Governance rescaling in Danish spatial planning: State spaces between fixity and fluidity

This chapter examines governance rescaling processes in the context of Danish spatial planning over the past decade. It contends that the spatial planning system in Denmark has the capacity to redefine and reinterpret conventional territorial scales through the parallel adoption and articulation of legal planning instruments and spatial planning strategies. The recent evolution of spatial planning in this Nordic perspective is indicative of planning systems that have moved away from hierarchical approaches to structuring territory, towards a multifaceted, iterative and more open understanding of planning as an evolving political process. In this context, strategic spatial planning assumes a key role in linking an increasingly fragmented legal framework. Strategic spatial planning transcends former generic and static planning scales, generating new spaces of engagement. The appraisal of legal planning instruments and spatial strategies, as well as the evolving redefinition of territorial scales in Denmark, suggests that the conventional, hierarchical and cascade-style ideal of policy implementation has been superseded. However, the Danish case is also illustrative of spatial planning systems retaining the vertical spatial anchor, as a means of ensuring the stability and permanence that the previous hierarchical power structures offered.