Keywords

1 Introduction: The Resilience Perspective and Urban and Regional Planning

As the world deals with a multiplying and intensifying spectrum of problems, resilience thinking is attracting increasing attention. Central and local administrations, national and international organizations, and civil society refer to resilience in their plans, policies, and strategies at an accelerating rate. The current usage of “resilience” covers various definitions from different disciplines (ecology, social sciences, psychology, planning) and refers to the set of characteristics that provide a system the ability to cope with change without losing its structure, keeping options for development open, and learning from past and present experiences when facing external or internal disturbances and stresses that may influence the system at different scales. (Adger 2000; Baud and Hordijk 2009; Nelson et al. 2007; Resilience Alliance 2007; Walker et al. 2006, 2004).

Resilience is now a keyword in policies on contemporary urban and regional problems such as ecological processes, natural disasters, economic crises, wars, terrorism, and forced migration . Examples of resilience planning practices abound globally at all levels of government as well as in international economic, social and humanitarian aid organizations, NGOs, and networks (see 3RP 2017; ICLEI 2018).

Within the context of urban and regional planning , recent studies and discussions highlight the core idea of resilience planning practices as providing durable solutions for cities and regions rather than immediate and short-term answers (Balsari et al. 2015; Gabiam 2016; Gonzales 2016). Hence, resilience seems to be occupying urban and regional planning debates and practices for an increasingly longer time span and can be assumed to be the primary planning approach or paradigm (see Eraydın 2013) of this century.

This chapter aims to develop an explanatory model that reframes the relation between resilience and planning practice and suggests that planning for resilience itself is a determinant of resilience. Such a model provides the necessary steps of incorporating a resilience perspective within the professional practice of urban and regional planning . In parallel, the model reveals the challenges ahead for previously established planning systems, such as Turkey’s, in adapting to a resilience-centred urban and regional planning practice.

The Turkish planning system has not yet incorporated resilience thinking into the visions, strategies, and agendas of central and local institutions. The most pressing challenges in Turkey arise from the lack of efficient coordination and management in preparing and implementing plans, reluctance to base decisions and policies on scientific knowledge, the lack of an established and transparent praxis of participation, and the lack of a governance model based on civil engagement.

2 Planning for Urban and Regional Resilience

Examining different studies on resilience can result in the following definition: Resilience incorporates capacities, resources, and abilities that can be mobilized when facing unexpected or expected, external or internal disturbances and stresses, and includes a process through which a system can adapt to and self-organize according to these changing conditions, without any interruption in its functioning. There is an emphasis in the current resilience literature on restructuring and developing systems for improved adaptability using learning capacities based on gained experiences (see Adger 2000; Baud and Hordijk 2009; Carpenter et al. 2001; Cote and Nightingale 2012; Holling 1973; Maguire and Cartwright 2008; Meerow et al. 2016; Nelson et al. 2007; Resilience Alliance 2007; Walker et al. 2004, 2006).

The components defining resilience for social-ecological systems (SESs) are similar and as important to conceptualize urban and regional resilience. The planning discipline conceives cities and regions as complex systems with strong spatial and social connotations, as well as ecological, physical, economic, political, and cultural dimensions. The International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives, now known as Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI), defines a resilient city as one that “is prepared to absorb and recover from any shock or stress while maintaining its essential functions, structures, and identity as well as adapting and thriving in the face of continual change” (ICLEI 2018). This chapter asserts that urban and regional resilience aims for three goals: (1) to maintain system functioning in the face of disturbances, (2) to maintain the well-being of system actors in a balanced and equitable way without harming other system components, and (3) to change and develop for future adaptability. Resilience planning aims to achieve the above goals by being the main instrument to operationalize resilience strategies . In practice, many institutions today use resilience plans to manage, coordinate, and actualize their short-term and long-term responses to crises such as natural disasters or humanitarian issues.

The twenty-first century is increasingly an era of crisis, change, and challenges. Climate change is making human settlements and societies around the globe more prone to natural disasters (e.g. flooding and fires). Natural processes are becoming harder to predict. Globalization and neoliberalization also bring new processes of change (Eraydın 2013), driving restructurings in political, economic, social, and cultural systems. Humanitarian crises caused by wars and terrorism continue (e.g. the Syrian refugee crisis), as do international political tensions. These situations reveal how cities and societies become subject to shocks and stresses. Further, as the urban population steadily increases, the parallel increase in socio-economic inequalities makes the issue of urban and regional resilience critical (Taşan-Kok et al. 2013).

