E-Planning Cultures: In Search of a Model for Comparative Research

nication technologies in urban planning seems to explain the recent interest for the comparison of e-Planning experiments. The outcomes of these comparative efforts seem to confirm the view that the organization and practice of e-Planning differ among countries, in part as a consequence of the different political and administrative cultures, as had been argued before in comparative studies focused on conventional spatial planning in Europe (CEC, 1997; Newman & Thornley, 1996; Larsson, 2006). However, as planning history shows, planning paradigms and planning methods tend to move from country to country, from one city to another, creating and sharing, in the different regions of the world, a common vision of urban planning (see, for example, Wright, 1987; Home, 1990; Celik, 1992; Mumford, 2000; Myers, 2003; King, 2007; Arku, 2009; Porter, 2010). The process of globalization and the influence of multilateral organizations (e.g., UN initiatives in the field of sustainable development, UN-Habitat, etc.) have been responsible for the diffusion of planning paradigms and urban planning methods, making the planning profession and the activity of spatial planning more international and more open to external influences. In the case of Europe, for example, the European integration process facilitated the diffusion of principles, methods and practices in the field of spatial planning among member states. This pattern seems also observable in the development of e-Planning worldwide. Recent comparative research focused on planning cultures, seen as “the ways, both formal and informal, that spatial planning in a given multi-national region, country or city is conceived, institutionalized, and enacted” (Friedman, 2005), opened new perspectives for comparative research in the planning field (Knieling & Othengrafen, 2009). In Europe, for example, a closer look at the main planning cultures identified in the literature – British, Scandinavian, German, and Napoleonic – a taxonomy in part influenced by the differences in the political and administrative structure of each country, reveals planning cultures as hybrid forms, suggesting cross-fertilization of planning principles and practices across countries, rather than monolithic sets of principles and practices in each ‘planning culture.’ Therefore, it is with no surprise that we see to emerge as an imperative the analysis and comparison of e-Planning experiments in different planning cultures and socio-geographical contexts, as planners and decision-makers, in the different layers of public administration, and E-Planning Cultures: In Search of a Model for Comparative Research