Planning Models: SITAR, General System, Technicist Model, etc

1. 4. SP Planning Models and Process
Models
a. Planning Models

2. At the end of the lecture, the students
will be able to:
1. Define the concept of planning model;
2. Identify and describe the various planning
models; and
3. Compare and contrast the typologies and
focus of the different planning models
according to Hudson, Wilson, and Adams

3. • A model is defined as a set of
variables classified as endoneous
and exogenous, cause-effect
relationships among these
variables, and the consistency of
these relations (H. Correa, 1975)

4. S - Synoptic model
I - Incremental model
T - Transactive Model
A - Advocacy Model
R - Radical Model
B. Hudson (1979)

5. • Identical to the popular
rational model. It includes
elements namely: goal
setting, identification of
alternatives, evaluation of
means against ends, and
implementation of decisions

6. Synoptic planning has roughly four
classical elements: (1) goal-setting,
(2) identification of policy
alternatives, (3) evaluation of
means against ends,
and (4) implementation of policy.

7. The process is not always undertaken in this
sequence, and each stage permits multiple
iterations, feedback loops and elaboration of
sub-processes. For example evaluation can
consist of procedures such as benefit cost
analysis, operations research, systems analysis,
and forecasting research.

8. Suggests that planning is constrained
more by available means than by the
definition of the goals. Planned
change a any level – institutional,
sectoral and national – typically
represents small adjustments from
the past

9. • Plans are constructed by a mixture of
"intuition, experience, rules of thumb,
various techniques (rarely sophisticated )
known to individual planners, and an
endless series of consultations“
• Lindblom calls it "the science of muddling
through

10. • Emphasizes interaction and
interpersonal dialogue and the
process of mutual learning in
planning

11. • Emphasis is given to processes of personal and
organizational development, and not just the
achievement of specific functional objectives. Plans
are evaluated not merely in terms of what they do
for people through delivery of goods and services,
but in terms of the plans’ effect on people-on their
dignity and sense of effectiveness, their values and
behavior, their capacity for growth through
cooperation, their spirit of generosity.

12. The advocacy planning movement grew up in
the sixties rooted in adversary procedures
modeled upon the legal profession, and usually
applied to defending the interests of weak
against strong-community groups,
environmental causes, the poor, and the
disenfranchised against the established powers
of business and government. (Alinsky 19'71;
Heskin 1977.)

13. Advocacy planning has proven successful as a
means of blocking insensitive plans and challenging
traditional views of a unitary public interest. In
theory, advocacy calls for development of plural
plans rather than a unit plan (Davidoff 1965). In
practice, however, advocacy planning has been
criticized for posing stumbling blocks without being
able to mobilize equally effective support for
constructive alternatives (Peattie 1968).

14. • Underscores the confrontational
characteristics of decision making

15. • Has two versions – one in which
spontaneous activism is guided by
self reliance and mutual aid, while
the second – focuses on situational
characteristics of nations or systems
that inhibit the equitable distribution
of goods and services

16. It stresses the importance of personal
growth, cooperative spirit, and freedom
from manipulation by anonymous forces.
More than other planning approaches,
however, its point of departure consists of
specific substantive ideas about collective
actions that can achieve concrete results
in the immediate future.

17. It draws on varying sources of inspiration-
economics and the ecological ethic (Schumacher
1913), social architecture (Goodman 19 7 1),
humanistic philosophy (Illich 1973), and historical
precedents (Katz and Bender 1976, Hampden-
Turner 19'75). This is radicalism in the literal sense
of “going back to the roots” content to operate in the
interstices of the establishment rather than
challenging the system head-on.

18. Criteria for comparative description and
evaluation of planning theories
No single approach is perfect, but a particular
theory can establish itself as "best“ simply because
there are no salient options kept in view.
• Table 1 presents a simple list of basic criteria
that one might use for assessing the scope,
character, and adequacy of the various planning
traditions. The six criteria have been distilled from
three independent selection processes; each
process is somewhat subjective, but they overlap
considerably in their results.

