**5.1 A "revolution" of communication strategies**

The most visible change introduced in municipal action in post-war Beirut is surely the communication trend. Traditionally, municipal governance and municipal projects were dealt with in closed circles between the notables and the technicians of the municipality. Word of mouth was the main way of informing the population about policies and projects. In todays' municipalities, we can see a serious concern of the municipal actors to mobilize new tools of communications.

In all three cases we've studied, we can see the creation of websites, municipal publications, posters and municipal billboards in the public space, publicity for events and frequent interviews in local and national media. Special attention is given to municipal projects. The use of 3D simulations is also frequent. To these media tools, we see also changes in the municipal practice itself towards more openness and transparency. The minutes of meetings are published on the websites or are displayed in the hall of the municipal building. Regular meetings are organized to present to the population the achievements and the projects of the municipality and receive comment. Some municipalities even worked on the training of their employees, who are most in touch with the population, for better communication. These tools have been undoubtedly successful. They've been used on and on in new editions since 1998. We can even see a professionalization of this activity with design studios coming in and the work on the "visual identity" of the municipality (logos, colour palette…).

These tools are part of what is usually called "city marketing". It has two goals. One is directly related to governance ant the need to transcend fragmentation and get in touch with

Bricolage Planning: Understanding Planning in a Fragmented City 115

Analysing actor-networks is most interesting for understanding urban planning opportunities and limitations. On one hand, it shows that setting urban development projects is more complex than just a question of grasping opportunities and engineering complex coordination between different actors. It is first and foremost a reconfiguration of the existing relations and the definition of new ones, and that is a case-specific issue. In the case of Chiyah, early projects were an opportunity to develop different types of experiences that give the municipal actor-network a clearer idea of what it could or could not do. On the other hand, the case of Chiyah got us to concur with Rydin (2010) that it is by focusing on the sociotechnical objects of the systems urban planning aims to change that we can get the best grasp urban planning processes. In fact, sadly, the demarcation line issue seems clearly to be tenacious and difficult to enrol in a municipal actor-network. It even is itself capable to enrol different socio-spatial entities and powerful actors "profiting" from the demarcation line's actual state, in what we can call here the

The fate of the population of the informal settlements was the main issue in the controversy around the Elyssar development project in the west of the southern suburbs of Beirut. Though the project considered the construction of social housing for 3000 persons, this number was far below the actual number of inhabitants of these settlements. In the midnineties, the Shiite parties, Hezbollah and Amal, engaged in long negotiations with the prime minister, in order to introduce changes to the project mainly including more social housing, but with no success. In fact, the issue was treated in the frame of larger negotiations between these actors implicating other projects and political understandings. The confrontation led to a standstill of the project. This however had important consequences on the life of the population of these informal settlements who were not only facing economic and social tenuousness but also harsh environmental conditions. It was the latter that seemed to provoke the most serious problems pushing the municipality to

The municipal actor-network of Ghobeiri engaged in four other types of interventions in this zone, always under the banner: dealing with unacceptable situation. This is how it came to install a water infrastructure network to numerous households in an informal settlement, build a breakwater made of sandbags to protect another from high sea waves, organize an informal souk in a neighbourhood and launch a pilot waste sorting project in another. There is a gradual evolution in the cases. In the latter projects, urgency seems less pressing, and we see less unilateralism form the part of the municipal actor-network, other actors – like

10 Among these actors we can identify political parties that built strong influence for themselves in the neighbourhoods along the demarcation line by claiming to defend these neighbourhoods. We can also identify a squatter population that fear displacement in the event of the resolution of the issue. And more importantly we have the central state that refused to engage in a project of large restructuring of the demarcation line – the study being offered by the Urban planning agency of the French region of Ile-

de-France – because the demarcation line is considered too much of a complex political issue!

demarcation line actor-network10.

**5.3 Urban infrastructures as a controversial issue** 

intervene to unblock dangerous and untenable situation.

international development institutions – are getting involved.

the population and the different local groups. The other is more strategic and related to the overall development of a city or a locality. It is based on the assumption that a positive vivid image of the locality could boost dynamic of private initiatives in the locality and attract new investments to it. It is urban planning without planners, a setting where image building will suffice for the development of a city or a locality. Governance and management on the other hand become central. However, this should not be confounded with the collaborative urban planning approach (Healey, 1997) based on Habermas communicative theory. We can see here a genuine effort to include local actors in the municipal actor-network dynamic, but only in an enrolled position. Though municipal actor-network leaderships may refer to these activities as participation, as in the three sample cases, they are more likely top-down information displays. There's no room for debate in these strategies. As propaganda and legitimation tools, these marketing tools are effective. They've positioned the municipalities in the local representations as major dynamic actors in the localities. However, they don't seem really to serve in getting local actors into the municipal actor-network. This is done through other "incentive schemes" and usually through direct contact.
