Post-politics of (Scottish) planning: gatekeepers, gatecheck and gatecrashers? – commentary to Walton

Abstract

Reflecting upon William Walton’s work in this issue of Fennia, this commentary elaborates on the ideas of post-politics evoked by Walton’s careful examination of Scottish planning. Applying viewpoints of depoliticization and post-politics may not provide pragmatic guidance for planning practice, yet it may sensitize to and enable revelations of situational, processual and structural workings of power. With new orchestrations of planning narrowing the spaces for local resistance politicisations, depoliticisation may be taken to mean less politics. However, the complicit politicisations brought about by applying governmental technologies may also be seen as a different kind of statecraft, resulting in all too visible politics of planning presented as technicalities. This calls for local action. ‘Gatecrashing’ the planning system for a disruptive re-introduction of more inclusive and empowering planning practices could mean attaining ‘agonistic spaces’ that could enable dialectical approaches under uneven power relations.