19. Criteria Characteristics and applications
Public
interest
Explicit theory of the public interest, along with methods
to articulate significant social problems, and pluralist
interests in outcomes. May include principles of
distributive justice, and procedures for dealing with
conflict.
Human
Dimension
Attention to the personal and spiritual domains of policy
imp acts, including intangible outcomes
beyond functional-instrumental objectives -for example,
psycho-social development,
enhancement of dignity, and capacity for self-help
Feasibility Ease of learning and applying the theory. Implies the
theory is practical to translate into policy
implications, and adaptable to varying types of problems,
scales of action and social settings
Table 1. Criteria for describing and evaluating planning
traditions

20. Action
Potential
Provision for carrying ideas into practice, building on
experience underway and identifying
new lines of effective solutions to problems.
Substantive
Theory
Descriptive and normative theory of social problems and
processes of social change. Predictive capacity based on
informal judgments, not just trend extrapolation; ability to
trace long range and indirect policy consequences;
historical perspectives on opportunities and constraints on
action.
Self-
Reflective
Capacity for laying analytical assumptions open to
criticism and counter -proposals; provision
for learning from those being planned for; capacity for
depicting concrete experience in
everyday language, as well as conceptual models using
aggregate data.
Table 1. Criteria for describing and evaluating
planning traditions

21. Major
Criteria
Synoptic
planning
Incremental
planning
Transactive
planning
Advocacy
planning
Radical
planning
Public
interest
Human
Dimension
Feasibility
Action
Potential
Substantive
Theory
Self-
Reflective
Table 2. Relative emphasis of SITAR theories
based on selected criteria
With color indicates partial or one-sided treatment
blank cells indicate characteristic weaknesses

22. • is more realistic than the rational
model and less passive than the
incremental model
• The mixed scanning model tries to
involve the strengths of the rational planning
model and the incremental planning model
and to eliminate the weaknesses (Mitchell
2002). It is based on ‘bounded’ instrumental
rationality (Larsen 2003).

23. D.E. Wilson, 1980
Attempts to use the idea of a system
as a unifying scientific paradigm
Learning from doing; learning comes through
the implementation of policies and strategies,
so adaptive management complements
research-based learning
Allan, 2007

24. • treats planning as a process of
social learning built on individual
psychosocial development that is
best realized in a small, non
hierarchical groups
D.E. Wilson, 1980

25. General systems concepts were applicable, e.g.
theories in the field of sociology from a modern
systems approach that included “the concept of
general system, of feedback, information,
communication, etc.” The theorist critiqued
classical “atomistic” conceptions of social
systems and ideation “such as ‘social physics’
as was often attempted in a reductionist spirit.”

26. Synoptic Political System
Resource Allocation Incremental
Manpower OD
Rate of return Advocacy
Satisficing Learning Adaptive
Mixed Scanning
General System
D. Adams 1991

27. • is expert driven, assumes a linear
process of decision making, tends to
treat the organization as a ‘black box’
and severely limits the number of
variables examined to quantifiable
indicators of education’s effect.

28. Views planning as dynamic,
shifting process of interaction
and exchange. It rejects the
assumption of rational –
decision-making

29. An open human system located
in social environment too
indefinite and inconstant to
allow easy generalization

30. Table 3
Comparison of Three Planning Models
Technicist Analytical and
administrative
activities by
oligarch of
specialist
Centralized planning
offices, clear lines of
authority
System analysis,
cost benefit studies;
programming
techniques, MIS
Political Exchange,
negotiation,
cooptation by
various
stakeholding
groups
Centralized goal and
policy mechanisms,
diffuse means of
articulations and
aggregation of
interests
Combination of
formal analytical and
information system
and less formal
information system
Consensual Dialogue,
consciousness-
raising
Decentralized small
face to face groups
Delphi, team
intervention

31. Miclat Jr., Eusebio F. (1998) Instructional Modules in Strategic
Planning
APA (1979) Comparison of Current Planning Theories:
Counterparts and Contradictions. Barclay M. Hudson
with comments by Thomas D. Galloway and Jerome L.
Kaufman