The discourse on the compatibility of planned inner-city shopping-malls. Calculative practices of knowledge-production and governmentalities of urban development in the inner-city of Mainz

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Robert Pütz
• Subject Area: Human Geography
• Term: from 2017 to 2019
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 374134160

The project analyses discourses of compatibility related to planned large-scale inner city shopping centres using the example of an ongoing planning conflict in the city of Mainz. As own preliminary investigations show, compatibility has evolved to a central concept of the debate - with heterogeneous specifications. The requested case study analyses these diverse discoursive framings of compatibility and their effects on the urban planning conflict especially taking into consideration the role of expert opinion. The concept of compatibility implies the existence of a normative framework how inner cities should develop: Only with respect to specific conceptual approaches to urban development it can be determined to what extent a planned shopping centre is compatible with the targeted development path. Conceptually grounded in studies of governmentality, the project first aims at a detailed description of the rationalities of governing urban planning processes that structure the discourse on compatibility. Second, the project analyses the implications of calculative practices in expert discourses for finding solutions in the conflict. Third, both aspects are brought together in order to synthesize the development of political rationalities of urban development in the context of the discourse on the compatibility of planned inner-city shopping centres. The empirical approach is based on a discourse analysis of a corpus consisting of minutes of civic participation, policy documents and reports, urban development concepts as well as semi-structured interviews to document experts opinions.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants