Can We Plan Too Much? – The Case of the 2010 Metropolitan Strategy for Adelaide

With a Labor government in power in South Australia since 2002, a series of interlocking plans for the state have been developed of which the most important are the strategic plan for the state, the strategic infrastructure plan for the state and the metropolitan strategy for Greater Adelaide. The metropolitan strategy of 2010 reflected the ambitious population and employment targets of the state strategic plan and provided a liberal supply of residential land for urban expansion together with ambitions for a more compact city with higher densities. There are inconsistencies in these objectives which have not been resolved and reflect the optimistic forecasts of the state strategic plan and the nature of the metropolitan planning process with strong input from the development industry. Preliminary evidence is that the plan is not tracking as proposed and more attention needs to be paid to short‐ and medium‐term prospects, and community involvement particularly in strategic localities.     

Introduction: understanding the consequences of the Arab uprisings – starting points and divergent trajectories

This introduction sets the context for the following articles by first conceptualizing the divergent post-uprising trajectories taken by varying states: these are distinguished first by whether state capacity collapses or persists, and if it persists, whether the outcome is a hybrid regime or polyarchy. It then assesses how far starting points – the features of the regime and of the uprising – explain these pathways. Specifically, the varying levels of anti-regime mobilization, explained by factors such as levels of grievances, patterns of cleavages, and opportunity structure, determine whether rulers are quickly removed or stalemate sets in. Additionally, the ability of regime and opposition softliners to reach a transition pact greatly shapes democratic prospects. But, also important is the capacity – coercive and co-optative – of the authoritarian rulers to resist, itself a function of factors such as the balance between the patrimonial and bureaucratic features of neo-patrimonial regimes.     

Contrary Siblings: Syria,Jordan and the Iraq War

Jordan and Syria, severed parts of the same country, were in many ways ‘siblings’: their systemic situation, as economically weak small states surrounded by more powerful enemies, was similarly vulnerable; their leaders at the time of the Iraq War were of a similar ‘modernising’ generation; the identities of their populations were similarly Arab-Islamic. Yet, they followed diametrically opposite policies toward the invasion of Iraq: Jordan bandwagoning with the United States and Syria defying it. This contrary behaviour is explained by their differential experiences of state formation and the differing social forces incorporated and identities institutionalised in Ba'thist Syria and Hashemite Jordan.