Spatial Planning

Spatial Planning

The Swedish School of Planning

Researchers study how planning works and which control mechanisms have an impact on spatial planning. They also study how planning processes, at different levels, are initiated and controlled and which institutions and actors are involved. The environmental and sustainability effects are also included.

Research on spatial planning is a multidisciplinary activity. As spatial planning is part of society’s governance system, research on planning in the broad sense is conducted within a variety of subjects, such as architecture, sociology, political science, human geography, environmental science, ethnology, and more. This is partly reflected in the department’s composition of staff, where several different subject areas are represented. More importantly, the theoretical and methodological basis of research is not limited to one subject, but spans many different sciences; consequently, the researchers receive impressions, inspiration and tools from a variety of disciplines.

 

Two different research fields

Research in the field of spatial planning at BTH does not take place in separate research teams, but individually and in different networks according to various theoretical perspectives, the methods applied and concrete research assignments.
Two main research fields can, however, be identified even if there is no sharp boundary between them:

  • planning as a control system for societal change and
  • the built environment as an outcome of planning.

Research on planning as a control system
Research on planning explores how planning works and the different control mechanisms (ideologies, legislation, professional norms, technologies) that affect spatial development, but also how planning processes are initiated and managed, as well as the institutions and stakeholders involved. Special emphasis is placed on how planning is influenced and changed under pressure from political trends and societal transformation in general, such as climate change, increased globalisation, alongside increased supranational governance and decentralisation. It also includes study of the democratic dimensions of planning and how different groups’ scope of action is influenced by and changes during ongoing processes, not least in terms of citizen participation in planning.

Research on the built environment
Research on the built environment explores how different perceptions of space affect planning in practice and thus the form and design. A starting point here is to understand how different material and social conditions produce space, that is, build space as a venue for a daily practice, but also how the space is a background to subjective experiences and notions about what the space is, or should be, in its new form. Another area of interest in this context is how different perceptions of general virtues, such as security, integration or meetings, affect the design of spaces in terms of their physical form. Similarly, the research explores how spatial structure has an impact on human life and daily patterns of activity, and how the urban form affects mobility, flexibility and identification issues.

Research at the Department of Spatial Planning is conducted in research projects and environments consisting of doctoral students and senior researchers. One of the research projects includes six PhD students and four senior researchers, and is also part of an internationally funded project and consortium of four European universities. Another research project is conducted in collaboration with researchers at Stockholm University, and yet another is a collaboration project within a broad Nordic research network. Research is also conducted, to a limited extent, by teaching staff with PhDs and doctoral students, focusing on planning issues in both a national and international context.

The research in planning and the built environment is conducted at the Department of Spatial Planning.

News

Smart Energy Solutions for Africa: Accelerating the green transition and energy access Partnership with Africa (SESA)

SESA: Building on and expanding existing partnerships between Europe and Africa, the SESA project aims to support leapfrogging sustainable energy solutions while substituting fossil-fuel-based energy. Embracing a cross-sectoral, interdisciplinary and collaborative approach, the target is to mitigate climate change and avoid lock-in situations while improving access to sustainable energy under affordable, reliable conditions. To do so, the project supports solutions that harness the sustainable and promising opportunities already present on the African continent, such as the highest solar radiation in the world. It includes increasing the use of renewable energies and, supporting and scaling-up nascent technical and financial innovations in order to steer energy in selected African countries towards more sustainable pathways. Conditions for successful implementation and replication are set to enable long-term sustainability of the project.

Examples of Projects

RETHINKING THE PLANNER

RETHINKING THE PLANNER

What kind of planners are we educating? Major societal challenges influence how, what and why planning is needed? This might be obvious but it nevertheless poses new demands of the relevance of planning. Urbanisation, climate changes, rural depopulation, privatization of public services and spaces, increased inequality and segregation are some of the contemporary challenges that forces planning to adapt and take on tasks in new ways to accommodate these. Such a change force planners to develop and evaluate their working methods. This project examines students’ as well as practitioners’ opinions and expectations of their professional roles as planners.

Read more about the project

SESA

SESA

Accelerating the green transition and energy access Partnership with Africa 

 

Read more about the project

CollAGE

CollAGE

Collaboratively developing age-friendly communities with municipality eldercare, spatial planning and Senior Citizens’ Councils

 

CollAGE is a six year research programme in which cross-sector collaboration between three main actors in the municipality is investigated, eldercare, spatial planning, and Senior Citizens’ Councils.

Read more about the project

What places? What ageing? Ageing-in-place in contemporary African urbanities

What places? What ageing? Ageing-in-place in contemporary African urbanities

This project is the study of spatial aspects of older people’s ageing and everyday life in contemporary urbanities in Africa: Walvis Bay in Namibia and Jinja in Uganda.

Read more about the project

UrbanHist

UrbanHist

Throughout the 20th century, urban planning constituted itself as an important tool to spatially direct social developments. Blekinge Institute of Technology, BTH, together with three other European universities has received a SEK 7,5 million grant for a study on urban planning in the establishment, development and transformation of European cities, regions and nations.

 

Read more about the project

Our Researches

Prof. Catharina Nord catharina.nord@bth.se

Prof. Abdellah Abarkan

Prof. Peter Schlyter

Associate professor. Christer Persson

Associate professor. Ebba Högström ebba.hogstrom@bth.se

 

Senior Lecturer. Lina Berglund-Snodgrass lina.berglund-snodgrass@bth.se

Senior Lecturer. Sabrina Fredin

Senior Lecturer. Mats Lundström Mats-Johan.Lundstrom@bth.se

Senior lecturer. Ann Maudsley Ann.Maudsley@bth.se

Lecturer. Jimmie Andersén Jimmie.Andersén@bth.se

Our Doctoral students

Ida Nilsson ida.nilsson@bth.se

Judith Oginga Martins

Andrea Gimeno

Susanna Weddige susanna.weddige@bth.se

Andreea Blaga andreea.blaga@bth.se

Contact

bild på abdellahProfessor Abdellah Abarkan
Head of subject, spatial planning
E-mail: abdellah.abarkan@bth.se
Telephone: + 46 455-38 53 55

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