City and Regional Planning doctoral student Tonni Oberly and Assistant Professor of City and Regional Planning Jason Reece have published “Planning History From the Lions’ Perspective: Reclaiming Black Agency in Planning History” in a special issue of the Journal of the American Planning Association on anti-racist futures.

The publication reframes planning history across five primary periods and suggests an extension of the final period that includes mass incarceration and ongoing police violence. Oberly and Reece look to center Black experiences in order to highlight the agency, power, and resiliency that Black communities have enacted despite racist planning policies and practices.

With an understanding of planning history from the perspective of those oppressed by traditional planning, the oppressed will no longer be dismissed as passive victims but will be understood as active players in their lives and communities. Instead, the political, social, psychological, and cultural power dynamics are acknowledged and demonstrate the ongoing determination of an oppressed group to fight for empowerment and joy. This allows for power dynamics to be reimagined for a better future of planning with, for, and by Black communities and any marginalized communities.

Read more at the Journal of the American Planning Association