Leadership challenges in the inner city: planning for sustainable regeneration in Birmingham and Barcelona

Abstract

Approaches to inner-city regeneration in Britain, Europe and North America have evolved since the 1980s to reflect greater priority on diversity of activities and more sustainable development. This has in turn posed new challenges for leadership in place-shaping and highlighted the need for different sets of skills, aptitudes and values than those which prevailed in the 1980s and 90s. This article examines how planners and policy-makers in Birmingham and Barcelona have tackled these challenges in the creation of new urban districts. It shows that while top-down approaches still prevail in both cities, leaders in Barcelona have been able to adapt more readily to the demands of a new era. In Birmingham, policymakers have struggled to break free of the more traditional approach that suited the city well in the 1980s but is less conducive to sustainable place-making challenges in the present day. This divergence of experience can be explained by several factors, most notably the institutional framework within which leaders operate and the prevailing planning culture rooted in the cities' pasts. The findings point to the need for this cultural influence to be taken into account in the forging of new leadership approaches in urban regeneration contexts.

Place leadership and the social contract: Re-examining local leadership in the East Midlands

“…From this the project was able to gain citizen involvement and gain local business support which enabled the City to press ahead with the urban, economic and social refurbishment of the Poblenou district of the City (named 22@) (Barber and Eastaway 2011). This model of Governance adds to the work of Cooke and Morgan (1998) by taking the concept of trust and the ideas of partnerships and adding a sense of legitimacy to it.…”

Cultura, transformación urbana y empoderamiento ciudadano frente a la gentrificación: Comparación entre el caso de Getsemaní (Cartagena de Indias) y el Raval (Barcelona)

“…Por otra parte, el proceso de regeneración del Raval es, según el Ayuntamiento, uno de los ejemplos del modelo Barcelona en el que se ha intentado hacer participar a la comunidad local (Barber & Pareja Eastaway, 2010). A pesar de que la estrategia de diseño e implementación de la regeneración urbana fue claramente top-down, con escasa participación de los vecinos del barrio (Blanco, 2009), las instituciones culturales del Raval han intentado desarrollar algunas vías de participación de los vecinos tradicionales, de los nuevos inmigrantes mayoritariamente de fuera de la Unión Europea y de la comunidad artística instalada en el barrio.…”

Leadership and collaborative planning: The case of Surakarta, Indonesia

“…Thus, the Surakarta case is quite contextual and benefited from social capital that fosters effective communication (cf. Barber and Pareja Eastaway, 2010). In this case, the local leaders actually exercised the essential task in collaborative planning, that is, to use effectively local cultural contexts so as to ease the communication process (cf.…”