Processes that shape cities and urban development are multidimensional and operate at different levels and scales. In parallel, planning for cities and regions requires a complex undertaking. Resilience thinking places the ideas of change and unexpectedness at its core and provides theories and instruments for elaborating cities as complex systems (Eraydın and Taşan-Kok 2013). Resilience planning, therefore, has the potential to constitute the basis of a new planning approach, but it should be noted that this framework is not a blanket solution to all problems in communities. Each city and region, every combination of potential disturbances, and all geographical scales of influences must be individually assessed. Every system has different characteristics and specificities, and thus, there is no single formula for resilience that works for all. In addition, because the attributes that provide resilience to systems are singular to each area and to the disturbance faced, a context-specific resilience planning is required.

Many discussions in the literature put the question of resilience for whom? and resilience for what? at their centre (Carpenter et al. 2001; Cretney 2014; Lebel et al. 2006). Grüneward and Warner (2012) note that what provides resilience in one context may harm it in another. Similarly, the resilience of the part may negatively influence the resilience of the whole (Grüneward and Warner 2012). Moreover, as Taşan-Kok et al. (2013: 48) indicate, the determinants of resilience for each city are also “a function of [the city’s] particular evolutionary path and its own capacity for adaptation”. All of these indications clarify that resilience planning for each city or region must be conducted independently, with respect to the system context. Planning is one of the only professions that can deal with such complex variables and strategically respond to the problems of each scale.

Resilience is not a natural attribute of systems. It can be enhanced, however, by plan preparation and improvements to the components specific to the system, disturbance, locality, scale, and society. Resilience is henceforth composed of a set of attributes that can be improved and developed through planning. Based on this understanding, planning becomes a major tool through which resilience can be enhanced, and in turn, resilience thinking opens up new terrain for the development of the planning profession.

This chapter maintains that there is a particular relation between planning and resiliency. Within the massive amount of the literature aiming to measure the resilience of human settlements and communities against various disturbances, there is little work that discusses the role of planning for a system’s resilience. Recent works on the practical implications of the resilience discourse (e.g. Wagenaar and Wilkinson 2015; Chmutina et al. 2016) analyse the ways in which public institutions achieve resilience for their cities or regions vis-à-vis identified risks and threats. Planning is the major instrument for analysing, designing, and managing the road to resilience. This chapter, therefore, argues that planning for resilience is itself a constitutional component of resiliency.

Beatley (2009) shows that resilience is above all determined by a system’s physical (built environment and land use), economic, social, and environmental attributes, resources, and capacities). In addition to this set of more tangible determinants, governance and participation (Berkes and Ross 2013; Lebel et al. 2006; Nelson et al. 2007; Pelling 2003; Ross et al. 2010), knowledge and information (Buikstra et al. 2010; Norris et al. 2008; Ross et al. 2010; Paton et al. 2001a, b), and institutions (Adger 2000; Berkes and Ross 2013; Nelson et al. 2007) are other important determinants of resilience that are highly mentioned in the literature. This second set of determinants relates mostly to the coordination and management of the resilience planning process. All the mentioned determinants contribute to the system’s performance—positively or negatively—against disturbances.

Resilience also requires a process-based understanding, where (1) risk perception (Altay Kaya and Eraydın 2013; Marshall 2010, 2007; Paton et al. 2001a, b), (2) strategy development (Blaikie et al. 1994; Scoones 2005; Maguire and Cartwright 2008; Bradley and Grainger 2004), and (3) actualized responses compose the process through which a system copes with a faced disturbance. How well these steps are performed shows the level of a system’s resilience. Ainuddin and Routray (2012) develop a community resilience framework that identifies similar sequential events in the course of achieving resilience: (1) potential impacts, (2) system vulnerability, (3) risk perception, and (4) resilience as the outcome.

Approaching the issue of resilience as a process (Nelson et al. 2007) composed of interrelated sequential stages exposes the primary fields of intervention—risk perception, strategy development, actualized responses—that are necessary for enhancing resilience. The process approach thus provides a guiding framework for structuring the planning process and its scope. Planning for resiliency should take into consideration knowledge of the above-noted determinants and develop strategies for efficient management and improvement. This practice ties into the resilience planning paradigm in accepting strategic planning approaches.

