- Are we all neoliberals now? Urban planning in a neoliberal era   288 kb by    Wright, Ian & Geer, Herbet | iwright@herbertgeer.com.au    Short Outline This paper considers the ideology of neoliberalism in the context of the competing ideologies of postmodernism and modernism Abstract The modernist perspective of planning is concerned with making public and political decisions in respect of the planning of our places more rationally and consistent with an overarching public interest. However the modernist perspective of rational planning action has been challenged by a postmodernist perspective of pragmatic planning, and more recently, by a neoliberal perspective rooted in the economic and political conditions of Milton Friedman’s monetarism and Friedrick Hayek’s classical liberalism. This paper considers the ideology of neoliberalism in the context of the competing ideologies of postmodernism and modernism to identify the following: > an urban change model which identifies the relationships between urban change, ideology, planning theory and planning models; > the cultural, social, economic and political conditions of neoliberalism; > the broad policy setting of a neoliberal government; > the key features of the neoliberal strategic management planning model which is used by neoliberal governments; > the key features of planning practice arising from the use of the neoliberal strategic managerial planning model; > the role of urban planners in a neoliberal state. The paper concludes that the neoliberal project is contestable and suggests that the adoption of collaborative planning processes and evidence based strategic management planning offers the opportunity for planners to reassert their professional status, rebuild the trust of the public and politicians and lift the planning profession out of its current malaise. Keywords Case Study presented on the ISOCARP Congress 2013: Frontiers of Planning - Evolving and declining models of city planning practice   Click to open the full paper as pdf document   Click to send an email to the author(s) of this paper