Governing ‘places that don’t matter’: agonistic spatial planning practices in Finnish peripheral regions

Autor(en)
Hanna Mattila, Eva Purkharthofer, Alois Humer
Abstrakt

Economic geographer Andrés Rodríguez-Pose argued recently that declining peripheries are increasingly becoming ‘places that don’t matter’ in the formation or implementation of national or European Union (EU) regional policies. In turn, this might result in a triumph of populist anti-establishment movements in peripheries, posing a threat to well-being in both the prospering and the declining regions. We argue that ‘places that don’t matter’ also exist in Finland, a country that has a long tradition of regional policy and equalizing welfare schemes. Our focus is on administration rather than politics, however. We look at the Finnish peripheral regions of Kainuu and Lapland, discussing the practices of spatial planners, who influence and implement EU and national regional policies in these regions. We ask how strategic spatial planning in Kainuu and Lapland is affected by the revengeful and antagonistic attitudes towards the ‘elites’ who, allegedly, are not directing a sufficient amount of attention to the peripheries. We look at the planning practices and institutional settings within which they work from the perspective of agonistic planning theory, asking whether and how spatial planners can turn the antagonistic and potentially revengeful attitudes into productive forces that could positively affect spatial development in these regions.

Organisation(en)
Institut für Geographie und Regionalforschung
Externe Organisation(en)
Aalto University, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, Delft University of Technology
Journal
Territory, Politics, Governance
Band
11
Seiten
813-832
Anzahl der Seiten
19
ISSN
2162-2671
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1080/21622671.2020.1857824
Publikationsdatum
12-2020
Peer-reviewed
Ja
ÖFOS 2012
507014 Regionalentwicklung, 507010 Politische Geographie
Schlagwörter
ASJC Scopus Sachgebiete
Geography, Planning and Development, Political Science and International Relations
Link zum Portal
https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/de/publications/49618309-c5ef-43f1-a1ef-ac11f8ac8522