How do Sustainability Ideologies Manifest in Local Planning Decisions?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.65582/gd.2026.004Keywords:
Sustainability, Development Management, PlanningAbstract
Sustainability underpins planning within the United Kingdom and is applied to all scales of development management decisions, ranging from small-scale householder planning applications to major urban regeneration schemes. Although sustainability has long been a guiding principle in spatial planning, no academic research exists on how sustainability manifests across development scales within planning decisions in England. This research applies Davidson’s novel typology for an exploratory categorization of sustainability ideologies within 21 planning reports from three outer borough London local authorities. It aims to advance an understanding of how sustainability manifests across development scales and to contribute to the literature at the junction of sustainability and development management. The research finds that sustainability adopts different sociopolitical ideologies across development scales. In large schemes, planners adopt a neoliberal approach where technology and the substitutability of capital justify sustainable outcomes. While in smaller householder and minor schemes, planners adopt radical (micro) and social democratic (macro) approaches that insist on limits to growth and follow traditional authority-applicant power relationships when justifying sustainable outcomes. The paper argues that sustainability in planning practice is not a fixed concept but a fluid and negotiated discourse. This has significant implications for policy coherence, democratic accountability, and the legitimacy of planning decisions. By illuminating the interpretive flexibility of sustainability within planning decisions, the research provides an inroad to better governance for the practice-led sector and offers recommendations to improve outcomes for private and public sector planners in England.
References
Besharov, M.L. and Smith, W.K., 2014. Multiple institutional logics in organizations: explaining their varied nature and implications, The Academy of Management Review, 39(3): 364–381. DOI: doi.org/10.5465/amr.2011.0431.
Bradley, B., 2021. ESG investing for dummies. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons Inc.
Cartwright, L., 1997. The implementation of sustainable development by local authorities in the South East of England, Planning Practice & Research, 12(4): 337–347.
Cornelissen, J.P. and Werner, M.D., 2014. Putting framing in perspective: a review of framing and frame analysis across the management and organizational literature, The Academy of Management Annals, 8: 181–235. DOI: doi.org/10.1080/19416520.2014.875669.
Davidson, K., 2014. A typology to categorize the ideologies of actors in the sustainable development debate, Sustainable Development, 22(1): 1–14. DOI: doi.org/10.1002/sd.520.
Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, 2026. Biodiversity Net Gain. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/biodiversity-net-gain.
Ferguson, P. and Wollersheim, L., 2023. From sustainable development to resilience? (Dis)continuities in climate and development policy governance discourse, Sustainable Development, 31(1): 67–77. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/sd.2374.
Ferm, J., Clifford, B., Canelas, P. and Livingstone, N., 2021. Emerging problematics of deregulating the urban: the case of permitted development in England, Urban Studies, 58(10): 2040–2058. DOI: doi.org/10.1177/0042098020936966.
Friends of the Earth, 1989. Friends of the Earth environmental charter. Goffman, E., 1974. Frame analysis: an essay on the organization of experience. Boston: Harvard University Press.
Greater London Authority, 2021. The London Plan. Available at: https://www.london.gov.uk/programmes-strategies/planning/london-plan/london-plan-2021.
H M Government 1994 The UK Sustainable Development Strategy, Cm. 2426, London: HMSO.
Kemper, J.A. and Ballantine, P.W., 2019. What do we mean by sustainability marketing?, Journal of Marketing Management, 35(3–4): 277–309. DOI: doi.org/10.1080/0267257X.2019.1573845
Lombardi, R.D., Porter, L., Barber, A. and Rogers, C., 2011. Conceptualising sustainability in UK urban regeneration: a discursive formation, Urban Studies, 48(2): 273–296. DOI: doi.org/10.1177/0042098009360690.
London Borough of Ealing, 2025. Your borough. Available at: https://www.ealing.gov.uk/site/scripts/home_info.php?homepageID=34.
London Borough of Ealing, 2026. Search for a planning application. Available at: https://www.ealing.gov.uk/info/201155/planning_and_building_control/2030/search_for_a_planning_application.
London Borough of Merton, 2025. Find a planning application. Available at: https://www.merton.gov.uk/planning-and-buildings/planning/find.
London Borough of Merton, 2026. Whole Local Plan. Available at: https://www.merton.gov.uk/planning-and-buildings/planning/local-plan.
