rebuilding the plot

7/31/2019 Rebuilding the Plot

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Daniel Taghioff, MA Anthropology of Media103497, School of Oriental and African StudiesAugust 2004

I confirm that this dissertation consists of my own work, and that where the

work of others has been used, that it is referenced fully in the text.


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Daniel Taghioff, MA Anthropology of Media, School of Oriental and African Studies

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Id like to thank Donal Savage and Elizabeth Fitzgerald for giving me so muchhelp in West Hendon. Id like to thank Mark Hobart for giving me the benefit ofhis ruminations and Marjorie Mayo for her wise guidance. Id like to thankSabrina Fitzgerald, Rev. James Fullam, Fereidoon Mostowfei and Colin Parsonsfor being good sports and participating. Id like to thank Derek Chung forwelcoming me in, and helping me to understand. Id like to thank the DetachedYouth Team in West Hendon for their good humour and patience.

But most of all Id like to thank Olivia and Alva, just because.

ITA Independent Tenants AdvisorMWH Metropolitan West Hendon

RA Residents Association

Figure 1: Map of West Hendon 17Figure 2: Aerial Photograph of the Estate 18

Figure 3: Metropolitan West Hendon's most recent vision of the area 19Figure 4: Street scene 31Figure 5: Overview giving building heights, from the old master plan 32Figure 6: Overview from the new master plan 33


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Rebuilding the Plot: Participation in Regeneration?

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Contents

8

Urban Contextual Global: Isation towards a state. 8

Imagine there's no heaven. 10

States of Mediation 12

States of Development 13

So what does this mean for this study? 14

15

17

Some Basic Background to the Regeneration 17

Getting to know the regeneration 19

25

Composition of the group 25

Issues that emerged during the Focus Group 26Creating consensus 26Representation? 27History 28Density Description 30Difference 34

37

Discourse: More than just text and reception. 37

United States of Democracy? 38

Inconclusion 40

41

45

46

47

50

67

68

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One problem within Media Studies is conceptualising the subject in audience-

hood (Hobart, 1997.) This has lead to a consideration of how subjects are

constituted inter-textually, between discourses1 not only of and about the mass

media, but also in relation to other practices. The inadequacy of considering

subjects only or mainly as audiences has been thoroughly explored: In terms of

the ways that media organisations tend to construct audiences (Ang, 1991,) and in

terms of how audiences tend to contextualise and re-contextualise the messages

they receive (Fiske, 1991.) Work has been done to explore some of the

discursive practices that are often implicated in the ways that audiences

contextualise media messages (Morley, 2000) focussing on the social constructionof senses of home, belonging and identity.

These approaches are attempting to contextualise audience reception studies more

broadly and comprehensively. In Morleys case this is particularly in response to

what is portrayed by him as an overly liberal and de-politicised approach within

the active audience type debates (see Morley - criticising Fiske-, 1992 : 2629.)

He sees this as placing too much emphasis on the ability of audiences to re-

contextualise media output, leading to a perspective that tends to overlook the still

considerable influence that media output may have, especially when considered in

relation to other hegemonic discursive practices.

This can be seen as part of a general criticism of so called post-modern

approaches as being de-politicised, in the sense that they are not addressing

ongoing institutionalised practices that form persistent relations of power and

oppression (Torfing, 1999: 291.) This seems like a curious criticism, in that much

of Foucaults work attempted to deal with precisely these types of enduring

practices. Also one of the key influences on Stuart Halls encoding/decoding

1I need to make a clarification about terminology here. I use discourse and practice

somewhat interchangeably, in that I follow Laclau and Mouffes sense of their being noessential distinction between them (1985.). I use the words therefore to give emphasis ratherthan distinction. This does not mean that I consider them both meaningful in the sense of

fully containing the intention of their agent. Polysemy seems to abound in discourse-practice(Hobart, 1999a.) However I also do not see all things as equally, or utterly, polysemic. Whilst

polysemy is contingent on both sender and receiver that does not erase the possibility of

some of the senders intention being discernable in a discourse-practice, even if it is notultimately determinable.


