OPINION: In releasing this information there is a hint of Council’s Manager of Development- MoD- (Ex-Planning Officer) subliminally defending the status quo. If that is to do with defending a livelihood rather than conceding that there are other ways to achieve better decision making that needs to be called out that is concerning.
Albeit possibly in an unguarded moment, the MoD once asserted that ‘cultural landscaping’ was not something governance (AKA Planning Authorities) rather it happens all by itself. Possibly cultural landscapes are GOD’S WORK and if this figured in the rationale it’s a concept that should be tested at a conference of professional ‘placemakers’ to test its veracity.
In Launceston as elsewhere every ‘development’ seeking Planning Authority endorsement is primarily to do with placemaking and cultural landscaping. At its best ‘placedness’, cultural sensibilities, community aspirations and social issues come into play. Autocratic bureaucratic assertions of RULE X sub-clause Y are essentially oblivious to this.
Sadly, we live in the Managerial Age, in a world where administrative imperatives prevail. The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid "dens of crime" that Dickens celebrated in his novels. It is not done even in concentration camps and labour camps because in those places we see the outcome of unfettered autocracy.
The ‘evil’ is conceived and ordered – moved, seconded, carried, and minuted – around tables in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted meeting places and conceived in the offices that facilitate and drive the decision making. The ‘evil’ is perpetrated by quiet men who wear suits and ties, who cut their fingernails and generally have shaven faces and do not actually need to raise their voices. Naturally enough, the symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the office of a thoroughly nasty business concern. Think 1984!
It turns out that there is a fiery gateway to hell on earth, an abyss, and what’s more it was created by careless governance and continues due to bureaucratic ineptitude … See https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-gates-of-hell-turkmenistan
It also turns out, and sadly so, that government is three fourths parasitic with the other fourth being to do with stupidity and fumbling around in dark places. Cultural landscaping should/could be about creating power and private resources for all in society by destroying bureaucratic and monopolistic control of a community.
That the possibility of mediation does not appear to be a possibility under the managerial status quo where it seems corporate developers are given free kicks whenever they ask for one. Good transparent accountable planning NIL …Investment driven development 4!
No comments:
Post a Comment