This paper develops an analytical framework from which to understand the mobilisation of post-political urban environments across spatial and institutional contexts. Our analysis of two closely related cases from a Swedish context reveals the potential benefits of combining studies on urban political ecology and policy mobility. By utilising Actor-Network Theory (ANT) we illustrate how post-political environments that are shaped by mobile and mutating policies of sustainable urban development are stabilised through distinct discursive strategies, capital investments and the desire for increased influence within global frames of action and contribute to the creation of, what we call, selective geographies.

The objective of the COMPASS project was to provide an authoritative comparative report on changes in territorial governance and spatial planning systems in Europe from 2000 to 2016. This Final Report presents the main findings, conclusions and policy recommendations. The COMPASS project compares territorial governance and spatial planning in 32 European countries (the 28 EU member states plus four ESPON partner countries). COMPASS differs from previous studies in that the accent is not on a snapshot comparison of national systems, but on identifying trends in reforms from 2000 to 2016. It also seeks to give reasons for these changes with particular reference to EU directives and policies, and to identify good practices for the cross-fertilisation of spatial development policies with EU Cohesion Policy. The research is based on expert knowledge with reference wherever possible to authoritative sources. Experts with in-depth experience of each national system were appointed to contribute to the study. The research design involved primarily collection of data from the 32 countries through questionnaires and five in-depth case studies of the interaction of EU Cohesion Policy and other sectoral policies with spatial planning and territorial governance.

This chapter discusses the emerging body of literature on the mobilities of metropolitan policies since the 1980s. It will achieve this by reviewing the various directions of research and by identifying a number of implications of when such policies are mobilised and eventually land in a given metropolitan area or city, respectively. A tentative typology on the movement of different types of urban/metropolitan policies is suggested that intends to kick off a debate on whether we can distinguish the degrees of visibility, transferability and mutability between these different types of policies. The chapter finalises with some concluding observations concerning the current state of the study of the mobilisation of metropolitan policies and by pointing out some avenues for future research. The key contribution of this chapter is an overview of the conceptual, empirical and historical literature about the mobilisation of metropolitan policies within urban and planning studies.

This chapter focuses on the thematic scope and approaches to urban and regional policy in the five case study cities of Lisbon, Oporto, Istanbul, Stockholm and Rotterdam, while the spatial dynamics and vulnerabilities of each case are explored in Chap.​ 5. For each of these large urban agglomerations, a number of key documents are introduced and evaluated to provide an understanding of their approach to managing urban change, and an examination is made of their operating institutional framework as regards planning and policy in urban management. These documents constitute key elements of the formal planning systems (e.g. municipal urban development plans or regional comprehensive plans). In addition to spatial plans, a number of other strategic documents that have a clear impact on the management of urban change are identified that complement the spatial plans in various ways. As the intention in this chapter is only to provide an overview, the analysis is restricted to the most important among them.

This paper discusses current challenges, expectations and practices related to an increasingly applied normative concept, namely that of planning to become (or to maintain) a ‘polycentric’ metropolitan area. Based on findings provided by a group of spatial planners from 12 metropolitan areas across Europe, the concept of polycentricity is explored along three thematic strands. The paper draws particular attention to the major rationales articulated by practitioners; efforts to set in motion an in-depth debate within an international group; and planners' experiences with regard to the concept's applicability.

This chapter explores the practices of implementing a polycentric strategy in the Stockholm urban agglomeration. The Stockholm case has been chosen to illustrate the need for a broadening of the understanding of resilience in actual land-use planning to a state in which the governance system can be viewed as a resilient structure that is flexible and adaptable to rapid changes at the city-regional level.

This paper primarily discusses strategies for the development of small and medium-sized cities and towns in Europe Union. The roles and potentials of small and medium-sized cities and towns are analyzed frstly. Then it primarily summarizes the growing concerns and related policies on medium-sized cities and towns in the following part, which refected the ambitions to integrate urban issues within the EU policy framework. Some of the major policy documents and programmes as well as related normative concepts of the EU policy framework are critically analyzed. The so-called‘urban dimension’is emerging in various strategies within the EU policy framework, whereas its specifc design and territorial focus, also in relation to small and medium-sized cities and towns, remains to be rather vague.

The political conditions for spatial planning in the Nordic countries are changing in multiple directions. This chapter investigates recent shifts and trajectories of change in spatial planning in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The focus is on the politics behind these recent shifts and the induced rescaling processes and modification of spatial planning instruments. The chapter provides at first a background on the so-called Nordic model, the different political-administrative structures in the Nordic countries and recent changes in regard to the political conditions for spatial planning. After that, we review the shifts in the spatial planning systems in the countries with a particular focus on the spatial planning instruments in the last 15 years. This is followed by a section in which we compare a number of further trajectories related to spatial planning. In the concluding discussion, we take up the post-political question in order to reflect upon to what extent we can identify signifiers towards either depoliticization or even repoliticization in regard to spatial planning in the Nordic countries.

