Editors’ Reflections and Conclusions

During the discussions that led to the creation of this book, and while comparing our experiences about planning in Turkey and South Africa, Mark and I noticed that we had a lot in common as planning scholars. We come from similar educational backgrounds and graduated at the same time. Our planning education followed the same philosophy of casting planners in the role of ‘guardians of the public interest’, and we were both very much aware of the practical implementation of planning in our respective countries. We were also trained with the passion that was part of the ‘guardians of the public interest’ discourse, and shared a tangible enthusiasm about our profession.