Indigenous planning

Indigenous planning has a broader and more comprehensive scope than mainstream or Western planning, and is not limited to land use planning or physical development. Indigenous planning is comprehensive and can address all aspects of community life through community development, including the social and environmental aspects that impact the lives of community members.[3]

Indigenous planning for land and resources can be understood as transformative planning as it addresses complex issues of Indigenous sovereignty, self-government, and self-determination.[4][5] Indigenous planning can also be understood as a form of insurgent planning,[6] as it provides an avenue for communities to confront and address their own oppression.[4] Indigenous planning is often a tool which allows for Indigenous communities to regain control over resources and exercise maintenance of their culture and political autonomy.

The scope of Indigenous planning can be seen to cover three broad areas: Indigenous communities, urban Indigenous communities, land and resource planning.

Indigenous peoples have been planning their communities for thousands of years, often referred to as 'since time immemorial'. However, planning as a technical and colonial tool has historically been used as a means to dispossess Indigenous communities through the re-appropriation of traditional territories for non-Indigenous profit and development. While Indigenous community planning is historically based upon managing interactions with the natural world, it now also focuses on interactions with non-Indigenous actors as well. In the political sense, this means fighting for and receiving legitimization and empowerment in leadership positions that were stripped from them through colonization.[7] As such, Indigenous planning has re-emerged as a reaction to Western planning, which was historically used as a colonial tool, for example through the reserve system in Canada.[8][9]

Indigenous planning emerged as a planning culture and field of practice during the mid-20th century within the context of modern planning and imperialism, however, Indigenous groups have been planning their own urban spaces for as long as they have existed. It is a continually evolving practice and spans (but is contextually unique to) Indigenous communities around the world.[1] According to John Friedmann, Indigenous planning emerged as a formalized field in relation to mainstream planning in 1992 at a MIT conference through the creation of a theory of action that was based on long-term learning, local planning and shared culture.[10] Three years later, in 1995, the Indigenous Planning Network was created under the American Planning Association (APA); the division is currently called Indigenous Planning (IP).[11]

Contemporary Indigenous planning practices are particularly prevalent in New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and the United States (countries with large Indigenous populations and colonial histories). Histories of colonization have significantly impacted Indigenous communities and their planning cultures.[12] International colonial processes are complex, divergent, and context specific.[13] The large scale and ongoing impacts of these processes include but are not limited to: dispossession from land and retrenchment of decision-making power, intergenerational trauma, systematic racism, and disruptions of local and traditional cultural systems.[13] Taiaiake Alfred asserts that it is essential to differentiate between Indigenous and Western planning cultures that are implicated within colonial legacies.[14] Generally, Western planning cultures have tended to value linear systems of rationality, with power structures that dominate and suppress those cultures that do not share these value systems.[2] Since colonization processes took place throughout the world, Indigenous planning cultures were largely ignored and actively disrupted as they were seen as impediments to western civilisation and progress.[12] The culture of Indigenous planning is described as a movement where Indigenous communities, planners, academics, governments, institutions, and leaders, resist colonial and neo-colonial planning traditions as well as work towards increasing protections of rights, freedoms, and sovereignty for Indigenous peoples.[15]

Some of the key principles of Indigenous planning that are distinguishable from 'mainstream' or Western planning approaches, are its recognition and incorporation of traditional knowledge, cultural identity, customary law, and Indigenous world-views.[11] As collective land-based peoples, land tenure and stewardship are at the core of Indigenous planning paradigms.[2] Instead of regulating private land use, as western planning does, indigenous communities see land as a birthright that belongs to everyone, passed down through generations. Because of this belief, keeping the lands productivity stable for the next generation is a large component of Indigenous planning.[16] Also in line with this belief, and a unique aspect of indigenous planning, are the countless indigenous technologies that work to foster a positive human relationship with the environment, as well as ensure present and future human symbiosis with nature.[17]

