The Roles of Social Media in Urban Planning, Case Finland

In Finland, digitalization is emphasized in political agendas, and boosting digital participation is a one of the goals in the ongoing renewal of land-use and building act. Although eParticipation tools are establishing their position in participatory urban planning practice, social media is still seeking its role in planning-related public participation.

In this paper, I present findings of my dissertation originally published in Finnish. The aim of the research was to understand planner’s viewpoints towards use of social media in planning, and to clarify the ambiguous role of social media in urban planning with a multi-method action research approach.

Based on the results, three different roles are suggested for social media in urban planning: an interaction tool for participatory planning, a channel for bottom-up self-organization, and a source of information that reflects everyday practices. However, the results show that the prevailing Finnish planning culture is difficult to combine with the self-organizing features and uncontrollability of social media.

The vague and conflicting role of social media cannot be explained solely by planners' personal experiences and attitudes, but is mediated by the conscious and unconscious elements of local planning cultures, such as the Finnish urban planning culture with its strong roots in comprehensive rationalist planning.

It is suggested that in order to adequately benefit from the potentials of the open and participatory citizen society in urban planning, open knowledge building and multidirectional interaction that integrates bottom-up self-organization with administrative top-down participation should be taken as a starting point for smart city planning.