London Borough of Redbridge, 2025. Local Plan. Available at: https://www.redbridge.gov.uk/planning-and-building/planning-policy/local-plan/.
London Borough of Redbridge, 2026. Planning. Available at: https://my.redbridge.gov.uk/planning.
Lozano, R. and Barreiro-Gen, M., 2023. Organisations’ contributions to sustainability: an analysis of impacts on the Sustainable Development Goals, Business Strategy and the Environment, 32(6): 3371–3382. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/bse.3305.
Luoma, E., Parviainen, T., Haapasaari, P. and Lehikoinen, A., 2024. Sustainability as a shared objective? Stakeholders’ interpretations on the sustainable development of marinas in the Gulf of Finland, Ocean & Coastal Management, 254: 107197–107206. DOI: doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2024.107197.
McManners, P., 2024. Essentials of sustainability for business. Abingdon: Routledge.Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, 2025. National Planning Policy Framework. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003386629.
Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, 2005. Planning Policy Statement 1: Delivering Sustainable Development. Available at: https://edemocracy.coventry.gov.uk/Data/Cabinet%20Member%20(Urban%20Regeneration%20and%20Regional%20Planning)/200503031400/Agenda/10a%20%20-%20Planning%20Policy%20Statement%20No%201%20-%20Delivering%20Sustainable%20Development%20-%20Appendix%201.pdf
Purvis, B., Mao, Y. and Robinson, D., 2019. Three pillars of sustainability: in search of conceptual origins, Sustainability Science, 14: 681–695. DOI: doi.org/10.1007/s11625-018-0627-5.
Raworth, K., 2017. Doughnut economics: seven ways to think like a 21st-century economist. London: Random House.
Rerup, C. and Feldman, M.S., 2011. Routines as a source of change in organizational schemata: the role of trial-and-error learning, The Academy of Management Journal, 54: 577–610. DOI: doi.org/10.5465/AMJ.2011.61968107.
Revell, K., 2023. Promoting sustainability and pro-environmental behaviour through local government programmes: examples from London, UK, Journal of Integrative Environmental Sciences, 10(3–4): 199–218. DOI: doi.org/10.1080/1943815X.2013.858752.
Rizvi, S.S., Rundell, D., Williams, O.D. and Hill, P.S., 2020. The political economy of universal health coverage: a systematic narrative review, Health Policy and Planning, 35(3): 364–372. DOI: doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czz171.
Rostron, J., 2001. Environmental law for the built environment. London: Taylor & Francis Group. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781843140825.
Salmivaara, V. and Kibler, E., 2020. Rhetoric mix of argumentations: how policy rhetoric conveys meaning of entrepreneurship for sustainable development, Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 44(4): 700–732. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1042258719845345.
Sayce, S., Walford, N. and Garside, P., 2012. Residential development on gardens in England: their role in providing sustainable housing supply, Land Use Policy, 29(4): 771–780. DOI: doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2011.12.002.
Schuler, D., Rasche, A., Etzion, D. and Newton, L., 2017. Guest editors’ introduction: corporate sustainability management and environmental ethics, Business Ethics Quarterly, 27: 213–237. DOI: doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2951788.
Stilwell, F., 2002. Political economy: the contest of economic ideas. Melbourne: Oxford University Press.
The Ecologist, 1972. A blueprint for survival. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Thornhill, I., Gilchrist, A., Searle, B., Koksal, C. and Sampson, D., 2025. Using past planning practice to inform biodiversity net gain in residential developments, Ecological Solutions and Evidence, 6(1): 1–6. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/2688-8319.70021.
Timofejevs, P.F., 2020. The environment and populist radical right in Eastern Europe: the case of National Alliance 2010–2018, Sustainability, 12(19): 8092–8105. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/su12198092.
United Nations, 1987. Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer.
United Nations, 1992. United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
United Nations, 2000. Millennium Development Goals and Beyond 2015.
United Nations, 2015. Sustainable Development Goals.
World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987. Our common future. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Yin, R., 2003. Case study research: design and methods. London: SAGE Publications.
Yu, X. and Fischer, T.B., 2019. Sustainability appraisal in neighbourhood planning in England, Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 62(6): 939–959. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09640568.2018.1454304.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
Categories
License
Copyright (c) 2026 The Author(s)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
