PLANNING THEORY AND DEMOGRAPHICS
ADVOCACY PLANNING
Lee C. Slusser, AICP
MAJOR PLANNING THEORIES
(I.E., MODELS OF THE PLANNING FUNCTION)
1. SYNOPTIC RATIONALISM
In philosophy in general, rationalism is the foundation and embodiment
of the scientific method. It serves the same role in planning theory. The
rationalist model of the planning process generally contains the
following steps.
• Goals and objectives are set.
• Policy alternatives are identified.
• The policy alternatives are evaluated – vis-à-vis effectiveness (in
attaining the goals and objectives),efficiency, and constraints
– using scientific conceptual models and evaluation
techniques (e.g., cost benefit analysis).
• The selected policy alternative is implemented.
2. INCREMENTALISM
This theory – which was espoused by Charles Lindbloom in The
Science of Muddling Through – is a practical response to rationalism.
Planning is seen as less of a scientific technique and more of a mixture
of intuition and experience. Major policy changes are best made in little
increments over long periods of time. Incrementalism very accurately
describes what actually occurs in most planning offices on a daily
basis.
3. TRANSACTIVE PLANNING
Like incrementalism, transactivism does not view planning purely as a
scientific technique. Transactivism espouses planning as a
decentralized function based on face- to-face contacts, interpersonal
dialogues, and mutual learning. Transactivism is roughly behavioralist-
style planning.
4.
Advocacism abandons the objective, non-political view of planning contained in
rationalism. Planners become like lawyers: they advocate and defend the
interests of a particular client or group (which is preferably economically
disadvantaged and/or politically unorganized or underrepresented).
• Paul Davidoff was an early champion of advocacy planning. He argued that
there is no one public interest for planners to serve, and thus, that
planners have no choice but to become non-objective advocates for
specific interests and groups.
• Saul Alinsky developed an advocacist vision of planning that is centered around
socalled “organizations.” Alinsky’s organizations develop where people
feel powerless. These organizations then hire planners (which Alinsky
largely sees as political organizers) to identify problems, develop an
awareness of these problems, and generate action.
• Alan Altshuler also argued for abandoning the objective, non-political view of
planning. He felt that to be effective, planners must become actively
involved in the political process.
5. RADICAL PLANNING
In a sense, radicalism takes transactivism to its logical extreme. Radicalism
hates hierarchical bureaucracies, centralized planning, and domineering
professional planners. It argues that planning is most effective when it is
performed by non-professional neighborhood planning committees that empower
common citizens to experiment with solving their own problems. The ideal
outcomes of this process are collective actions that promote self-reliance. Much
of the radical planning literature that I have personally read is based on Marxist
interpretations and theories.
6. UTOPIANISM
Utopianism believes that planning is most effective when it proposes sweeping
changes that capture the public imagination. Daniel Burnham’s Plan of Chicago,
Frank Lloyd Wright’s Broadacre City, and Le Corbusier’s La Ville Contemporaine
are often cited as utopian works.
7. METHODISM
Methodism addresses situations in which the planning techniques that should be
used are known, but the ends that should be achieved by these techniques are
not. Such a situation would be making a population projection just to have it
handy when it is needed. Methodism views planning techniques as ends into
themselves.
 THEORIES MOVEMENT ORGANIZATION SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE
MAJOR THEORIES OF URBAN SPATIAL ORGANIZATION
FUNCTIONALISM
1. COCENTRIC THEORY (BURGESS, 1925) • The architect should know the needs of your client first before you come up with
a design.
• City grows in a radial expansion from center to form
circles
SELECTIVISM
• A city is seen as a set of cocentric rings (these rings are • Indentifying our architecture in terms of our locality and country.
roughly listed, in order, below). As the city grows, each
ring invades and overtakes the next ring out – a process ECLECTICISM
called Invasion/Succession (thus, Cocentic Theory is • Usually applied to any building that incorporates a mixture of historical style.
sometimes referred to as Invasion/Succession
Theory”). STRUCTURALISM
• Saw the introduction of the iron or steel construction
• The central business district (CBD)
Joseph Paxton
• Independent worker housing Henry Labrouste
• Better housing Gustave Eiffel
• Commuter/suburban housing
MONUMENTALISM
• Based on the notion that the “Form of an Object should last.”
2. SECTOR THEORY (HOYT, 1939)
Le Corbusier
• Pulls growth of entire in same direction August Perret
Ludwig Mies Van De Rohe
• High-density residential, commercial, and industrial uses Peter Behrens
radiate out from the central business district (CBD) in
“sectors” that follow major transportation routes. More RADICALISM
expensive housing also radiates out from the CBD • Demand for a radicalship in emphasis from the building of the past to the design
of those which meet the requirement and demands of the modern times.
– towards large open spaces and higher ground. Less
expensive housing takes whatever land is left over.
NATIONAL ROMANTICISM
• Self-emulated style fed by particular local historical motifs and devices as well as
the associative aspects of the great historical period in architecture.
3. MULTIPLE NUCLEI ZONE THEORY
(HARRIS AND ULLMAN, 1945) FUTURISM
• Cities grow around several district nuclei
EXPRESSIONISM
• Certain land uses group together to take advantage of • design ideal that would express emotion and the essence of life
unique facilities (e.g., universities), specializations,
Bruno Taut, Hans Poelzig
codependencies, or externalities. This theory is often Erich Mendelsohn
applied to cities with more than one CBD. Walter Gropius
RATIONALISM CIAM
(Neue Sachlichkeit GERMAN) Congrès Internationaux de l'Architecture Moderne
• Architects, in turn, sought to design buildings that might improve the International Congress of Modern Architecture
lives of those within them. They called for designs of great clarity that
paid strict attention to function and made use of modern materials and
• Was founded to promote social justice and modern architecture
technologies
• People living in the right environment would be more likely to behave in
Johannes Brinckmann accordance with the dictates of society
Leendert van der Vlugt
Mart Stam ORGANISM
(ORGANIC ARCHITECTURE)
• That every building should relate harmoniously to its natural surroundings and
that a building should not be a static, boxlike enclosure but a dynamic structure,
NEO-PLASTICISM with open, flowing interior spaces.
• Expressing the works using non-color (white, black, grey) with primary
Frank Llyod Wright
colors

