Planning for Wicked Problems: A Planner’s Guide to Land Use Law

Efforts to teach students pursuing graduate degrees in urban and regional planning are often frustrated by the case books that have been prepared for use by law professors teaching similar courses. Dawn Jourdan and Eric J. Strauss have attempted to take their concerns to heart in the design of this Planning for Wicked Problems: A Planner’s Guide to Land Use Law.

Each chapter begins with a planning problem that is complex and has no correct answer. Students should answer this hypothetical before reading the subsequent sections of each of the chapters.

The second section of each chapter provides a primer for each topic. This primer is meant to summarize the basic principles of the law and to identify the types of questions relevant to planners when such issues arise.

The third section of each chapter includes a series of edited court opinions. The cases selected have been identified by American Institute of Certified Planners as those fundamental to planning education.

Each chapter concludes with an answer to the proposed wicked planning problem.

Planning for Wicked Problems has been written to demonstrate to future planners how the law may be a useful tool in helping them invent solutions to wicked planning problems. The book features a companion website for additional study and review.