This chapter suggests a two-faceted approach to studying resilience: (1) measuring the performance of the system, that is, the adaptive capacity of the system and its components, and (2) measuring the efficiency of the planning process, that is, planning ability and efficiency in operationalizing plans. There is a massive amount of empirical study on the first facet: the resilience performance of cities and communities. The following section presents a structural model of explanation and analysis for the second facet of resilience: efficient planning.

3 Developing a Structural Model for Resilience Planning

The process of resiliency can be understood as the process through which available risks and opportunities are perceived and dealt with (Altay Kaya and Eraydın 2013); strategies for coping are developed, a disturbance is experienced, immediate responses are manifested, short-term and long-term actions are operationalized, lessons are drawn from experiences, and the perception of potential risks and opportunities is redeveloped. This provides a cyclical understanding of system development, conceptualized as adaptive cycles (see Holling 1986, 1992 in Gunderson 2000, Walker et al. 2004, 2006). In a similar understanding, Foster (2007) introduces four stages in her framework for assessing regional resilience: assessment, readiness, response, and recovery. These stages parallel to her definition of regional resilience: “the ability of a region to anticipate, prepare for, respond to and recover from a disturbance” (Foster 2007: 16). The first two stages, assessment and readiness, compose the phase of preparation resilience, and the following two stages, response and recovery, compose the performance resilience phase (Foster 2007). Between the two phases, the system experiences shock, crisis, or stress. The most valuable contribution of this approach is that resilience as a process is not limited to a specific time period but encompasses actions before and after a disturbance.

Foster’s (2007) two-phase and four-stage model also provides a suitable framework for elaborating resilience planning , as planning covers and relates to all four dimensions. While most discussions and studies focus on measuring and improving performance resilience, accepting planning as a constituent of resilience draws equal attention to the preparation phase of resilience.

Lu and Stead (2013) identify six characteristics of resilience based on a synthesis of the resilience indicators available in the literature. These aspects can be used as guiding points for the further configuration of resilience planning : (1) attention to the current situation, (2) attention to trends and future threats, (3) ability to learn from previous experience, (4) ability to set goals, (5) ability to initiate actions, and (6) ability to involve the public.

From the above six characteristics of resilience, two factors stand out: first, the necessity of efficient coordination and management by the administrative actors of the resilience process, which is strongly related to the practice of urban and regional planning , and second, the importance of community involvement within decision-making processes. The literature on social and community resilience proves in many ways the importance of building community capacities through social cohesion (Ainuddin and Routray 2012; Berkes and Ross 2013; Cutter et al. 2008, 2010; Kulig et al. 2008; Mayunga 2007; Norris et al. 2008; Ross et al. 2010), self-organization capacity (Berkes and Ross 2013; Kulig 2000; Kulig et al. 2008; Norris et al. 2008), participation (Lebel et al. 2006; Pelling 2003; Nelson et al. 2007), and engaged governance (Maclean et al. 2014; Ross et al. 2010). Planning for resilience should thus incorporate participatory and collaborative approaches.

The model (below) for resilience planning outlined in this chapter adopts Foster’s (2007) stages of resilience and incorporates various strategies, actions, and policies highlighted within the literature. The model lists and suggests various tasks and actions related to the different stages of resilience (see Tables 11.1, 11.2, and 11.3), with three principles operating at the cross section of all suggested activities: (1) communicating with the public, (2) collaborating at different levels, and (3) critically assessing. These principles are the indispensable elements of each stage of resilience planning.

The third principle, critically assessing, is based on a major criticism of resilience thinking, which is that the focus on maintaining a system’s structure and functioning diverts planned and actualized efforts from critically evaluating the system’s shortcomings. This diversion may in turn be contributing to potential risks and threats and prevent the system’s administrators from making necessary radical (or otherwise) changes and restructurings.

3.1 The Stages and Proposed Components of Resilience Planning

Assessment Stage The assessment stage greatly contributes to how prepared the system is against disturbances. This stage takes into consideration the context and scales within which the system is embedded, as well as potential disturbances and system characteristics.

Table 11.1 Steps of the assessment stage in resilience planning (prepared by the author based on Eraydın and Taşan-Kok, 2013; Foster 2007; Lu and Stead 2013; Taşan-Kok et al. 2010)
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The proposed actions for this stage include analysing the current situation; learning from the system’s past and present experiences, as well as others’ experiences; making predictions; determining the appropriate vision for resiliency; making critical assessments; communicating; collaborating; and, finally, producing the resilience plans (detailed explanations for each action are presented in Table 11.1). The assessment stage is crucial, as it is where most of the preparatory work of planning is conducted, especially around establishing the scientific grounds for the plans.