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paper, and on Cultural Studies in general, has been the work of Ernesto Laclau

(Hobart, 2003: 18.) His work on articulation and discursive practices actually

emerged in relation to a consideration of the discursive construction of polity and

citizen, an inquiry into democratic practices and their subject positionings. This

seems to be an attempt to address ongoing practices, constitutive of what weconsider to be the social (Laclau, 1990.)

Within media studies Laclaus work has contributed to limiting the ways in which

people are pre-articulated theoretically, in order to allow inquiry into the ways in

which they themselves articulate their lives, and particularly their social

positioning. This has taken the form of criticism of the encoding/decoding model,

as relying on overly mechanical notions of social positioning, leading to an overly

mechanical sense of communication (see Reddy, 1979,) which obscures much of

the contingency and particularity of discursive responses to messages (Hobart,

2003.) But how can this sense of the contingency and particularity of discourse be

reconciled with a sense of enduring hegemonic practices?


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One way into this question might be to look at how audiences are influenced by

those practices implicated in the empty signifier of democracy, (Torfing, 1999:

248.) One example is the practices surrounding the idea of participation or

consultation in public decision making, hopefully involving those likely to be

affected by the outcomes (Abbot, 1996.) This study attempts to start to considerthese strands in relation to one another, by combining an ethnographic and

audience reception approach to studying the consultation process of an urban

regeneration project, in West Hendon in London. This seems to allow opportunity

to address these issues discursively, but also in relation to a more historical,

ethnographic and documentary, inquiry. This is aimed at allowing a sense of the

endurance of the discourses that seem to be influencing audience reception, in

relation to the particularity and contingency of their2 mobilisation, in and of the

discussions in a focus group setting.

Chapter 1 will critically consider a range of theorisation that seems relevant to the

study, in order to establish a theoretical explanation of using an audience

reception type of approach to study a consultation process. Chapter 2 will

review the methodological decisions I made during this work. Chapter 3 will

describe the ethnographic part of my work, giving an account of the lead-up to the

focus group, and my attempts to construct a balanced group. Chapter 4 will

describe the composition of the focus group, before discussing thematically the

issues emerging from it in relation to the ethnographic work and relevant

documentary sources. Chapter 5 is a discussion of some of the more general

implications of this work.

2The issue of agency in discourse is tricky, and makes talking about discourse tiresome. I broadly,

for now, settle for Morley's (1992: 59-72) conception of subjects in history interpolated byand interpolating subject positions in discourse . I see this as a non-dualistic model of agencythat acknowledges both the endurance and historicity of the subjective, whilst taking in theradical contingency of the discursive. Things can look very different within different

discussions, so objects are transformable (Bakhtin, 1986), historically/agentively produced(Laclau and Mouffe, 1985) and without necessary relation to the real,(Baudrillard, 1990.)This does not, however, erase a historical body-self as a continuity. I do not see a necessary

relation between positing continuity-memory (as a basis for active contextualisation) andessentialising a reified subject.


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Urban Contextual Global: Isation towards a state.

An examination of an urban regeneration project implies some reference to urbanSociology. One area that has been treated extensively within urban Sociology is

the relation between an individual and the urban context. Simmel's classic

article (1903) on The Metropolis and Mental Life, which has gone on to influence

contemporary urban Sociology, via its influence on the Chicago School, struggles

with the problem of if the metropolis builds up, or breaks down, the individual.

Such an inquiry must answer the question of how the personality

accommodates itself in the adjustment to external forces. (Simmel, 1903:20.)

So clearly this is a work based on the notion of an individual distinct from their

surroundings.

All intimate emotional relations between persons are founded on theirindividuality, whereas in rational relations man is reckoned with like anumber, like an element which is in itself indifferent. (Simmel, 1903: 20.)

