Planning and the public : actor-networks and the plan-making process.

This study explores the development plan-making process in two local authorities,
and focuses on the role different groups, including 'the public', play in this. This
research aims to uncover the ways in which the practices of plan making are
constructed through the work of actors and texts, and to trace how these actions
reflect and constitute relations of power.
Plans have been viewed as modernist tools. However this conception has been
criticised in work drawing on the writings of Habermas and Foucault, which will be
critically assessed. Problems associated with these theories and a need to trace how
actions and structures might be constituted led to adopting a theoretical framework
drawing on actor-network theory. This theory has a radical view of structure, agency
and power and forces attention onto how stabilities are constructed. The theoretical
framework adopted draws on these concerns to trace how actors, entities and
networks emerge through social actions. The research questions focus these concerns
onto understanding how plans are written, who is important in this and how entities
such as 'local authorities' and 'the public' are constructed.
Qualitative research was carried out in two cases, examining how the plans were
written and focusing on how techniques of involving 'the public' were constructed.
Case study descriptions trace how networks were built and how were important in
mediating actions. In particular, the ways in which 'councils' 'officers', 'members',
'the public' and 'central government' are defined, form a focus.
Analysis of the two cases revealed significant similarities attributed to a 'central
government' network. Differences arose in the ways in which 'council' networks
composed different practices of plan-writing and how officers and members were
defined. This study shows how texts and actors shape plan-making, and how certain
practices of governance are constructed.