Abstract: The concept of decolonization has received significant critical attention acrossacademic disciplines, including planning history, leading some scholars tocaution against its conceptual stretching. Within Planning Perspectives, a leadingjournal in Planning History however, the term is relatively absent, signallingopportunities for future content, such as special issues, wider geographicalscope, and engagement with multilingualism. Although multiple contributionscritically address the colonial origins and legacies of spatial planning models incirculation worldwide, areas that remain under-explored include the impacts ofpolitical decolonization on urban settlements in ex-colonial territories, andchallenges to colonial epistemologies in research and institutional cultures. Webegin this paper by acknowledging our positionalities in relation to coloniallegacies before reviewing the journal’s engagement with the intertwinedhistories of planning, colonialism and decolonization to date. Drawing on ourresearch, we suggest there is scope for greater critical focus on decolonizingagendas in planning history, in the context of wider interdisciplinary debates onthe meanings and politics of decolonization, Reparatory Justice, and thelegacies of colonialism in spatial planning, development and urban studiesworldwide. The paper concludes by proposing five potential avenues for‘decolonizing’ Planning Perspectives in the future.
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