Efficient management and realization of the assessment stage will provide the system with an inventory of potential disturbances, risks, threats, and opportunities; pertinent perception and awareness of the context and situation; identified system characteristics (vulnerabilities and capacities); and the abilities to predict challenges, learn from experience, communicate, collaborate, and ultimately develop an effective resilience plan. These achievements are important inputs for all stages of resilience planning .

In terms of operationalization and instrumentalization, the assessment stage requires (1) effective coordination and management of the planning work, with a competent, professional workforce, inter-institutional collaboration and communication, and decisions based on scientific grounds; (2) effective management of data, information, and knowledge; and (3) a participatory and inclusive approach towards planning.

Readiness Stage The readiness stage aims to prepare the system for potential disturbances (Foster 2007). In this stage, strategies, policies, and tools for resilience are developed and readiness actions are implemented.

Table 11.2 Steps of the readiness stage in resilience planning (prepared by the author based on Eraydın and Taşan-Kok, 2013; Foster 2007; Lu and Stead 2013; Taşan-Kok et al. 2010)
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As evident from Table 11.2, readiness actions may include anticipatory prevention implementation activities (Nelson et al. 2007), implementing policies for enhancing the capacities of system components (individuals, institutions, and community), projects to reduce vulnerabilities, and system restructuring based on the critical assessments conducted in the previous stage. The scope of readiness actions can be both long term and short term.

Efficient management and realization of the readiness stage will provide the system the necessary robustness (Lu and Stead 2013) in withstanding and responding to shocks, reducing potential damages, and give it a variety of options and resources to be mobilized in response to disturbances. In terms of operationalization and instrumentalization, the assessment stage requires (1) a well-coordinated and transparent process of implementing planning decisions, strategies, and policies and (2) capacity to plan and the ability to set goals (Lu and Stead 2013).

Response and Recovery Stages The response and recovery stage includes actions, operations and projects initialized in response to faced disturbances, within varying time spans from immediate to long-term. With reference to planning, response and recovery stages are where implementing plan strategies, policies, and projects occurs.

The proposed actions for response and recovery are categorized under the titles of immediate responses; short-term interventions; plan, policy and project implementations; service delivery; providing economic support, funding, and incentives; communicating with the public; collaborating; and critical assessment. Details of each action are presented in Table 11.3.

The recovery stage can be viewed as a continuation of the response stage and includes implementing protracted policies and projects for system recovery. These actions are also preventive and can be viewed as investments, instigated by lessons learned from the disturbance. Therefore, the recovery stage includes once again a critical evaluation of the system and of the experienced process to derive changes for the future. With this last component, the adaptive cycle of resilience begins again.

Efficient management and realization in these stages will provide the system with rapid response and recovery abilities (Lu and Stead 2013), such as to diminish damages, reorganize after the disturbance, implement positive change, and critically evaluate the process.

In terms of operationalization and instrumentalization, the response and recovery stages require (1) efficient resource management; (2) collaboration with the community, community capacities, and a praxis of participation; (3) good international relations (if applicable); (4) effective process coordination and management; and (5) an equitable, fair, ethical, and transparent approach to governance.

Table 11.3 Steps of the response and recovery stages in resilience planning (prepared by the author based on Eraydın and Taşan-Kok, 2013; Foster 2007; Lu and Stead 2013; Taşan-Kok et al. 2010)
Full size table

The model explained above aims to provide insight into the stages and components of resiliency and resilience planning . This approach shows that planning and resilience are intricately related processes, and therefore, effective planning greatly contributes to system resilience. By listing the main stages and components of resilience planning, as well as sets of related actions, this chapter helps identify the key attributes, capacities, and abilities that should be attained by communities’ institutional structures. In summary, resilience planning, as structured by this model, requires well-coordinated, effectively managed, scientifically grounded, transparent, inclusive, and equitable planning systems and governance processes.

4 The Contemporary Planning Context and the Resilience Approach in Turkey

Adopting resilience thinking into the context of cities and regions, and into planning practices, usually requires a change of perspective on planning theory, practice, and operationalization, as discussed in the previous sections. Any system change can be difficult, and integrating a resilience perspective into a country context can bring additional issues. For example, in the Turkish case, inherent problems in the country’s planning system make integrating a resilience perspective that much more challenging.

