Content area
Full Text
Urban Planning Theory since 1945 Nigel Taylor
London, Sage, 1998,190 pp., 13.99 pb, ISBN 0-7619-6093-7
Nigel Taylor has produced a book that should be well worth the read for his target group-"town planning students" (p.v). In the 170-odd pages he not only skillfully relates the main developments in planning thought/ideology in Britain over the last 53 years-from rampant modernist blueprints to scientist, systems theory, participative planning, Marxism, neo-liberalism, post-modern insecurity and neo-modern communicative rationality-but also provides enough of his own readings of these developments to challenge the more inquisitive student to take up further explorations. The Notes should be helpful in this regard althrough they are few and one gets the idea that the author has held himself back.
As for 'overseas compatibility', while the book has a distinct British focus/ flavour, of which we are not made aware in the somewhat generic title, it should, if not purely as a source in a course on British planning theory, assist readers from other shores-especially '[post-]colonial shores'-in making sense of some developments...