Issue Attention Cycles in Planning Science. A Discourse and Network Analysis using the Examples of "Climate Change" and "Shrinking Cities"

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Although we can retrospectively observe the ups and downs of hot topics in planning science, yet issue attention cycles have not been subject of a comprehensive and systematic analysis in this field. This is the starting point of this research project. It deals with the basic question how issues evolve in the scientific discourse on spatial planning. Using the Examples of "Climate Change" and "Shrinking Cities", issue attention cycles in planning science are examined exemplarily. Building on existing approaches of the sociology of science issue attention cycles are conceptualized as socially determined development processes on the basis of a phase heuristic. In the frame of a discourse analysis the changing meaning of the respective issue in the professional discourse in the course of time is examined. In addition, social structures and processes of the issue attention cycle are examined. A network analysis describes a specific picture of the active and passive actor landscapes in the respective field and, based on this, an institutional analysis takes the structural context of actions by the network actors into consideration. The research project aims at enabling a deeper understanding of issue attention cycles in planning science by describing the complex processes of the public treatment of issues in planning science and by identifying key impact factors.