Surely Simmel here is aware of two distinct ways of approaching the individual

and yet he turns to biology to try and reconcile the tension between them. He

argues that people are rendered physiologically blas by the mass of

impressions that the city present to their nervous system. He then argues that this

fits with the effects of the money economy, which makes all things exchangeable

for one another, and so flat and lacking in particularity. What is strange about this

is that he is describing how people are simultaneously shaped by internal and

external forces interacting with one another (is not the hustle of city life to a great

extent but an expression of the money economy?) However, he still insists on

maintaining the notion of the individual as causally distinct from the

surroundings. This seems to present barriers to an analysis of how people shape

their surroundings through their understanding of it, or, to mirror the dualism, of

how people at the same time are shaped by their surroundings, through their

understanding of it.


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In order to explore this problem further, I am treating what I have selected from

writing on urban Sociology (mainly from Dickens, 1990) as a discourse built

around two main elements:

1)The notion of processes tending towards equilibrium, some sort of climax orsteady state. This comes out explicitly in the Urban Ecology influences in

Chicago School thinking (Dickens, 1990: 32-34.) (For criticism of equilibrium

Ecology see Forsyth, 2003: 63-68.) It also can be seen in the Sociological

writing that, like Dickens, sees people tending towards a condition formed by

the (i.e. either locally or globally fixed and unitary) urban context. This

implies some sort of social equilibrium determined by some more or less fixed

underlying context. Writing on Globalisation often seems to posit the Global or

Modern as a determinable endpoint to the processes that they describe (e.g.

Giddens, 1997.) All these, more or less stable, notions of an equilibrium, are

what allows these writers to assume there is some sort of natural context to

which they can refer to, separate from the contextualising activities of those

involved.

2)A set of basic units that operate as the basis of exchange processes tending

towards, and working within, this imputed equilibrium state. These units areoften devoid of particular features, and pristine in their generalisability, and

thus exchangeability, with other objects expressed via these units. Examples

would include the constructions of individualism that correspond with Amely

Rorty's exposition of notions of the self as an accumulation of properties,

(1976.) Another example would include the notion of space, as place devoid

of particular content and thus amenable to commodification and exchange (See

Sacks, 1986.) Another example is a notion of human instinct. (See Dickens,

1990: p,) a notion that tends to be devoid of particularistic content, and mainly

used in the construction of a standard individual (an oxymoron, it seems to

me.)

There are problems that follow on from these elements:

1)This notion of a climax state tends to posit one specific, non-negotiable and

determining reality external to the agents involved. This brings the problem of


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a dualism between that which is natural, and that which is cultural or

socially produced. This becomes particularly acute in the ways in which the

notions of context and contextualisation, are respectively fixed or avoided.

2)The standardisation of these units tends, unsurprisingly, to mask theirparticularity. In the case of subjects/people/agents etc. This tends to bring

about a doubling of the subject (Foucault, 1970: 330-373.) There is a tension

between the notion of a unique individual (In Rorty's terminology)

conscience, as a point for the interpretation of principle, and the notion of a

standardised, rational and rationalising self (again by Rorty's scheme, 1976.)

In other words there seems to be irresolvable tension between the general and

particular in the construction of the notion of the individual, (Baumann,

1993: 44-47.) A tension that was found even in the earliest writings within the

liberal tradition (Winch, 1960.) This tension seems to arise from overlooking

the ways in which subjects (and objects for that matter) are continually

constituted and re-constituted discursively (Hobart, 1997.)

Imagine there's no heaven.

An issue that is picked up and runs as a theme throughout Dickenss Urban

Sociology is Giddens's idea of space-time distanciation i.e. that our lives, in a

modern and inter-connected world, are determined by events largely beyond our

face to face, or even mental, horizon. He posits this as leading to the increased

activation of a universal human instinct for ontological security i.e. for a control

and understanding of the contexts of our lives. What is interesting in this is that

he is basing his ideas on two basic units of exchangeability, space and time3.

Giddens, as expressed by Dickens, uses this to construct a notion of an

overarching human instinct that is explanatory of the human need for social order

and hierarchy (Dickens, 1990.)

