Content uploaded by Andre Sorensen
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Andre Sorensen on Dec 02, 2014
Content may be subject to copyright.
A preview of the PDF is not available
Urban planning and civil society in Japan: Japanese urban planning development during the 'Taisho Democracy' period (1905–31)
Abstract
Much has been written in recent years about the importance of civil society in ensuring positive outcomes for people in the development of urban space. For citizens to be involved in a meaningful way in urban planning requires the existence of a political space - created by organizations, community groups, social movements, voluntary societies - that is outside the control of government. The development of the international planning movement during the first decades of the twentieth century is an excellent example of the importance of such non-state actors in developing a competing vision of the urban future - and a set of prescriptions on how to achieve it - that was both at variance with the priorities then being pursued by national governments and which explicitly put forward the public welfare and urban quality of life as the highest values. Japanese planners, architects and municipal administrators were avid followers of international planning ideas during this period, attending many of the international congresses and attempting to adopt many of the current ideas for use in Japan. While the early years of the Taisho period saw a proliferation of social organizations in Japan and the development of an embryonic civil society, however, by the early 1930s an expansion of the role of the state, and particularly of the activities of the Home Ministry had resulted in its effective absorption of most of the political space available for independent agendas in city planning. After this period, planning thought and practice was firmly central government territory. This paper examines the role of this important watershed in the development of Japanese city planning and urban management practice.
... These collections of national or local initiatives resulted in each country having its own approach to planning, which influenced later developments, in urban design as well. Sorensen (2001) gives an example of this process when writing about the development of Japanese urban planning. He points out that although urban planning was strongly influenced by the international planning movement, adapting solutions from the French and German planning systems, the Japanese approach towards urban space, i.e. a concentration on the parts instead of the overall whole, steered the evolution of Japanese urban planning. ...
... Analyses of various systems of spatial planning (Sutcliffe 1981;Sorensen 2001) indicate that these systems are diverse. This distinction stems from multiple factors, the most important of which seem to be: historical conditions, the administrative structure of the country, culture and the individual socio-economic parameters. ...
Tools for assessing the social impact of urban designs are being developed internationally and in Swedish municipalities. While methodological development is underway, a theoretical discussion about the implications of urban design on social impact assessment (SIA) and its critical potential is rare, leading to the situation whereby much SIA is instrumental and might act against reinforcing and improved integration of the social dimension into the practice of urban planning and design. There is a need to address the democratic aspect of SIA in terms of equality and involvement of different perspectives on the design of urban space. The aim of this thesis is to advance SIA conceptually and methodologically within the field of urban design and to enhance the understanding of what this advance implies in respect of how different urban planning and design stakeholders define and handle evaluation of the urban space and its social aspect. Research through design of an approach to the design of urban space is used as a method for advancing SIA, where design consists of a series of iterative activities applied on a local urban redevelopment case in Gothenburg, including screening, imaging, presenting and testing. The research also includes studies of literature and documents, participation in knowledge arenas, re-conceptualisation and re-contextualisation, physical modelling, and focus group workshops. The approach, called SOCIO-FORM, focuses on a) the relationship between the social and built form aspects, b) the architectural nature of the process of its construction, and c) the transversal character of this activity. It outlines the meaning of urban design for SIA, suggesting the design of urban space as a shared subject of interest, activity, and production of knowledge. Through reflecting the subject for design (urban space), the process of its design, and the production of knowledge about it (the subject of design) the approach develops the transverses of spatiality, design and knowledge in-the making to advance SIA and its transversality. The thesis inverts the cause-effect hierarchy of assessment and analysis and shows how SIA can be developed by and into designerly practice through a new context of application to serve a diversity of perspectives on urban space, activities and stakeholders that are involved in urban design with a means to think critically about spatiality and its social dimension. The thesis emphasises a critical urban design perspective on the concepts and practices of SIA and the view that the contemporary Swedish planning practice of SIA has of the design of urban space, and draws attention to a designerly mode of evaluation and its role for a more integrated, coherent and democratic urban development. An alternative understanding emerges that expands the space of possibilities attributed to contemporary SIA. It improves SIAs urban-ability – a quality of being able to navigate in and embrace the complexity of discussion about a relationship between the aspects of socio and form. By means of this alternative reading, the thesis formulates theoretical foundations for designerly strategies to develop social sustainability tools, as a complement to the contemporary development in urban planning and design practice of evaluation. In a wider sense, the thesis shows how SIA integrated with urban design might contribute to social sustainability.
