Land use, to a significant extent, determines the level of pressure exerted upon the natural and economic environment. Such pressure in turn, when combined with the degree of vulnerability of the environment, determines the quality of the environment. Pressures and vulnerability vary considerably from one place to another as does the quality of the environment and its natural resources. The European Union, for example, is characterised by extraordinary variability in its socio-economic framework, in terms of natural resources endowment, the degree of exploitation and the quality of environment. In the area of landscape characterisation alone, Europe displays considerable diversity due to, among other physical dimensions, the extent of forestry in the Member States. In Ireland, some 10% of the land is afforested while in Sweden and Finland over 70% is afforested. These differing characteristics result in policy challenges which can be significantly different for the policy maker, even before there is any effort to begin characterisation on the basis of cultural identity, economic position or demographic profile.
Where an overlay of societal characteristic is applied to the physical characteristic of an area, there has to be an expectation that the policy parameters applicable in one jurisdiction, or area, will be different from those applicable to other areas. Consequently, within an increasingly internationalising policy environment, policy-making and implementation must be organised so as to take account of such physical as well as social/cultural differences. What has to be a central feature of any approach to policy development and the planning that results, is the realisation that territoriality, regardless of the physical characteristics and social/cultural mores of the area concerned, is a central aspect to sustainability. This thinking is clearly set out in the Platform for Sustainable Development issued by the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government recently.
It is, therefore, a necessary pre-condition in policy development to incorporate a spatial perspective within the context in which the policy is to be implemented. This is so the local policy environment will be different across areas and regions due to their demographics, social outlook and physical characterisation. Thus, spatial planning is seen as essential for matching development policies and subsequent land use with the capacity of an area or region to absorb development sustainably but only if there is a clear relationship between it and other policy considerations.
What this means is that the spatial planner necessarily must consider the broader policy process. Equally the spatial planner, regardless of the thematic consideration, has to factor in the spatial/territorial impact of the policy being developed and his/her colleagues in other public policy applications must do likewise. In the absence of a territorial application, education policy, for example, may undermine rather than underpin the socio-economic sustainability of an area because the schools are put in the wrong place or not at all because the education policy-maker did not think about the spatial policy which places people in a particular location to live. This challenge can be addressed through the creation of a relationship between the horizontal planning processes of local and regional governance with those of the State and the international environment such as the influence of the European Union, hence the importance of having a sustainable development policy for the country. It also must address the diagonal nature of cross-boundary planning and policy overlap. This is so as policy influences will arise outside of the immediate territorial or organisational boundary. Equally, however, a failure to address institutional restructuring at the two upper levels of governance i.e. regional/national and national/international will negate most integrationist actions at local / regional level. Integrated planning requires a complementary political and administrative commitment to reform.
The effort to integrate from one level of policy to another, within a spatial perspective, will fail if departmental silos are not addressed. The UK Audit Commission has suggested that local policy development is at its best when local leadership is provided. Such leadership has to seek to improve local well-being through coherent policies that are aligned at the national, regional and local level. Leadership is based on processes which seek to develop coherent programmes of change that are based on local needs and opportunities but placed within a national policy context. Strategic planning and management, in its broadest sense, is being advocated as the framework for the co¬-ordination of economic and social development across the OECD. In particular, it is being seen as a means of ensuring that the territorial impact of policy is taken into account in its development and implementation. There is a developing consensus that strategic planning could be used more consistently. This requires the implementation of sectoral or thematic policy, while contributing to sustainable and balanced regional development.
Ultimately, the spatial perspective or the governance of territory increasingly must be factored into the corporate planning of any organisation with a public policy remit. This necessitates integrated planning processes across such public bodies. Complementary political and administrative commitment to reform the nature of the policy interface is therefore necessary. While local policy development may be at its best when local leadership is provided, it will not deliver on local expectations for the same reason that applies to the national policy maker. No matter how well engaged a community is within a local policy process, the expectations arising within that process will not be met. The management of local expectations by local leadership has to take place within a framework that allows for translation of national into local policy and vice versa. In the absence of complementarity across policy fields that are horizontal, vertical and most particularly diagonal, the advantages of such leadership will be more limited. Such need for leadership puts a focus on the organisational arrangements in place and how these can be manoeuvred into making the connection between place, space and policy. Such settings can be designed within a place-shaping strategy that has a territorial focus to meet local perspective and political expectation. Such place-shaping is person-centred.
The nation-state cannot be the only manifestation of identity through territory. This is so because the characteristics, physical and cultural, of the nation-state or the region, also become distinguishable in their own right at the local and in certain instances, regional level. Such characteristics may reflect a locally shared perspective arising from a particular physical characteristic. It may also reflect a relevant historical event for a particular local population along with other related socio-cultural and linguistic characterisations. The influences are wide. The relevance of such is that sense of place and identity are becoming an increasingly important aspect which must be internalised into the local-centre policy interface, particularly in the context of the internationalisation of the policy process across economic, social and environmental matters. Understanding this is a minimum requirement for successful spatial policy application in unstable economic conditions.