However Giddens's ideas seem to mask as much as they reveal. The resort to

space and time distanciation mainly as a cause of a universalneed for social

3 There is not much evidence that time exists if one abandons the notion of non-

time i.e. the idea that things can ever stand still. In that light one could just as

well argue that we exist in one unending but ever-changing moment. So time, from

this perspective, seems like another way of dividing up our lives into standard

units amenable to exchange.


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order, excludes viewing it as an effectof the discursive aspects of globalisation. It

serves to mask the political processes that give rise to Globalisation i.e. national

and international processes of negotiation (see Stiglitz, 2002.) It is not surprising

that a view incorporating metaphors of splitting things down to basic, quantifiable

and exchangeable units, might mask the very particular, qualitative andsynthesising discursive forces that would seem to shape events at all scales.

Giddens's framework seems well suited to masking the discursive aspects of

power.

The account then leads to a universal instinct that all individuals share. This

seems like a nice way to explain the social order as being natural, in the absence

of any explanation of how it is actively and discursively constituted. What is

missed out is an explanation of how a general need for order is translated into the

myriad of specific practices that make up people's lives. The blunt notion of

instinct is used to easily explain away how people come to understand their own

needs. Clearly they don't necessarily do this as individuals, and they don't do this

in isolation from their environments, or contexts, or in isolation from how these

are represented to them, by themselves and others.

It is interesting that Giddenss work on Globalisation stands in contrast to hiswork at a more local level, in his ideas around structuration. Here the actions of

actors and their qualitative discussions are seen as significant, and so worthy of

scrutiny, rather than taken as an a priori reality (Bogason, 2000: 93 100.) This

seems to lead to a pan-optical structure in Giddens's work, where those whose

discussions affect the way things are done globally are immune from scrutiny,

shielded behind an ontological need for some sort of overall equilibrium or state

of reality. But the rest of us are subject to scrutiny. His ideas of structuration

reproduce the sense of an overall background reality, by positing structure as

something distinct from agency (Hobart, 1999b.) This again seems to defend

some sort of ontological status quo, whilst, somewhat pan-optically, diverting

attention away from strategically active agents constitutive of that status quo, and

towards the analysis of agency in relation to more immediate constraints.

This is a particularly pressing point when considering local participation in a

regeneration process. The differences encountered are precisely negotiations over


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people's needs for secure and familiar homes, and the ways in which these needs

are negotiated as part of a highly politicised process. It is precisely these sorts of

negotiations of what, for instance, security and familiarity mean that are at stake.

What the future reality, or ontology, will be, once it has been produced via these

discursive processes, is also at stake. In other words almost the entirety of thelocal context is part of the negotiation, so an approach that takes a form of

equilibrium, or type of context, as given, obscures important issues: How is the

regeneration process contextualised by local people, and how is it being

contextualised to them, by others?

States of Mediation

The issue of active contextualisation also causes problems within the study of the

Media. The division between an individual and a sense of their environment, as a

given background state separate from their actions or interpretations, can be found

in models of communication that are current within Media Studies. One example

is Stuart Hall's Encoding-Decoding model, which is built around a notion of codes

determined by a fairly singular contextualisation of what social positioning is.

Morley examines the problem of a notion of positioning being viewed as

distinct from the discursive processes they are supposed to influence. He points

out that audiences will respond to messages by mobilising codes based on

historical and current articulation of their positioning. They are not, in this view,

isolated from outside articulations of their positioning, and their sense of their

positioning is contingent on discursive processes. This is not to say that there is

necessarily no relation between positioning and the interpretation of messages, or

the types of interpretive resources available. Nor is it to say that people face total

freedom of meaning and interpretation in relation to their life situation. But the

ways in which people interpret their own positioning confounds any simplistic

determinate model of class and other social / structural categorisations, and thus

the types of reading people will make of messages. Morley makes this case in

his Nationwide study (which employs a focus group methodology,) with the

differences in responses between more oppositional shop stewards, and more

accommodative union officials. Despite both groups explicitly being members of

the same class for themselves, these two groups diverged in their

interpretations, due to the specific circumstances of their lives and occupations

(1992). Thus the various and contingent ways in which people actively


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contextualise their own positioning is significant in any study of audiences.