... Th e city infrastructure of the Meiji (1868-1912) and Taishō (1912)(1913)(1914)(1915)(1916)(1917)(1918)(1919)(1920)(1921)(1922)(1923)(1924)(1925)(1926)) eras struggled to cope as its population doubled between 1895 and 1923, and the Great Kantō earthquake of 1923 pushed increasing numbers into distant suburban areas. 2 From 1919, urban planning became heavily centralized, producing utilitarian neighborhoods that lacked green or open spaces to gather in. 3 Scholars have noted that during the twentieth century the proliferation of railway infrastructure saw stations replace or evolve from the multifunctional waterside areas of the Edo period, 4 which blended transport, trade, and amusement. 5 After World War II, when Allied fi re bombings reduced huge areas of the city to ashes, similar patterns of redevelopment and the expansion of commuting suburbs continued with relative neglect of communal areas. ...
This article explores how urban space produced by the Japanese railway system is appropriated by people for common use in Tōkyō. Drawing from ethnographic research among musicians at a central train station, I explore how individuals enmeshed within the schedules of the commuter network negotiate mobilities that fall outside the purview of railway urbanism. Station tsūro are passageways monitored by rail staff and local authorities, protected by traffic and railway commerce laws, and influenced by competing pressures from the overburdened network and local neighborhoods. Musicians sensitive to these shifting relationships identify leeway within, performing in ways that open tsūro up, producing temporary, finely balanced spaces of encounter and connection. Through these processes, the commuter system creates rail-specific forms of human relationships.
... M Ma ac ch hi iz zu uk ku ur ri i a an nd d C Ci iv vi il l E En ng ga ag ge em me en nt t i in n A Ar re ea as s o of f D Di is sc cr ri im mi in na at ti io on n Areas like Higashi Kujo, a precinct of Kyoto's Southern District (Minami-ku 南区), where most zainichi Koreans in the city live, have faced many changes in the last few decades whereby local citizens' movements and civic engagement have spread rapidly throughout the state. There is considerable evidence of high levels of motivation and enthusiasm among Japanese people regarding efforts to make their environments more liveable, as demonstrated by the increase in urban planning (see Sorensen 2001) across the country during the 1990s. With the aim of enhancing the quality of the local setting and of environmental management processes, such activities are widely referred to as machizukuri (街づくり or 'community building') 14 and represent an important development in local politics and urban management in Japan. ...
In recent years, an increasing number of immigrants, together with greater pressure on the state from both outside and within to recognise the diversity of its society, have caused a shift in public and academic attention from the idea of Japan as an ethnically homogenous nation to the concept of a 'multicultural Japan'. This paper explores the emergence of the notion of 'multicultural coexistence' and focuses on the assimilation of foreigners in Japan. In the foreground of this endeavour, the country's Korean minority has struggled to be included in Japanese society through different types of civic groups and neighbourhood associations. A machizukuri process in Higashi Kujo (an area around Kujo Street) in the city of Kyoto, as well as the Madang Festival, are presented along with the details of their organization, revealing the multiple meanings of this process and festival, respectively. Through a close look at these cases, the article shows how different groups of people work together to make their society a shared and diverse community.
... In recent years the importance of civil society for city planning has received increasing attention 6 . It has been argued by Sorensen (2001) that a vibrant civil society is essential to ensuring positive outcomes for people in the development of urban space. ...
Systems of urban planning typically incorporating the preparation of plans and regulatory procedures for controlling land use development in line with the plan have been in existence for many decades in most, if not all countries. However, while the rationale for public sector intervention in urban development is still valid, the systems of urban planning used have been found to be wanting in many aspects,. Since the critical measure of success of urban planning is the extent to which it really leads to the desired improvement of places, and the circumstances of communities through the use of plans, it is in this light that this study is analyzing the system and practice of urban planning in Botswana, with reference to the plan-making and implementation processes in Gaborone City. This study reveals that there is consensus that the system of urban planning is falling far short of meeting urban development objectives because planning has become marginalized in action. Consequently, change is needed if planning is to make a more positive contribution to society. Furthermore, proposals are put forward for reforming the way development plans are produced, which has implications for how they are used in development control process and decision making.
