Policy Learning: How Planners Learn from Each Other
Planning is a multidisciplinary profession, drawing upon many different fields for its theory, ideas, frameworks, and even institutions. Planning has been built upon the central tenets of mutual learning, analysis, policy making, and direct action to impr
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Policy Learning: How Planners Learn from Each Other
Abstract Planning is a multidisciplinary profession, drawing upon many different fields for its theory, ideas, frameworks, and even institutions. Planning has been built upon the central tenets of mutual learning, analysis, policy making, and direct action to improve communities, and its practitioners have applied theories from many different fields. Planners use a range of methods to develop community plans, draft policy, and deliver programs and services. The case study approach is one of the most frequently used methodologies in policy learning and development. This chapter outlines the ways in which planners learn from each other in practice and research, with a particular focus on the use of case studies and policy learning processes. Challenges with these approaches are discussed, along with suggestions on how to meaningfully learn from other contexts. The chapter sets the stage for Chap. 3, which presents and analyzes 11 case studies in TOD. Keywords Case study • Meta-analysis • Policy learning • Policy transfer
Planning is a multidisciplinary profession, and as such it draws upon many different fields for its theory, ideas, frameworks, and even institutions. The earliest professional planning institutions granted membership to those working in allied professions such as engineering and architecture. John © The Author(s) 2020 R. Thomas, L. Bertolini, Transit-Oriented Development, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48470-5_2
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R. THOMAS AND L. BERTOLINI
Friedmann, in Planning in the Public Domain (1987), presented four major intellectual traditions of the discipline (social reform, policy analysis, social learning, and social mobilization), each of which contributed tools, ideas, and theories into planning. Planning has been built upon the central tenets of mutual learning, analysis, policy making, and direct action to improve communities, and its practitioners have applied theories from many different quarters. Observing communities, measuring and analyzing their characteristics using data have been essential practices for decades; since the 1970s, life histories, focus groups, community forums, and many other methods have balanced the quantitative data gathered in large datasets, such as national- level censuses and transportation data on travel patterns. While planners use a range of methods to develop community plans, draft policy, and deliver programs and services, the case study approach is one of the most frequently used methodologies in policy learning and development. This chapter outlines the ways in which planners learn from each other in practice and research, with a particular focus on the use of case studies and policy learning processes. Challenges with these approaches are discussed, along with suggestions on how to improve upon them. The chapter sets the stage for Chap. 3, which presents and analyzes 11 case studies in TOD.
Learning from Case Studies Planners regularly study policies from other places, adapting them to suit lo
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