Article
Urban strategy in an era of public policy assessment: Beyond the methodological divide
Review of Development Economics
(2023)
Abstract
This article presents the one-sided intellectual influence of Economics on Urban Studies & Planning, the case of two social science disciplines with different epistemologies and approaches to policy advice. Subsequently, it presents the emergence of the so-called evidence based policy (EBP) approach in Economics, comprising experimental (randomized control trial) and quasi-experimental (difference-in-differences and propensity score matching) methods. The article shows that even though EBP claims to be exempt from normative/political, and even theoretical, considerations, it builds upon two features of neoclassical economics: sufficiency and separability. These conditions comprise its normative neoclassical theory background. We discuss the neoliberal turn in development narratives and their influence on urban planning, which coincides with the emergence of EBP. We analyze some EBP examples in the urban planning scholarship.
Keywords
- Neoclassical Economics,
- Economic Methodology,
- Development Economics,
- Randomized Control Trial,
- Urban Studies
Disciplines
Publication Date
Summer 2023
DOI
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/rode.13017
Citation Information
Nestor Garza and Jennifer Garza Puentes. "Urban strategy in an era of public policy assessment: Beyond the methodological divide" Review of Development Economics (2023) Available at: http://works.bepress.com/nestor-garza/36/