... For this reason, LPR was become popular and has been implemented in a wide range of scales, from urban expansion to rural replotting plans, and from long-standing urban redevelopment to new urban construction, etc. According to [3] and [4], reasons of the (2) high prices of land; (3) not systematized management instruments of land-use; (5) conflict among parties involved; and (6) disagreement on compulsory purchases of landuse. However, the law's act still remains in force up till today. ...
Land pooling and readjustment (LPR) is a significant instrument which is used to the rapid development of urbanization. It is a way of urban expansion and renovation without any compulsory revoking of land. By this way, people should not be relocated like in other ordinary planning projects, but they are encouraged to contribute their land (or land value) for construction and modernization of infrastructure system. Therefore, after contribution, remaining land will increase its value, and living conditions will also be improved. Especially, this approach is effectively implemented in urban renovation projects in various countries and regions worldwide, i.e. Japan, Germany, Korea, Taiwan, The United States of America, Australia, India, and Thailand. Its effectiveness has been demonstrated for mitigating unusual urban growth in peripheral areas. This study aims to perform the significances of LPR instrument, as well as demonstrate its practical impacts by analyzing an implemented case-study of Tra Vinh city. Recommendation of deployment is also done as a solution for renovation of landscapes of Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) embankments.
... Furthermore, planning decisions were exclusively in the hands of the central government of Japan under the 1919 City Planning Act (Ishida 1987a). Before the enforcement of this act, there were a number of local initiatives to improve environments, in particular in established cities like Osaka (Hanes 2002; Sorensen 2001). However, as the ...
Regional and urban planning is a common policy concern among modern nationstates.
It largely defines the quality of life as well as the wealth creation in
contemporary society. However, the concept of planning varies among nationstates.
In particular, non-Western nation-states, planning was initiated under the
influence of the imperialist order. To advance ‘planning theory’, there is a need to
understand how the concept of planning is constructed in different culture. This
paper shows why planning for late developed states had to aim for nation-state
building and how this affected ‘planning culture’ by examining the development of
early planning in Japan. The analysis shows that origins of planning and relevant
institutions still continue to have pervasive influence on planning policy
development even in contemporary Japan.
Cambridge Core - American Studies - Multilevel Democracy - by Jefferey M. Sellers
Taking an historical view, the paper considers how Japan has struggled to regulate development and examines the impact of land reform in the immediate post-WWII era. This is seen as a key institutional change that precipitated numerous political and policy shifts in subsequent decades and acted as a critical factor in shaping Japanese land use. The focus of the paper demonstrates how the political and economic transformation of Japan just prior to and after land reform in 1946 led to a situation where successive governments have tried but ultimately failed to intervene successfully in the development process, contributing to unsustainable outcomes derived largely from a sustained period of growth and economic development. In our view, this was supported by the legal framework reinforced under the Allied Occupation (1945–1951), alongside the outcomes of the land reform process. This has also led to a remarkably consistent set of institutional conditions. In order to highlight the impact of land reform the case of Japanese green belt policies between 1927 and 1965 are used to provide a more detailed account of the difficulties that planning and land use regulation has experienced in Japan.
In 1947, Japan became the first East Asian country to introduce democracy, and it was not until four decades later that South
Korea completed the democratic transition. Today, surprisingly, South Korea stands out among the East Asian countries as the
one that has the most vibrant and politically powerful civil society, whereas in Japan, the role of the nongovernmental organization
(NGO) sector in political advocacy is greatly limited. Using historical institutionalism, this paper tries to explain why
the NGOs in South Korea and Japan play vastly different roles in political advocacy. It concludes that the different social
movement traditions have played important roles in the evolution of the civil societies in Japan and South Korea, and led
to the different levels of institutionalization within the NGO sector.
KeywordsCivil society-Political advocacy-Social movement tradition-Institutional change-Japan-South Korea