Spatial planning is often expected to coordinate other policy areas or sector policies, in particular those that have strong spatial impacts. Ideally this process of coordination shall lead to policy integration or to other forms of consensual agreements such as policy packages. Inevitably the question arises to what extent spatial planning can be considered as an autonomous policy area with specific instruments (e.g. statutory frameworks that are of visionary, strategic or regulative character) and power resources. We address this question by discussing and comparing the role of spatial planning across 32 European countries in relation to 14 other policy areas based on findings from the ESPON COMPASS study. First, the degree of integration of spatial planning is investigated within other policy areas at three different policy levels (national, sub-national and local). Secondly, the extent to which these 14 policy areas are influential in current debates on spatial planning will be compared with the year 2000. The analysis reveals a number of recurrent patterns and types of spatial planning as well as directions of change. In the end we argue that spatial planning plays a significant and for the most part even increasing role in relation to other policy areas in most of the studied countries in Europe, but at the same time we can construe a growing degree of diversification between countries, policy levels and policy areas.

In this paper we discuss findings of our case study on the making and implementation of the exhibition 'Experiment Stockholm' in 2015, which, based on artistic exhibits as well as a number of forums, aimed at generating creative narratives for the sustainable urban future in the Swedish capital city-region. Our analytical framework is informed by the emerging notion of 'urban living labs' across Europe as well as 'communicative' and 'actor-relational' planning theory', which is discussed in another paper within the poceedings of this conference (cf. Schmitt et al. 2016). We argue that the exhibition 'Experiment Stockholm' and the activities around it can be characterised as a soft mode of urban governance that can help to unlock creativity and to open up avenues for experimentation and alternative solutions in urban planning. However, caution must be taken to not overvalue such approaches, as our example implies a rather exclusive expert forum instead of a a mode of governance that might be associated with openness and wider engagement. In addition, our example illustrates the significance of suitable and unconventional methods, which otherwise considerably limits the innovative capacity of the participating stakeholders and their search for alternative solutions.

The normative concept of polycentricity has become a promising tool to pursue spatial policy goals such as spatial equity and justice, sustainable and balanced development, and, more recently territorial cohesion, at various scales across Europe. As earlier research has shown, a number of city-regions use the concept for their planning and development work. In pursuit of polycentric development, they call for a robust terminology, solid analysis and methods. As a result, literature analysing polycentricity at the city- or mega-regional scale has grown significantly and it appears that some consensus has been achieved in regards to the main facets and dimensions. Recognizing that the potentials to comprehend city-regional dynamics by focussing on the extent to which polycentric urban patterns evolve has not yet been fully utilised, this paper intends to contribute to a more comprehensive view on polycentricity at the city-regional scale. In doing so, we study the (potentially) emerging urban patterns of two cases, the Dusseldorf and Stockholm city-regions, employing different theoretical starting points and analytical approaches. With this in mind, we aim to unpack the concept of polycentricity at the city-regional scale and to offer academics, as well as planning professionals and policy-makers, further insights into qualifying, analysing and understanding the complexity of the topic at hand. Likewise, we argue that sound strategies to promote and mobilise different facets of polycentric development should be carefully reflected and related to the theoretical, methodological and even normative starting point of any attempt to comprehending polycentricity.

Since the 1990s, the concept of governance has become an integral element of spatial planning research. In this article, we revisit some of the key contributions to the literature to discuss how and to what extent governance theory has informed planning theory so far and what the implications are for our understanding of how to construe planning practices. Next, we examine the current governance literature in order to identify promising elements that can further inform planning theory and practice. More specifically, we discuss relations between hybrid modes of governance in regard to cross-sectoral coordination of actors and institutions, and the implications of various forms of learning within governance networks. Finally, we suggest entry points for planning research such as studying the combination and the interplay of various modes of governance to understand the inherent functioning of spatial planning assemblages, or investigating the learning capacity of actors and institutions in order to anticipate their adaptive capacity to respond to changing contexts in spatial planning practice. However, we also point out a few, but troublesome implications. One of them is that planning understood as the governance of place might imply that the term ‘planning’ as such becomes meaningless and that planning theory might turn into a subsection of (institutional) political theory. The article serves as a framing text for this special issue as it addresses a number of key elements and underlying concepts of the governance literature that are relevant for understanding the procedural dimension of spatial planning and which underpin some of the issues that are addressed in the more case study-based contributions by the other authors.

How can the established concept of ‘Norden’ – which covers the Northern European countries of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden – be understood in a brave new world of megaregions? The significance of Norden, which literary means ‘the North’, is often acknowledged to be a ‘stabilised’ transnational (mega) region (Gustafsson, 2006). This is due, in part, to the Nordic countries sharing a number of cultural and historical commonalities, somewhat similar political trajectories through the 20th century and a well-known welfare state tradition. Yet, on closer inspection, we have seen in recent years various diverging development paths in territorial policy and politics in general, and urban and regional planning in particular. Furthermore, when adopting a relational perspective, we can detect how a number of Nordic city-regions are being formed and transformed – through transnational (business) networks and various related state spatial strategies – with the aim being to strategically place them as nodes within the global space of flows. What this amounts to is a more fluid geographical image of Norden. Against this backdrop the concept of Norden is an interesting example of how (mega) regions are being constructed through particular sets of relations, processes and mechanisms, while at the same time being challenged and deconstructed by other sets of relations, processes and mechanisms. In this chapter, we seek to problematize these happenings, providing critical reflections from a North European perspective. The research presented derives from a range of studies and observations produced by Nordregio – The Nordic Centre for Spatial Development.

