Innovation without change?
| Verfasser | Jouve, Bernard |
Abstract
Since the 1980s, urban transportation has been a recurring problem posed to public authorities. The problems linked to this policy field are very diverse and concerned economic, environmental, technical, fiscal, institutional and democratic questions. Local authorities are facing a situation in which they have to modernize their policies through innovative practices. This article deals with the question of innovation in five European cities (Geneva, Lyon, Naples, Munich and Stuttgart) and evaluates their capacity to innovate.
Introduction
The question of urban transportation figures prominently in contemporary political discussion. It arouses numerous political and technical controversies which are not limited to European states, as witnessed by the demonstration in Mexico City, April 11-14, 2000, organised by the association "Cooperation for the Development and Improvement of Urban and Peri-urban Transportation" (CODATU), which brought together more than 500 participants from 40 countries to address the problems of "Urban transportation and environment." (1)
Since the 1980s, it has been a recurring problem, which public authorities seem to have difficulty dealing with. Decisions are made--certain ambitious (especially in budgetary terms) programs are launched--yet this policy issue regularly looms large on the public agenda in Europe. The present article seeks to analyse initiatives undertaken in this area of public policy and to examine technical, institutional and procedural innovations in five European cities: Geneva, Lyon, Naples, Munich and Stuttgart (2).
The comparative approach utilised here aims at bringing to light the socio-political and institutional elements at the heart of processes of innovation. In order to leave no door unopened, our approach is deliberately broad. Innovation is understood to involve all modifications of an institutional, technical, judicial or procedural nature whose explicit function is to de-compartmentalise exclusively sector-based and uni-modal approaches to urban transportation. Public policies in the area we are concerned with are, above all, sector-based, thereby reproducing a manner of public action on which modern states are built (Jobert, Muller 1987).
In concrete terms, the issue of urban transportation has long been encapsulated in the sum total of measures taken in domains such as urban roadways, downtown parking, public transport and two-wheeled vehicles. None of this has involved research into true synergies among these sector-based decisions. In many cases, faced with increasing private automobile use for urban transportation, the classic response of public authorities has been to try to reverse the trend through heavy investment in mass public transit (subways, streetcars, regional railroad transit system, etc.) For more than ten years it has been known that this type of policy does not suffice, resolving neither the crisis in public transportation nor the problems of urban congestion and air pollution (Madre, 1987). Experts and scientists regularly restate these disturbing findings, but nothing seems to change. The terms of reference remain the same, with the same disappointing results (Lefevre, Offner 1990; Pucher, Lefevre 1996). Similarly, a good many countries have only recently acknowledged the need to take account of public opinion and the preferences emanating from civil society. In fact, civil society has frequently "invited itself" to the negotiating table by means of powerful collective mobilisation at the local level. Thus, to speak of policies of urban transportation, rather than urban mass transit policy, implies a different way of thinking and acting with regard to both the framework and content of public policy. Does such an outlook prevail in the different cities examined? That is the central question to which this article intends to contribute.
The nature of the debate: policy innovations and choice of urban models
It is no longer necessary to conduct a "trial" of any form of intervention built around a sector-based approach to the decision-making process. It is patently obvious that the mere accumulation of sector-based actions, without establishing linkage between them, is not only insufficient to generate a full-fledged public policy sector but incapable of responding to the problems faced by public authorities. Action in the domain of urban transportation first requires recognition of this area as a legitimate sphere of action for public authority--which, in turn, must be equipped with adequate means of action, institutions and adequate procedures. Above all, a systemic perspective must guide planning for modes of transportation and for various uses of public space. Any action affecting a particular way of getting around in a particular city space must be considered in light of its citywide consequences for all other modes of transportation (Lefevre, Offner 1990b). Thus, urban transportation is interlinked with general problems involving the institutionalisation of collective action and the need to create local settings for structuring the debate and generating solutions that are closely adapted to local problems (Duran, Thoenig 1996).
Innovation in the domain of urban transportation can be charted on a dual grid:
* A process dimension is embodied in this question: How can public action be produced in a different manner that responds to the need for coherent, integrated thinking about different means of transportation while taking into account the evolving problems facing public authority, notably in terms of participation? Answering this question may involve innovation of different types: institutional (merging local institutions, centralising spheres of authority), procedural (initiating new ways of consulting the population) or technical (creating new expert models that allow travel to be modelled at the functional territorial level of a metropolitan area.) Similarly, innovation can have a more political content when embraced by an elected representative who provides strong leadership and maintains coherence among sector-based projects.
* A substantive dimension refers back to the actual content of choices made by public officials. During the 1990s, did urban transportation become a full-fledged public policy sector in itself, i.e., a sphere of action dealing with different modes of transportation in a systemic manner intended to manage interdependencies and better articulate travel sequences? Or do we remain in a well established sector-based framework in which different transportation modes are planned and managed independently, and efforts are made to limit private automobile use by upgrading the quality and service availability of public transit system, including the construction of mass transit networks such as subways or streetcars?
The concern here is to link consideration of the form and the content of transportation policies. Can the form evolve independently of the content? And vice versa? This questioning is addressed not only to the social sciences but also to decision-makers and citizen-users seeking to understand what is truly changing--particularly in the realm of urban policy--in a world that appears increasingly complex.
In this article, we examine the very foundation of transportation policies in five European cities. We have striven for varied political and institutional contexts so as to bring out similarities, as well as differences, in the ways problems arise and are dealt with. Thus, the five cities can be grouped under three broad institutional headings: a unitary state which, for twenty years, has undergone significant decentralizing reforms (France); a state in the process of federalization (Italy); a federal state which accords increasing authority and political resources to local and regional actors (Germany); and a confederal state (Switzerland). From a classic perspective, these institutional differences are supposed to have a significant effect on the formulation and implementation of public policies--in this case, those concerned with transportation. Indeed, according to neo-institutionalist literature, institutions do not emerge as mere political arenas but as constructs helping to define the preferences of actors and the way they conduct their strategies, permitting certain behaviours while valorising or forbidding others (March, Olsen 1989).
While an urban transportation "sector" as such does not appear on the organization charts and in the concrete functioning of public authority in European cities--as does, for example, urban planning, economic development, cultural affairs--public authorities are, nonetheless, increasingly inclined to deal with this domain as an integral whole. The first type of questioning developed in this article focuses on specific problems that cities have to deal with. In order for a public policy to exist, the public authority must be already aware and/or "borrow" awareness (one ought to be wary of any approach that tends to make a hard-and-fast distinction between public authority and "civil society") of a problem that may have several dimensions.
Constructing the problem at hand
When analyzing public policies, the framing of a problem is a privileged moment for examining whether or not the conditions exist for transforming frameworks of action. The "problem" of urban transportation is not purely technical or institutional. It relates to a redefinition of modes of action utilised by the public authority, to the exercise of local democracy, and to the effect of transformed patterns of electoral representation on the functioning of the city in Europe. One of the challenges posed by urban transportation is precisely the need to change our way of understanding its functioning, which no longer corresponds to the classic "European urban model" characterized by centralisation and density. Continued urban sprawl, driven by the quest to own individual...
Um weiterzulesen
FORDERN SIE IHR PROBEABO ANCOPYRIGHT GALE, Cengage Learning. All rights reserved.
