The State of the Art of Planning

The paper is based on a planning philosophy which attempts to deal with the total environment: social, economic, and physical. It describes the complex inter-relationships among the many professions, social groups, and organizations involved in planning and suggests that an approach involving systems analysis and multi-disciplinary teams is required. Current planning practice is analyzed by means of a matrix which relates 43 kinds of planning studies with 28 technical steps required for their successful completion. The need for better techniques is emphasized for evaluating planning performance and to present a method for devising such techniques. Planning decisions are postulated and solutions to planning problems are sought mainly through one of the following approaches: (1) Policy; (2) judgment; (3) analysis and judgment; (4) operations research; and (5) applied research.