States of Development

One area where people's articulation of their own positioning has taken on

significance is in debates on Development, especially around participation andempowerment. Approaches such as participatory rural appraisal are aimed at

helping people to articulate their own resource positioning. This takes place

within a type of focus group or group interview setting, to generate a context for

discussions of community needs. Mosse points out that this assumption of

community can be manipulated to construct the outcomes of participation,

either by facilitators working towards organisational priorities, or through the

manipulation of public discourse by elite groups within the communities

concerned. Thus an uncritical contextualisation of participation, as occurring

within communal consensus, can lead to such processes becoming less than

participatory for many of those involved. This is especially so for those whose

interests may be less likely to be articulated in public (e.g. women.) A more

dynamic (less state-like) and more antagonistic view of communal life, might

lead on towards a more careful consideration of the various interests that may be

in play in the situation. This might sensitise enquiry to the various

contextualisations that may, therefore, be involved.

John Abbot's Sharing the City attempts to address the issue of participatory

processes taking place in a variety of contexts, and the implication of a need for a

variety of approaches to participation. He, is in a sense, reaching towards a sense

of Participation as an empty signifier i.e. that it is useful, discursively, in terms of

its non-specific reference to an ideal (Torfing, 1999: 282.) However he opts to set

up a classification of different contexts, portrayed as determining which type of

participation would be appropriate. This seems to embody some valuable

experience of what has and has not worked in various situations. However, he

seems to universalise in a way that blocks any sense of the contextualisation of

participation by those involved in participation.

Surely a large part of any participation is precisely a negotiation of what the

context of the participation is. Development savvy Governments, for instance, are


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likely to want to portray themselves as being open to participation, especially in

response to recent development agendas on Good Governance. (Stiglitz, 2002.)

This may well be an issue within the context of UK planning policy, where the

question has been raised: Why the great emphasis on public participation in

planning policy, when so little attention is paid to the views of the people who doparticipate? (See Abram, 2001: 185.)

So what does this mean for this study?

It would be tempting here to try and analyse this process based on the preceding

criticism of Giddens's discourses on globalisation, so influential in Dickens

overview of urban Sociology. Indeed the ex-nomination of the influence of neo-

liberal discourses, within the decision-making related to governance, seems like a

valid position from which to critically analyse the discourses found around urban

regeneration (see for instance Taylor, 2002.) Unfortunately, for the purposes of

this study, this does not realise the goal of investigating how the people involved

contextualise their situation. Also, such global influences have to operate via

specific discursive threads within the situation anyway, so it seems to me to be

more fruitful to examine the various types of discourses mobilised and mobilising

in relation to the regeneration's consultation project, and only then to reflect on

what implications this might have for more general discussions.


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I approached this research with a focus group methodology in mind. This was

due partly to the types of theoretical reflections given before. A focus group is a

useful methodology, as it allows the researcher some insight into the discussions

that go on between members of an audience, (Morley, 1992: 97.) Focus group

research has also found favour in studies of the social construction of space, in

relation to the ways in which people make consumption choices (Holbrook &

Jackson, 1996.)

I lived for the year in West Hendon. My first key informant, Donal Savage, has

lived in the area for three years, and first suggested the possibility of the study to

me. My second key informant, Elizabeth Fitzgerald, helped me to assemble a

focus group. She is active in the Resident's Association (RA), which is engaged

in negotiation with the company running the regeneration, Metropolitan West

Hendon (MWH.) I used a snowballing methodology in putting together my focus

group, as recommended to me by Professor Marjorie Mayo at Goldsmith's. She

pointed out that looking for participants in a non face-to-face manner was unlikely

to produce a good response rate in this type of study. I simply did not have the

resources available for random sampling (Bryman, 2001.) I attempted some level

of external validation or rather triangulation of the responses from the focus

group by following up documentary sources. I focussed on documentary sources

that might indicate what sorts of discourses were in play around the

regeneration, sources such as the Urban Regeneration Handbook (Roberts and

Sykes, 2000,) MWH's own publicity material (Metropolitan West Hendon, 2003,)

the local press (appendix 7) and correspondence from the local MP (appendix 6.)