Until very recently, the concept, theory, and application of resilience thinking have been absent from Turkey’s official planning context. Resilience still remains a field of discussion mainly appropriated by scholars, and even in academia, there is a limited amount of work produced in Turkish. To identify the challenges specific to Turkey, this section explores the issues of the planning environment in Turkey and examines the resilience thinking that does exist within that context.

4.1 Challenges in the Turkish Planning Context

Planning in Turkey has undergone major transformations in various political periods. A review of changing urban policies, the legislative framework, and the related creation of the urban environment as the outcome reveals 1980 and 2002 as two major points in the recent history of the Turkish planning system. Understanding the changes experienced during these periods is important for understanding the current problematic structure of the Turkish planning context and, hence, for identifying the challenges that await if a resilience perspective is to be pursued in the country overall.

The first turning point in Turkish planning history was Turkey’s coup d’état of 1980 and the introduction of neoliberal policies with subsequent governments. In the 1980s, government policy aimed at integrating Turkey into the globalizing world system (Güzey 2016) and targeted their economic policies to that end. This period is characterized by decentralization and deregulation at the national level that facilitated the creation of an open-market economy (Bayırbağ 2013).

Similarly, local government reform occurred in 1984, which increased the duties and powers of metropolitan municipalities. These reforms included a vast transfer of planning and approval authority to local administrations. Municipalities and mayors became stronger (Bayırbağ 2013), but the state did not relinquish its hegemonic position in the urban space in Turkey (Duyguluer 2012). Conversely, legislative interventions in the 1980s laid the base for urbanization as a rent-generating tool for local and central governments alike (Bayırbağ 2013; Türkün 2011). This inclination intensified in the 1990s through market-supporting reforms (Güzey 2016) and clearing slums and squatter housing for redevelopment projects.

The second turning point in Turkish planning history also began with government change. After coalition governments since the coup, and an economic crisis in 2001, the newly formed Justice and Development Party came to power in 2002. The 2000s in Turkey were characterized by the persistent and intensifying deployment of neoliberal urban policies, with the increasing presence of the state as an economic actor in the urban space through rent-extracting, large-scale urban projects and implementations (Penpecioğlu 2011).

Since 1980, neoliberal thinking had been instrumentalized through extensive restructuring of planning and urban development legislation. Successive law making and amendments contributed to the proliferation of rent extraction, profit maximization, and capital accumulation via the urban space (see Güzey 2016; Türkün 2011; Türkün et al. 2014). Interventions in the legislative framework of planning and urban development both provided the legal supports for these changes and channelled the discourse for their legitimization (Güzey 2016). Moreover, the new legal setting gave exceptional rights to certain authorities, bypassing existing laws and plans, as well as scientific and technical knowledge. These practices opened up an unrestricted terrain of operation for many projects.

These legislative interventions have resulted in a tangled planning system, which hinders professional practice. Many of the urban development and redevelopment implementations are not grounded in professional or scientific knowledge but rather on the vision and agendas of the policy makers. This neoliberal perspective of economically focused urban policies contradicts with the principles of resilience planning , which are strongly rooted in scientific assessments and based on social concerns such as equity, transparency, inclusivity, and cohesion. Conversely, current urban policies and implemented projects have been criticized for sharpening socio-economic inequalities and socio-spatial segregation (Güzey 2016, Türkün 2011). In addition, both the planning process and plan implementations offer limited opportunity for political representation and participation from the communities they are produced for (Türkün 2011).

4.2 Resilience Thinking in Turkey in Relation to Resilience Planning Stages

4.2.1 Assessment and Readiness Stages

The assessment and readiness stages of the resilience planning framework presented in this chapter include the major steps of the planning process for cities and regions and comprise preparatory analyses, policy and strategy development, project development, and producing resilience plans. In a country context, the professional practice of planning is determined by government’s accepted planning approach and the legal framework regulating the planning process, the latter of which is mainly shaped and conditioned according to the government’s vision of planning and urbanization.

