Patsy Healey and 'Collaborative Planning' (2005): Re-thinking Democracy in the ‘Reasoning in Public’ Arena

Abstract

The interpretation of the notion of citizenship has led some authors to the conclusion of the necessity of overcoming a ‘restricted conception’ of citizenship, in order to gain a more inclusive recognition of a cosmopolitan, rather than a mere universal, recognition of rights. So, three core issues are tightly intertwined in this paper: the controversial issue of citizenship in its multiple facets: the formal that is institutional, the substantial and the denied one; the role of planning and its ethical implications; and the very idea of democracy in its dichotomy: institutional versus substantial. Patsy Healey’s work offers us a wide set of normative perspectives and intellectual stimuli, with all the challenges of their applicability and transferability, in order to nurture (a more substantial) democracy. In all the work of Healey, planning is considered a way to enhance and re-enchant democracy, due to the long history of planning’s normative interest in richly participative democratic processes. In line with Patsy’s work, this paper considers planning as a way to enhance and re-enchant democracy.