PLANNING FOR A SUSTAINABLE EUROPE? - TU Berlin

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square opposition to the orthodox approach of instrumental rationality, which is
supported by an epistemology of scientific objectivism. Willson is aware that his critique
of the technocratic, systems-analytical roots of planning, and of transport planning in
particular, is neither new nor original. The real starting point of Willson’s argument is
therefore not based on the obvious and now widely noted failures of instrumental
rationality and the related scientific methodologies, but rather on the observation that the
real-life expressions of the supposedly “scientific” transport planning rationalities are
much more selective and strategic than true instrumental rationality would allow for. So
ironically, following this line of argumentation, communicative rationality is in part
about bringing the kind of “good” (i.e. unstrategic) rationalism back into the transport
planning process that current practice has lost by not more strictly adhering to its
scientific rationalist roots. In Willson’s (2001:6) words:
Conventional transportation planning practice reflects a tension between the espoused
theory [of instrumental rationality] just described and a theory-in-use of strategic
rationality. By strategic rationality, I mean a form of rationality that is oriented toward
achieving political action.
Unfortunately, Willson ultimately leaves this tension unresolved. He has read
Flyvbjerg and is therefore aware of the argument that “the context for rationality is power
– power that turns rationality into rationalization.” (p.24). He nevertheless maintains that
“communicative rationality is a desirable and practical approach to transportation
planning” (p.25). As sketched out in the article, communicative rationality mainly
amounts to a conflict-solving strategy which is already in part “employed by effective
transportation planning practitioners” and which he admits has a potential limited
applicability to “a ‘blank slate’ planning exercise undistorted by power and constrained