I also triangulated the focus group with the various meetings and discussions I

encountered during my ethnographic work. I adopted this approach to avoid

fixating on one text as the main determinant of the discursive formation and

rather to look at inter-textuality, or the various discourses in play in the situation,

and what I could glean of their (see footnote 2 in the introduction,) interplay.

Whilst I obtained informed consent from thoseparticipatingin the research for

what I have included here, I was unable to devote time to going through sections

of the final text with them to check my interpretation against theirs, nor am I sure


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they would have had the time and goodwill to devote to this.


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Some Basic Background to the Regeneration

Figure 1: Map of West Hendon. Source: www.multimap.com

The map above (figure 1) gives a sense of West Hendon Broadway. The estate,

which is going to be knocked down and rebuilt, is between the Broadway, which

will be partially demolished and remodelled for traffic flow purposes, and the

Welsh Harp, a reservoir that serves as a leisure and wildlife spot in the area. Oak

Lane frames it at the southern end. See figure 2 below for an aerial photograph of

the area, to give more of a sense of the scale of the project. The image below that

(figure 3,page 19) gives the planned layout of the estate, according to the

regeneration body. (The arrow in the top-right indicates north.)


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Figure 2: Aerial Photograph of the Estate, Source www.multimap.com

The estate is going to go from around 650 homes to over triple that number,

although this final figure has been the subject of quite some discussion. The

building work is due to take place after the planning applications are complete,

and is broadly scheduled between 2006 and 2014, subject to completion of the

negotiations around the planning application and the types of timing problems

often associated with such projects. The West Hendon regeneration is one of fourregeneration projects going on in the borough of Barnet, with others in

Stonegrove, Graham Park and Dollis Valley. I would like to leave my account of

the background here, to try to avoid pre-interpreting the situation too much.


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Figure 3: Metropolitan West Hendon's most recent vision of the area (August2004.)

Source: Metropolitan West Hendon's website.

Getting to know the regeneration

I started by attending a meeting for traffic planning on the 29th of October 2003

(incidentally 5 nights after Diwali and the 3rd day of Ramadan, in an area with

both a Hindu Mandir and a Mosque on the Broadway.) The meeting was at 215

West Hendon Broadway, which is the main information distribution point for the

regeneration team, as they term themselves. The meeting was to present a

computer simulation, to show how traffic flow would be improved by the building

work. What struck me about those turning up was that they were all white and allseemed over 50 years old (Donal (35) and I (28) felt somewhat out of place.) The

computer model, presented by external traffic consultants, at first seemed to

inspire awe in those present. It was presented as factual and thus seemed hard

to question. A discussion ensued, where it emerged that this was a model for

morning traffic. When I asked about evening traffic, the consultants admitted that

they had no model for this, but that it would be about the same but in the

opposite direction. At this point a discussion ensued, where residents challenged

as to if the system would be able to deal with future increases in traffic numbers


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etc. Discussing this afterwards, Donal and I were shocked at the profile of those

attending (perhaps people working don't have the time or energy, perhaps non-

British people feel excluded,) and at the impression that the traffic model had

been produced mainly for presentation purposes, as it had not been produced very

thoroughly, covering all times of the day.

I went to see Derek Chung on the afternoon of the 20th of July. He is one of the

two most active members on the RA, I had seen one of his newsletters up in the

window of the community centre on the estate. He welcomed me in, and we sat in

his living room as he explained to me his responses to the regeneration process.

He explained to me that initially the density of housing had been 2500 homes and

that this had been reduced to around 2100 when the first planning application hadbeen rejected. He pointed out that some of the residents had been living in their

houses for 32 years, and as such they had made a major financial and emotional

investment in their homes. He then started to explain some of the conflicts over

the design of the new homes. He pointed out that the initial proposal for window

sizes and room sizes would have reduced them considerably, and that he was

fighting to keep them the same as they had been. He pointed out that the houses

were currently very pleasant inside, and that the residents weren't willing to have

worse, after they had moved. He raised the issue of the shape of the rooms: Even

if the floor space remained the same, a change of shape in room meant that the

new home would be unsuitable, that it wouldn't fit the residents. He used the

image of trousers being the wrong shape, of having one long leg instead of two

shorter ones. I was surprised by how nice the homes were once you were inside

them, in contrast with my initial pre-conception of the estate as being run-down

and poor. This sample of one seems to support the need for a discussion of how

areas are constructed as problem areas and who exactly goes about doing that.