Indigenous communities everywhere have sustained and developed distinct, fluid and evolving planning cultures that are unique to land, history, and peoples. These cultural planning practices include land stewardship, resource management, community planning, and intergenerational learning transfers such as traditional ecological knowledge.[2] Indigenous planning cultures often hold traditional governance structures, including: matrilineal heritage or consensus based decision making; self-reliance and resiliency; and, reciprocity and ceremony.[18] Complex relationships with time exist, with strong emphases on cyclical patterns, such as nature-human relational processes and the Seven Generation Sustainability methodology.[18] Strength-based practices and wellness planning lenses are employed, rather than a negative or weakness based assessment framework.[19] Many of these Indigenous cultures evoke particular planning methods, including: Transformational Planning,[20] Participatory Planning, Therapeutic Planning,[21] Cultural Humility, and Reconciliation.

The Indigenous planning culture is an intersectional, placed-based approach and political movement that is shaping western and mainstream urban planning cultures.[13] Paullette Regan discusses the process of changing Canadian planning culture through the efforts of non-Indigenous Canadians to decolonize their personal beliefs and behaviours.[22] Ryan Walker and Hiringi Matunga use case studies from Canada and New Zealand to discuss how planners might be able to re-situate Indigenous and mainstream planning cultures as a partnership in urban contexts.[13] The reclamation of Indigenous planning cultures challenges western planning assumptions and many planners worldwide are questioning how non-indigenous and indigenous planners can work collaboratively towards planning practices that are reconciliatory, respectful, creative and culturally responsive.[13]

Some Canadian First Nations engage in Indigenous planning through an approach known as Comprehensive Community Planning (CCP).[23][24] CCP is a community-led and community-owned process. As a planning exercise, CCP takes a holistic and long-term approach that considers all aspects of the community, for example: housing, health, culture, economy, land use, resources, education, language revitalization and governance.[23] CCP can also be a way for Indigenous communities to engage formally with government organizations who provide external resources and funding for First Nations projects.[24] Comprehensive Community Plans are living documents designed to reflect and respond to the changing priorities and goals of the community.[25]

In the United States in 1995, a grassroots movement with the ideals of the new theory of indigenous planning established 5 basic principles of indigenous planning.[26] The principles established are; people thrive in community, ordinary people have all the answers, people have a basic right to determine their own future, oppression continues to be a force that devastates people, and the people are beautiful, already.[26]

Several planning schools have incorporated Indigenous planning focuses into their curriculum. Some build relationships with Indigenous communities on whose lands they exist. For example, the University of British Columbia, School of Community and Regional Planning maintains a partnership with the Musqueam Indian Band.[37] Planning schools which offer Indigenous planning curricula are often interested in updating professional planning education and practice through approaches involving the native ideals and perspectives of decolonization and reflexivity.[9]

Academic institutions with Indigenous planning-focused curricula include:

• James Cook University (Graduate Certificate of Planning and Indigenous Communities)[38]
• University of Auckland (Bachelor of Urban Planning (Honours) - Māori urban planning)[39]
• University of British Columbia (School of Community and Regional Planning - Indigenous Community Planning program)[37]
• University of New Mexico (School of Architecture and Planning - Indigenous Design and Planning Institute)[40]
• University of Northern British Columbia (School of Environmental Planning - First Nations planning specialization) [41]
• University of Saskatchewan (Bachelor of Arts - Community Planning and Native Studies)[42]
• Vancouver Island University (Master of Community Planning - First Nations planning focus area)[43]
• University of Manitoba (Department of City Planning - Indigenous Planning Studio)[44]
• University of Waterloo (Department of Planning - Indigenous Peoples and Community Planning - Special topic course) [45]

• Aboriginal peoples in Canada
• Architecture
• Environmental planning
• Indian Americans
• Indigenous peoples
• Indigenous Australians
• Local economic development
• Māori people
• Participatory planning
• Planning cultures
• Strategic planning
• Urban planner
• Urban planning
• Urban planning education
• Urban planning in Australia
• Urban planning in the United States