National Council on Urbanization In Turkey, one of the most prominent documents setting the vision for and discourse on urbanism and planning at the national level are reports from the “Şehircilik Şurası”—the National Council on Urbanization (NCU)—a committee founded by the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization (MEU) (decree no. KHK/644, 4.7.2011). As explained in the latest report (MEU 2017), which was derived from a series of meetings in 2017, national councils on urbanization are to guide meetings that support the development of strategic decisions and institution policies and facilitate the realization of investments. The 2017 report’s main theme is a “New Vision in Urbanization” and is comprised from the works of four commissions: “Design, Planning and Identity in Our Cities”, “Urban Regeneration ”, “Urbanization, Migration and Cohesion”, and “The Place of Local Administrations within the New Vision of Urbanization”. The commissions are composed of members from public institutions, private enterprises, NGOs, and academics, and their meetings have therefore a collaborative and interdisciplinary approach. The report, which sets Turkey’s current agenda for the field of planning and urbanization, is introduced as a reference document for ministry employees and all institutions and organizations working in the field of planning, as well as for any other interested parties.

The commission reports (1) present the dominant inclinations and accepted values in global planning; (2) provide an up-to-date and critical analysis of the current situation in Turkey; (3) identify existing problem areas; and (4) suggest recommended areas of study/fields of intervention with respect to their identified themes.

For the purposes of this chapter, the document and related reports of the commissions were examined through a two-step systemic analysis to determine the influence and availability of resilience thinking within the introduced “new” vision for Turkey in urbanization and planning. The first step was a keyword analysis, which sought the use of the word resilience within the document. This step aimed to understand in which context the text refers to the concept of resilience. In the second step, traces and influences of resilience thinking or the resilience paradigm were sought within the proposed fields of intervention.

The analysis shows that, first, there is no clear wording around the concept of resilience. Two words for resilience are used within the document, likely for two reasons: first, because the Turkish literature on resilience is new and inadequate, and second, there is no direct translation of the word resilience in Turkish. The Turkish academic literature on resilience translates the concept into two ways: dirençlilik and dayanıklılık. The first usage means resistance, and the second means endurance, and neither directly reflects what resilience means in English. Both usages, however, are found in the NCU 2017 report and were tracked.

This document is likely the first time the concept and framework of resilience are used in a national document. The catalyst for introducing a resilience reference to Turkish policy makers appears to be the New Urban Agenda (NUA) declared in the UN’s Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, Habitat III, in Quito, Ecuador, in October 2016. The NCU committee conveys the responsibility shared by Turkey, as being one of the member states of UN, to integrate decisions taken in the NUA into national strategies and implementations (2017: 12). Resilient cities are among the visions of the NUA (2016: 5), which can be achieved through “readdressing the way cities and human settlements are planned, designed, financed, developed, governed and managed” (2016:3). However, despite the above assertion, resiliency does not appear to be holistically understood as thinking or planning framework by NCU. Resilience is only briefly mentioned, and only in the recommended fields of intervention in the form of disaster resilience. Perhaps, this brief mention, however, will begin a broader discussion on implementing various resilience processes in Turkey, if the document is used as a collaborative basis from which to analyse the current thinking and develop policies.

Urban Regeneration Implementations Over the last two decades, the government’s main policy in mitigating earthquake disaster risk had been to implement a widespread urban regeneration process for buildings at risk, instead of building disaster resilience in a more comprehensive and multidimensional way, which considers social, environmental, economic, and physical processes together. Due to the lack of consistent and scientifically grounded policies in previous periods, the existing building stock is considered to be the main reason for loss of life and for physical damage in earthquakes in Turkey. Instead of fixing the problems in legislation development, institutional mechanisms, and the construction sector, the government concentrated on developing new legislation to allow this “urban regeneration”, which, as Güzey (2016: 41) says, is globally accepted to mean “increasing the resilience of societies’ to disasters”. However, when Turkey’s regeneration projects are examined, regeneration apparently means nothing but “restructuring of the city” (Güzey 2016: 41) and obtaining high levels of rent from it.

From this analysis, this chapter concludes that there is no direct reference to the concept and framework of resilience in Turkey as it is understood in much of the rest of the world. That resilience is in the NCU document at all is likely thanks to the council’s participatory nature, as it includes actors from the academia, civil society, and the private and public sectors. This collaborative and participatory practice has been and continues to be absent in many actualized urban implementations and interventions, and resilience planning is not yet found in the public agenda for urbanism and planning. Integrating this perspective into national and local visions and agendas will therefore present manifold challenges, not the least of which is socially and professionally led restructuring of the overall planning system.