The ESPON DeTeC (Detecting Territorial Potential and Challenges) project has developed five territorial approaches that can support regional stakeholders in revealing and detecting challenges and potential within a wider territorial context from a European perspective. The objective of this article is to present these approaches, which can be used to make ESPON knowledge more tangible and which can help in navigating through the inherent tensions, associated with the policy concept of territorial cohesion. In doing so, the article provides at first a brief introduction to the concept of territorial cohesion, a presentation and discussion of the territorial approaches with a particular focus on how they address exogenous challenges and endogenous potentials, conceptualize regional territories within relational spaces, and finally, how they direct attention towards territorial governance and the fluidity of scales and places. It is a practice oriented article that in conclusion discusses how territorial approaches can provide guidance for strategic local and regional policy making and how they help to open up new perspectives in local and regional development through the application of ESPON knowledge.

Across Europe the regional policy level is difficult to capture analytically, due to the prevailing differences in terms of institutional settings and political contexts, geographic size and scope of regions. Regional planning is not an exception as it is institutionalized differently across Europe and its practical significance varies in regard to mediating competition over the use of land, regulating change and promoting preferred spatial and urban form. In general, the regional level is often considered as an appropriate scale for addressing current challenges in relation to sustainable development; and regional planning as such is appreciated as a sub-national mode of horizontal and vertical coordination to integrate various policy fields. However, the institutional context of regional planning has changed significantly in recent years, which has resulted in weakening its political significance and practical relevance. In this paper, we question and nuance these seemingly diverging theoretical and practical views on the position of regional planning through a comparative analysis of regional planning across Europe. Drawing upon results from the ESPON COMPASS (2018) project, we investigate i) shifts in the distribution of spatial planning competences; ii) changes in regard to regional planning instruments, and iii) the role of regional planning within sectoral policies. We conclude that the institutional and instrumental conditions for regional planning across Europe are extensive and to some extent have been renewed and adapted to changing contexts in recent years. In principal regional planning seems to be well positioned to mediate the use of land and to regulate spatial development. However, the role of regional planning is differently positioned in each country in relation to various sectoral policies and the way statutory instruments are produced and applied. Due to diverging trajectories of regional planning our comparative analysis indicates only minor congruence with earlier classifications of spatial planning traditions across Europe.

Plans and other planning instruments that are used to mediate and regulate spatial development are fundamental for the operation of spatial planning systems, and for defining them, as well as pursing spatial planning objectives. This paper is based on an extensive comparative study of spatial planning systems in Europe (ESPON COMPASS), which included a review of spatial planning instruments that are used to mediate competition over the use of land, to allocate rights of development, to regulate change and to promote preferred spatial and urban form. Over 250 spatial planning instruments in 32 different European countries were identified by national experts. The results show a diverse pattern with strong differences in regard to the instruments' characteristics (e.g. visionary, strategic, framework or regulative) at different policy levels (national, regional and local) even between countries that have been grouped together within similar types or traditions in earlier studies. Furthermore, many individual planning instruments are often expected to combine several functions, e.g. they are expected to simultaneously be, in different combinations; visionary and agenda setting, providing strategic and long-term coordination, establishing policy frameworks for other plans and decisions, and/or be regulatory including legally binding land use commitments. Many planning instruments might thus be understood as 'multi-purpose tools'. Based on this review and analysis we offer empirically derived typologies and conceptualizations of spatial planning instruments that provide a different image of spatial planning systems across Europe compared to earlier studies, and as such gives insights in what directions spatial planning in Europe is moving.

Much of the policy analysis of spatial planning today focuses on governance or multi-level governance in the sense of tracing vertical and horizontal linkages and integration of relevant stakeholders (particularly from the bottom-up). Thus far, little attention has been paid to the more specific territorial dimensions of governance or how knowledge of territorial specificities and the territorial impacts of various courses of action are used in policy- and decision-making. This paper presents the conceptual and practical implications of the ‘ESPON TANGO’ – project (Territorial Approaches for New Governance). To that end a framework of analysis was developed to systematically conceptualise, operationalise and explore territorial governance processes. Some of the main empirical findings from twelve case studies across Europe are synthesised along 20 components of territorial governance. These components are representative of the structural and process-oriented facets of territorial governance. It will be argued that our analytical framework offers various entry points to understand the main elements and characteristics of territorial governance and thus adds clarity to the debate on what territorial governance is. It also offers a more practical access to doing territorial governance to support practitioners and policy makers at any level to promote territorial governance.