Community informatics in participatory e-planning,

a meta-analysis of action research in Helsinki

Liisa Horelli, Joanna Saad-Sulonen & Sirkku Wallin

Aalto University, Finland

CIRN 2012 Community Informatics Conference, Prato, Italy, 7-9 November 2012

Participatory local community (Palco), 2009-2012

Liisa HorelliSirkku Wallin

Joanna Saad-SulonenJenni Kuoppa

Karoliina Jarenko

Aalto-universityhttps://wiki.aalto.fi/display/Palco/

Outcomes of action research in the Herttoniemi neighbourhood (2004-2012)

Planning & building the local environment (community yard, metro station, safety issues etc.)

Service innovations (bus routes, afternoon daycare services, help-desk in the local web-site)

Enabling tools (CI tools and platform, local web-sites with instruments for e-planning, e-governance and e-learning)

A new culture of co- governance (Local forum and committee; self-organising groups)

Structure of the presentation

• Question, argument & aim

• Community?

• Meta-analysis of the articles

• Conclusions and discussion

Liisa Horelli

Question, aim & argument

• Q: What consequences does CI have for urban planning and its connection to everyday life and the community? • Aim: To present for discussion the results of a meta-analysis of nine publications we have produced during the last three years•Arg: CI transforms urban planning into participatory e-planning that enhances dealing with the glocal context of everyday life.

Liisa Horelli

The changing meaning of community

• Then: community as a local territory or community of interest, partly virtual

• Now: community not a territorial container but a relational, glocal space intertwined with regional, national, international links, needing trans-scalar strategies (Majoor & Salet 2008)

Liisa Horelli

The context

Meta-analysis of 9 articles,forged into 3 themes

• The evolving relation between urban planning, technology and participation

• CI playing with the glocal

• The context matters

https://wiki.aalto.fi/display/Palco/Publications

Liisa Horelli

”The evolving relation between urban planning, technology and participation”

Participatory e-planning as “a socio-cultural, ethical and political practice which takes place offline and online in the overlapping phases of the planning and decision –making cycle, by using digital and non-digital tools.”

”The Hybrid infrastructure of communication in Herttoniemi”

Contextual analysisVisioningImplementation Co-planning

Maintenance

Evaluation

tim

e

PARTICIPATION& DELIBERATION

The participatory e-planning process

Everyday life

WORKSERVICE

S

MOBILITY

HOUSING

Monitoring…

The wider context

CI facilitates the integration of the process of participatory e-planning with the issues of everyday life

Young people learning digital citizenship skills through designing a common yeard

An example:

• Extreme examples: Arab spring,

Occupy the Wall Street & Zapatista• Conditions for effective application of CI for

glocal purposes are tech, org, inst, & social capacities (examples from Honkong & Taipei)

• Civic groups not consciously involved with trans-scalar strategies around urban planning

”Playing with the glocal”

”The context matters” (Comparison of Helsinki & Sydney)

• Differences due to the governance systems (liberal/Nordic welfare state)

• Adoption of e-planning is a highly selective process, progressing by trial and error

• But, formal planning will eventually

adopt new approaches and tools!

What consequences does CI have for urban planning and its connection to everyday life and the community?

• CI is a catalyst: e-planning becomes even the site for involvement in the design of digitools

• All parties have to manage complex strategies in the glocal (trans-scalar) everyday life

• Expanded forms of CI required,

also beyond the local

Conclusions:

Horelli, L. & Schuler, D. (2012). Editorial for the special issue on “Linking the Local with the Global within Community Informatics”. Journal of Community Informatics, 8(3).  

Wallin, S., Saad-Sulonen, J., Amati, M. & Horelli, L. (2012) Exploring participatory e-planning practices in different contexts: similarities and differences between Helsinki and Sydney. International Journal of E-Planning Research, 1(3),17-39.

Saad-Sulonen, Joanna (2012) The role of the creation and sharing of digital media content in participatory e-planning. International Journal of e-Planning Research, 1(2).

Wallin, Sirkku & Horelli, Liisa (2012) Playing with the glocal through participatory e-planning. Journal of Community Informatics, 8(2).

Horelli, Liisa & Wallin, Sirkku (2012) Gender-sensitive community informatics for sustaining everyday life. In Marion Roberts & Ines Sanchez de Madriaga (Eds.) 'Fair Share' Cities: the impact of gender planning. London: Ashgate.Saad-Sulonen, Joanna & Horelli, Liisa (2010) The Value of Community Informatics to Participatory Urban Planning: a case-study in Helsinki. Journal of Community Informatics, Vol. 6, No. 2. Available at http://ci-journal.net/index.php/ciej/article/view/579/603Horelli, L. & Wallin, S. (2010) The Future-Making Assessment Approach as a Tool for E-Planning and Community Development – the Case of Ubiquitous Helsinki. In Silva, C. N. (Ed.), Handbook of Research on E-Planning: ICTs for Urban Development and Monitoring (pp.58-79). Hershey, PA: IGI Global.Wallin, S., Horelli, L. & Saad-Sulonen, J. (Eds) (2010). Digital tools in participatory planning. Aalto University. Centre of Urban and Regional Studies. Series C27. Available in PDF format at: http://lib.tkk.fi/Reports/2010/isbn9789526032603.pdf 

Publications