Meaning-making in the city A grounded approach for "meaningful" collaboration in participatory planning for urban transitions

This thesis responds to a puzzle from my own practice: participatory planning processes often leave actors dissatisfied. I do not take this dissatisfaction as inevitable just because some planning outcomes will not satisfy everyone. I explore this through the sensitising concept of meaningfulness, understood both as the act of meaning-making and as engagement in something worthwhile. The research sits at the intersection of two contradictory planning modes: visionary (shaping the future) and regulatory (creating order). I argue that participatory planning, approached through purposeful reflexive modernisation, holds potential for transformative outcomes. This requires reflexivity that changes not just actions but also the structures actors operate within. My research question asks how meaningful collaboration between citizens and policymakers can be facilitated in sustainability-driven urban planning projects. I answer this question, based on two years of action research (2022-2024) within a participatory trajectory in Amsterdam. I develop three conceptual tools: in-between spaces, curated spaces where boundaries can be redrawn; transformative pragmatic registers, for designing flexibility as actors engage with the unexpected; and visioning objects, enabling plurality without silencing controversy through consensus. Together, these show participatory planning's potential to shape new meaning while helping actors sustain positive emotional connections to the city and its future.