Questions of Legitimacy and Consensus in Regional Planning: The Case of CQ A New Millennium

Everingham J¹*

1. The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

This paper seeks to explore democratic rationales inherent in a recent case of regional planning in Australia and to highlight a departure from the liberal representative democracy that has prevailed in Australian political culture. In Australia, as elsewhere, there are increased opportunities for more participatory governance. This occurs through cooperative networks involving a range of non-elected stakeholders and citizens rather than relying on vertical control by the state. Such broadened involvement raises questions about a range of issues including representation, accountability, legitimacy, deliberation and balancing competing validity claims. These issues are central to any project that seeks to employ community engagement practices to address the supposed ‘democratic deficit’ in complex societies. Competing arguments in these respects for community engagement practices versus a procedural, top-down role for the state are considered in relation to a regional planning exercise in Central Queensland, Australia. The case study suggests that there are advantages to specific forms of community engagement with respect to some, but not all of these dimensions in such governance roles.

Click here to view the full paper