4.2.2 Response and Recovery Stages

The response and recovery stages relate to the post-crisis phase in this chapter’s presented resilience planning model. The current Turkish functioning in this area is only limited to the field of disaster management . This lack of the resilience perspective is also shown in the above-presented analysis of the NCU 2017 document.

The Disaster Management System in Turkey Planning for effective and efficient disaster management should include all stages of resilience planning ; however, the Turkish system has been criticized for inadequate risk and mitigation planning and for focusing more on the response and recovery phases (Caymaz et al. 2013). Moreover, the connection between spatial planning and disaster planning in Turkey is also observed to be weak (Şenol Balaban 2016). As highlighted by Şenol Balaban (2016), there is a need for an integrated risk management system within the current legal and administrative planning framework (Şenol Balaban 2016).

Although hazard management and mitigation planning should be of utmost importance in Turkey, especially after the 1999 (Marmara) earthquake, there is still no formal resilience plan for the region. In 2009, a number of decentralized administrations dealing with disaster management were united under a central administration titled the Disaster and Emergency Management Directorate (AFAD), with the aim of collaborating on the subject area. This institution develops risk management and mitigation practices under an integrated hazard management system. Although the content of many policies developed within the institution shares similarities with a framework of resilience, the concept is not a foundation for the plans and related visions, strategies, or policies.

5 Challenges in Operationalizing Resilience Planning in Turkey

Turkey’s current planning system includes multifaceted problems stemming from its complicated and politically manipulated history of development. The idea of resilience thinking is still new, and Turkish policy makers have not readily made any preparations towards resilience planning . To summarize, the challenges in establishing a resilience planning approach can be elaborated on three levels: (1) issues with the legislative framework, (2) issues related to the accepted planning approach, and (3) issues in plan implementation.

The presented model on resilience planning sets out some attributes as prerequisites for a planning practice to operationalize resilience. These are condensed into three points.

First, a planning system must have the capacity to effectively coordinate and conduct the planning process, which requires a highly qualified planning team, a universally acceptable planning approach, interdisciplinary and inter-institutional collaboration, and effective management. Second, the planning system should have the ability to instrumentalize and implement planning decisions in an equitable and ethical way. Third, the system should have an established praxis of participation as part of its governance structure.

The planning implications from the above analyses are as follows: The Turkish planning system requires extensive institutional and legislative reforms and restructurings to become an efficiently functioning system with the capacity to adopt the resilience practices of coordination, cooperation, participation, and engaged governance (Maclean et al. 2014; Ross et al. 2010). This achievement itself first requires building and enhancing community capacities and social cohesion. Finally, investing in knowledge and information is at the core of all these issues.

5.1 The Need for Coordination and Cooperation

The prevailing problems of the Turkish planning system signal an urgent need for simplification, systemic unity (Duyguluer 2012), and efficient coordination. The multitude of laws, institutions, plans, and policy-making authorities complicates planning practice in Turkey. Moreover, there is an absence of accord between the process of planning—making plans—and operationalizing and implementing these plans.

The above issues require a need for coordination and cooperation at different levels, beginning with communication around the plans prepared by different institutions for the same area. Providing a coordinated set of plans at different scales and for different sectors should not only free up time and energy but also eliminate conflict among plan decisions for the same area and end the prevailing authority chaos. This approach necessitates collaboration and cooperation among different administrative bodies, from the national to the local level, and establishing clear definitions of their duties, “competences, tools and resources” (NUA 2017: 23), in parallel to one of the NUA commitments (2017: Article 87) on building urban governance structure.

This critical analysis of the inherent problem areas in the Turkish planning system aimed at exposing the legitimization of piecemeal and economically focused urban implementations through legal interventions as part of an increasing neoliberal climate in Turkish urban policy making. Partial revisions, plan adjustments, and related project implementations must fit into the general vision, aims, and strategies of urban development set by coordinated plans at the relevant scale. Such changes should also preserve the interest of local communities by taking into consideration conditions, such as liveability, well-being, environmental quality, social cohesion, and conform to universally shared values such as sustainable development, cultural and natural heritage conservation, and respect for collective memory (Eraydın 2013).

