderssonA (eds) Handbook of Creative Cities. Aldershot: Edward Elgar, 501–516.
17.
FriedmanD (1971) The Machinery of Freedom. La Rochelle: Arlington House.
18.
GrammenosFCraigBPollardD (2008) Hippodamus rides to Radburn: A new model for the 21st century. Journal of Urban Design13(2): 163–176.
19.
GunderMHillierJ (2009) Planning in Ten Words or Less: A Lacanian Entanglement with Spatial Planning. Aldershot: Ashgate.
20.
HallP (1980) Great Planning Disasters. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.
21.
HallP (1999) Cities of Tomorrow (updated version). Oxford: Blackwell.
22.
HallP (2014) The strange death of British planning: And how to bring about a miraculous revival. In: JonathanM (ed.) Kaleidoscope City: Reflections on Planning and London (RTPI London Centenary Publication). London: RTPI London, 56–63.
23.
HavelMB (2014) Delineation of property rights as institutional foundations for urban land markets in transition. Land Use Policy38: 615–626.
24.
HayekF (1944) The Road to Serfdom. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
25.
HayekF (1960) The Constitution of Freedom. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
26.
HefetzAWarnerM (2007) Beyond the market versus planning dichotomy: Understanding privatisation and its reverse in US Cities. Local Government Studies33(4): 555–572.
27.
HeQ (2000) The land-enclosure movement of the 1990s inaugurating China’s new ‘Land Enclosure’. Chinese Economy33(3): 57–88.
28.
IkaLASaint-MacaryJ (2012) The project planning myth in international development. International Journal of Managing Projects in Business5(3): 420–439.
29.
InchA (2012) Deconstructing spatial planning: Re-interpreting the articulation of a new ethos for local English planning. European Planning Studies20(6): 1039–1056.
30.
IssermanAM (1985) Dare to plan: An essay on the role of the future in planning practice and education. Town Planning Review56(4): 483–491.
31.
JacobsJ (1968) The Death and Life of Great American Cities. New York: Vintage Books.
32.
LaiLWC (1994) The economics of land-use zoning: A literature review and analysis of the work of Coase. Town Planning Review65(1): 77–98.
33.
LaiLWC (1995) Some theoretical issues of land use rights reform in China: Some theoretical issues. Land Use Policy12(4): 281–289.
34.
LaiLWC (1996a) Zoning and Property Rights: A Hong Kong Case Study. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press.
35.
LaiLWC (1996b) Hear the other side: A rejoinder to Roger Bristow’s commentary of Samuel Staley’s planning ‘Uncertainty’ and ‘Rules’. Planning and Development12(1): 62–63.
36.
LaiLWC (1997a) The property rights justifications for planning and a theory of zoning. In:Progress in Planning: Recent Research in Urban and Regional Planning, vol. 43, no. 3. Oxford: Pergamon Press, 161–246.
37.
LaiLWC (1997b) Back to the question: A reply to Mee Kam Ng regarding the Bristow-Staley debate. Planning and Development13(1): 38–39.
38.
LaiLWC (1998) The leasehold system as a means of planning by contract. Town Planning Review69(3): 249–275.
39.
LaiLWC (1999) Hayek and town planning: A note on Hayek’s views towards town planning in the constitution of liberty. Environment and Planning A31(9): 1567–1582.
40.
LaiLWC (2002) Planning and property rights under constitutional capitalism. International Planning Studies7(3): 213–225.
41.
LaiLWC (2004) Spontaneous catallaxis in urban and rural development under planning by contract in a small open economy: The ideas of Hayek and Mises at work in town and country planning in Hong Kong. Review of Austrian Economics17(2–3): 155–186.
42.
LaiLWC (2005) Planning by contract in Hong Kong: The leasehold foundation of a comprehensively planned capitalist land market. Economic Affairs25(4): 16–18.
43.
LaiLWC (2007) ‘The problem of social cost’: The Coase Theorem and externality explained: Using simple diagrams and examples to illustrate the role of land use planning in tackling externalities. Town Planning Review78(3): 335–368.
44.
LaiLWC (2010) A model of planning by contract: Integrating comprehensive state planning, freedom of contract, public participation, and fidelity. Town Planning Review81(6): 647–673.
45.
LaiLWC (2013) Planning by contract: A re-presentation of the Hong Kong leasehold system. Paper presented to the symposium on Institutions of Land Rights and Sustainable Asian Urbanization, Global Asia Institute, National University of Singapore, Singapore, 19November.
