Young people’s participation in urban landscape planning and transformation: a scoping review of interactive approaches

Abstract

This article presents a review of methodological advancements and transformative potential in participatory processes with young people in urban landscapes. It offers a framework understanding of current types of participatory processes in relation to urban landscape planning, and underlines lifeworld and action as two key components in transformative participatory processes with young people. The two-step scoping review of a literature sample (n = 44 studies) finds a prevalence of less-interactive approaches to young people’s participation in urban landscapes, and subsequently analyses openings for lifeworld and action in the more interactive approaches described (n = 17 studies). The interactive methods described demonstrate opportunities to facilitate young people’s own articulations of lifeworlds within the urban landscape, especially in extended processes deploying multiple creative methods. The relatively few examples of actions and interventions resulting from participatory processes points to the need for further development and the ambition to include young people in transforming urban landscapes towards increased sustainability.