5.2 Operationalizing Participation and Engaged Governance

Participation and governance present themselves as the most urgent fields of change in the Turkish planning system (Duyguluer 2012). As the commission reports in the NCU (2017) also indicate, there is inadequate participation from the communities in planning and design processes. Although the plan preparation stage of regional plans is conducted through inclusive meetings and workshops, where a variety of stakeholders are invited to submit their knowledge, opinions, and requests, it is not sufficient. Their participation is limited within this stage and does not continue into subsequent stages. Further, when the presented opinions of the stakeholders in these meetings are evaluated by the planning team, there is uncertainty around whether the collected data are fully incorporated into the finalized plan documents. In addition, direct inclusion of households and communities cannot be attained if they are not represented by an NGO. The NCU commission reports (2017) convey that this limited approach to participation leads to feeling a lack of place attachment (MEU 2017), which is an important determinant of social resilience (Marshall et al. 2007; Paton and Johnston 2001). In Turkey, then, there is need for more developed, acceptable, and transparent models and tools of community participation in urban and regional planning (MEU 2017:50).

Such engagement requires the inclusion of all stakeholders in a just and legally supported way (MEU 2017), not only to make observations and become informed, but to convey desires and ensure rights. Active participation should be established in the form of what Arnstein (1969, 2016: 282) calls “citizen power”, where community members have as much control and influence over the plan as planners and public administrators do. This type of participation differentiates from pseudo-participation practices, which allow a limited level of involvement with no citizen access to political power, and where community values, desires, and decisions have no trackable continuity in plans and policies due to lack of transparency. Arnstein (1969, 2016: 283) classifies such types of “involvement” as “non-participation” and “tokenism”, where participation is limited to attending information meetings and is manipulated for legitimizing plan decisions. The resilience literature underscores participation as an important determinant of social resilience , as it builds trust, allows different interests to be expressed and interact with each other, and contributes to self-organization (Lebel et al. 2006). Through effective local participation and access to accurate planning information, the community can use their political power to defend the values and issues important to them.

Assuring active participation also contributes to the goal of good governance. As Lebel et al. (2006) note, governance is about how governments interact with various actors. Citizens from the private sector and civil society should be able to contribute to decision-making processes through different forms of participation. Lebel et al. (2006) identify “participation, representation, deliberation, accountability, empowerment, social justice, and organizational features such as being multi-layered and polycentric” as the main attributes that are associated with good governance. A corollary of governance is trust. Pelling (2003) indicates that the successful operation of partnerships within governance processes is based on the trust between different actors.

The current approach to governance has evolved towards incorporating community engagement for overcoming top-down approaches in decision-making processes (Cuthill 2010). Karslen (2010: 47) defines engaged governance as “active participation between interdependent actors, and use of research based knowledge in order to solve a situation of regional complexity”. Maclean et al. (2014: 152) connect engaged governance to social resilience and find that engaged governance “facilitate[s] effective and equitable decision making” and “is considered essential for effective problem solving”.

6 Conclusion

This chapter aims to identify challenges to be resolved in the Turkish planning system in adapting a resilience perspective. The discussions reveal that these issues are not only related to Turkish planning practices but to the institutional and legislative frameworks that underpin them. The chapter contributes to resilience planning discussions in three ways, first through developing a model of explanation for resilience planning, which can be used as an analytical framework in further researches. Second, the chapter presents an overview of the Turkish planning system to expose its vulnerabilities and the required fields of restructuring to operationalize resilience planning in Turkey. Finally, by combining the implications of both analyses, the chapter suggests that there is a need for restructuring the institutional and legislative frameworks of the Turkish planning system to improve coordination and cooperation and to actualize the praxes of participation and engaged governance (Maclean et al. 2014; Ross et al. 2010).

Resilience planning is the leading planning paradigm in the twenty-first century (Eraydın 2013); however, this does not mean it is a perfect system. As a final note, the chapter underlines potential shortcomings of the resilience planning approach. First, the resilience discourse, despite its emphasis on the role of institutions, strongly encourages solutions through enhancing individual and community capacities. This focus, however, should not excuse local and central governments as having the main responsibility for fixing the sources of some problems. Moreover, the resilience discourse does not question the dominant system. For example, neoliberal capitalism is the cause of many vulnerabilities, and radical changes in the capitalist system must be made for effective adoption of a resilience model. Finally, it should be strongly noted that to benefit from what resilience thinking provides, the world needs equitable, inclusive, and democratic governments that allow an engaged governance and active participation from all levels of society. With all the current democracy deficits globally, this last issue calls for urgent attention.