Ideological Fantasies in Planning Theories and Practices

This edited volume challenges the hegemonic ideologies that underpin contemporary planning thought and practice, building on and extending the pioneering work of Michael Gunder. Through the lens of fantasy―particularly as theorised in Lacanian psychoanalysis―contributors interrogate how planners’ desires, decisions, and subjectivities are shaped by ideological narratives that sustain dominant neoliberal structures. The book includes Michael Gunder’s influential work on ideological fantasy, alongside eleven original chapters that collectively deconstruct, traverse, and reimagine ideological constructs in planning.

The volume is organised into three thematic sections. The first section critically deconstructs capitalist ideological fantasies embedded in planning education, urban imaginaries, participatory governance, and neoliberal policy discourses. The second section explores how fantasies operate within environmental governance, housing activism (such as YIMBYism), flat ontologies, and community strategies, while also identifying possibilities for alternative discourses. The final section presents counter-hegemonic perspectives from non-Western contexts, including critiques of China’s Territorial Spatial Planning and Iranian philosophical traditions of truth-telling as ethical governance.

Contributors include established and emerging scholars from diverse global contexts, offering interdisciplinary insights for researchers and practitioners in planning, geography, sociology, philosophy, and political studies. This collection stands as both a scholarly tribute to Gunder’s intellectual legacy and a call for critical, transformative planning for futures.

Elham Bahmanteymouri is Senior Lecturer in Urban Planning at The University of Auckland. Her research focuses on urban critical theories, incomplete markets, housing markets, economic assessment of urban development policies, spatial inequality, and the implications of digital platforms and AI in planning and governance. She also has extensive professional experience in Urban and Regional Planning across public and private sectors.

Jean Hillier is Professor Emerita of Sustainability and Urban Planning with the Centre for Urban Research at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia. Her research interests include poststructural planning theory and methodology in times of uncertainty, more-than-human planning, and problematisation of dark cultural heritage in North-East China.

Mohsen Mohammadzadeh is Senior Lecturer in Urban Planning at the School of Architecture and Planning, The University of Auckland. He holds academic qualifications in Urban and Regional Planning, Urban Design, and Civil Engineering. His research and publications focus on planning theory, alternative approaches to planning theory and practice, and the critical examination of disruptive urban technologies and their impacts on cities.