The 2nd meeting on OTB-Urbanism Joint Research Themes took place on November 21st at the Hugo Priemus zaal at the OTB. The aim of the meeting was to bring aspects of territorial governance that are addressed in ongoing research in both groups to the foreground.
Roberto Rocco gave a general introduction on governance. In this introduction, he focused on the accountability of governance arrangements and reminded us of the frameworks to evaluate this. In the second half of the meeting researchers presented the ways in which they incorporate governance issues into their research.
Reactions to what was presented (and not presented) gave us a good idea of the scope of on-going research at OTB and the Department of Urbanism of the TU Delft. For now we conclude that research focuses on (a critical review of) spatial planning practices/approaches in the context of specific issues such as energy, transport and water management.
In respect to territorial governance, research does not focus on either the inclusiveness or the efficiency of planning approaches but seeks to understand key factors that have led to a diversity and variation of planning spaces with differing outcomes in respect to these aspects of governance. We will discuss these factors in more depth in the future!