Le Corbusier and Candela NEW BRUTALISM

BAU HAUS
• Bauhaus is a German expression meaning "house for building."
Bauhaus buildings have flat roofs, smooth façades and cubic shapes.
Colors are white, gray, beige or black. Floor plans are open and
furniture is functional.
Walter Gropius, Mies van der Rohe
• Is characterized by bold forms, harsh proportions, and rough materials such as
exposed concrete, steel, and wood. In contrast, the establishment has stressed
lightness of construction, delicate elements finely proportioned, and glossy
materials such as glass, enclosing as with a transparent skin luminous volumes
of space.
METABOLISM
• Fascinated by high technology and mass production, the metabolists produced
fanciful drawings for cities that seemed to come from science fiction. They
envisioned huge structures with movable modules for living, some floating on
water, some rising as skyscrapers.

INTERNATIONAL STYLE Kenzo tange

• The characteristics of the new architecture: an emphasis on volume, Fumiko maki
not mass; on regularity, not symmetry; on proportions and sleek,
technical perfection rather than ornament; and a preference for elegant
materials that included those of the machine age.
ARCHIGRAM
• American form of Bauhaus architecture. • Futuristic proposals expressed hope about the power of technology to transform
The name came from the book The International Style by historian and and improve the world.
critic Henry-Russell Hitchcock and architect Philip Johnson.
Peter Cook, Ron Herron
• America's International Style became a symbolism of Capitalism: It is
the favored architecture for office buildings, and is also found in CONTEXTUAL ARCHITECTURE
upscale homes built for the rich. • Takes its clues from adjacent buildings, whatever their individual merits
• Based on association and not on composition, could produce buildings of
Seagram Building in New York, enduring aesthetic quality
designed by Mies van der Rohe
with Philip Johnson. James Stirling,
"all things to all people"
DECONSTRUCTIVISM DECONSTRUCTION
• Is an approach to building design which attempts to view architecture
in bits and pieces. The basic elements of architecture are dismantled.

• In theory and in early designs, deconstruction involved the dismantling

of architectural elements and the rearrangement of their constituent
parts. In these designs architects did not concern themselves with the
physical laws of the real world, and most of their early proposals were
unbuildable.

• The resulting buildings were typically disjointed in form, and they

dramatically contradicted standard conventions of design and
construction

Peter Eisenman
Frank Gehry
Richard Meier
Rem Koolhaas

FORMALISM
• Emphasizes highly structured visual relationships rather than subject
matter, symbolism, theme or ornamentation.

Bauhaus architects.

ART DECO
Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes
(International Exposition of Modern Industrial and Decorative Arts)
• This exposition immediately influenced many American patrons and
architects who desired to create a modern design that was not so
austere or lacking in ornament as the modernism

• It was a modernism that was not too modern and that incorporated
elegant materials, including new materials such as aluminum, stainless
steel, and early plastics. Art deco used a great deal of ornament with
stylistic motifs such as zigzags and multiple curved forms. Its bold
linear or flat geometric patterns were accentuated by strong color
contrasts.

Chrysler Building (1928-1930) in New York City

William Van Alen.

Empire State Building (1931)

Shreve, Lamb & Harmon,
with engineers H. C. Balcom and Associates