46.
LaiLWC (2014) The impact and philosophy of Abercrombie’s plan. In: JonathanM (ed.) Kaleidoscope City: Reflections on Planning and London (RTPI London Centenary Publication). London: RTPI London, 38–46.
47.
LaiLWC (in press) Planning by contract: Two dialogues. In: DavidAStefanoM (eds) Private Urban Planning: Opportunities and Limitations. London: Routledge.
48.
LaiLWCHungCWY (2008) The inner logic of the Coase Theorem and a Coasian planning research agenda. Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design35(2): 207–226.
49.
LaiLWCLorneFT (2006) The Coase Theorem and planning for sustainable development. Town Planning Review77(1): 41–73.
50.
LaiLWCLorneFT (2013.) The fourth Coase Theorem: State planning rules and spontaneity in action. Planning Theory. Epub ahead of print 9December2013. DOI:10.1177/1473095213510430.
51.
LaiLWCLorneFT (2014) Transaction cost reduction and innovations for spontaneous cities: Promoting a “Meeting” between Coase and Schumpeter. Planning Theory13(2): 170–188.
52.
LaiLWCChauKWLeeCKK, et al. (2014) The informational dimension of real estate development: A case of a “Positive non-interventionist” application of the Coase Theorem. Land Use Policy. 41: 225–232.
53.
LordA (2013) Towards a non-theoretical understanding of planning. Planning Theory. Epub ahead of print 12March. DOI:10.1177/1473095213477642.
54.
MeadowcroftJ (1997) Planning for sustainable development: Insights from the literatures of political science. European Journal of Political Research31: 427–454.
55.
MeyerGD (2011) The reinvention of academic entrepreneurship. Journal of Small Business Management49(1): 1–8.
56.
MintzbergH (1981) What is planning anyway?Strategic Management Journal2(3): 319–324.
57.
MoroniS (2010) Rethinking the theory and practice of land-use regulation: Towards nomocracy. Planning Theory9(2): 137–155.
58.
NeuwirthR (2005) Shadow Cities: A Billion Squatters, A New Urban World. New York: Routledge.
59.
NgKM (1996) Economics planning and politics: Sharing my views with Lawrence Lai and Samuel Staley. Planning and Development12(2): 54–59.
60.
NozickR (1974) Anarchy, State and Utopia. New York: Basic Books.
61.
PallagstK (2010) Viewpoint: The planning research agenda: Shrinking cities—A challenge for planning cultures. Town Planning Review81(5): i–vi.
62.
PortugaliJ (1999) Self-Organization and the City. Berlin: Springer.
63.
RivolinUT (2005) Cohesion and subsidiarity: Towards good territorial governance in Europe. Town Planning Review76(1): 93–106.
64.
RothbardM (1973) For a New Liberty. New York: Macmillan.
65.
SchusterJM (2005) Chapter 15: Substituting information for regulation. In: Ben-JosephESzoldTS (eds) Regulating Place: Standards and the Shaping of Urban America. New York: Routledge, 333–357.
66.
ScottJC (1998) Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
67.
SieganBH (1970) Non-zoning in Houston. Journal of Law and Economics13(1): 71–147.
68.
SieganBH (1997) Property and Freedom: The Constitution, The Courts, and Land-Use Regulation. London: Transaction Publishers.
69.
SowellT (1996) Knowledge and Decisions. New York: New Books.
70.
StaleySRClaeysER (2005) Is the future of development regulation based in the past? Toward a market-oriented, innovation friendly framework. Journal of Urban Planning and Development: ASCE131(4): 202–213.
71.
StranskyDW (1988) Gated communities as public entitles. Unpublished professional paper, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY.
72.
TillyC (1997) Chapter 7: War making and state making as organised crime. In: TillyC (ed.) Roads from Past to Future. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 165–192.
73.
TomlinsonJ (1987) Review article: To plan or not to plan. Journal of Economic Studies14(1): 60–65.
74.
UmbeckJ (1981) Might makes right. Economic InquiryXIX: 38–59.
75.
WarnerSB (1968) The Private City. 2nd edn.Philadelphia, PA: Philadelphia University Press.
76.
WebsterCJLaiLWC (2003) Property Rights, Planning and Markets: Managing Spontaneous Cities. Aldershot: Edward Elgar.
77.
WildavskyAB (1973) If planning is everything, maybe it’s nothing. Policy Sciences4(2): 127–153.