Derek also pointed out that the regeneration process had been much less

consensual than MWH and the council had been presenting it as. He said that

when the original plan, for all four regeneration projects within Barnet, had been

placed before the council, the vote had been split evenly down the middle, five

councillors for and five against. The Chairman gave the casting vote for the

regeneration. He was also suspicious of the voting process, pointing out that


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employees of the council or MWH went around following up the polling. He felt

that they coached people as to how they should respond and that the project was

sold to people: As he put it, If you offer a child a stick of Broccoli or an Ice

Cream, what are they going to choose? He felt that residents hadn't been very

well informed about the project, and I assume that this is why he uses themetaphor of a child.

He mentioned that the decanting meetings had been put off. These were

meetings to discuss the issue of how residents were to be re-housed during the

building work, and then moved back into properties on the estate once building

work was completed. He then discussed the issue of the way in which the

planning process worked. Residents were required to vote on proposals that werevery vague, and then had much less power to negotiate once the proposals had

been accepted. I read this to mean that there was a perceived general tendency

towards deferral and vagueness on behalf of MWH, and that this was perceived as

disempowering for the RA.

I went on to Interview Elizabeth Fitzgerald, also on July 20th

. She seems to be the

other person most active in the RA alongside Derek. She explained how the she

had held MWH to account over the size of the public spaces in the area, that theywere below certain legal minimum standards. She also explained that she had

held them to account over the Welsh Harp being a site of special scientific

interest, and that this meant that they could not build anything within 60 feet of

the water. The overall impression she gave me was that opposition and scrutiny

from the RA had been necessary to keep MWH within minimum legal boundaries,

and that, by implication, MWH had not been pro-active about it's own

compliance.

I had realised by this time that the main issue I was facing in terms of putting

together a focus group was not so much ethnic representation, but issues of gender

and age, alongside where people lived, and the ways in which they already

belonged to existing political affiliations in relation to the regeneration. Since I

had encountered mainly middle-aged men in my initial work, I decided to ask

Elizabeth, rather than Derek, to participate in the focus group. I also discussed


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this problem with her, and she said she might know younger people, or people that

wereforthe regeneration who might be able to help, drawn from on the estate.

Elizabeth, acting now as one of my key informants, introduced me to her

daughter, Sabrina Fitzgerald, whilst I was playing at a community cricket match

put on by the Detached Youth Team, as part of the summer programme for kidson the estate. Whilst I was wary of my group being completely colonised by

people connected to Elizabeth, I also had to acknowledge that Sabrina, as a

younger woman in the process of completing her law qualifications with work

experience at the Crown Prosecution Service, was likely to have a differing set of

perspectives and priorities from the others in the group, and so would help to

round it out as a sample.

Elizabeth also invited me to a meeting between the four RAs, of the four

regeneration sites in Barnet. I met Elizabeth on the 26th of July to go to this

meeting. We met Derek and a man called Colin Parsons, to share a car to the

meeting. Elizabeth had explained that Colin was a leaseholder on the Estate, and

so would give another perspective on the regeneration, due to his different

ownership position. I was again wary of the group being taken over by a clique,

but had to acknowledge that his would be an interesting perspective to have. So I

introduced myself and my work. During the car journey to the meeting, Colin

explained to me some of the historical background to the regeneration, as he saw

it. He pointed out the long history of selling off council housing in this country,

and explained that he saw the regeneration as an extension of this, a further

strategy for getting rid of social housing. A discussion opened up within the car,

and it seemed that Elizabeth and Derek were also worried that the social housing

tenants would not have secure tenancies in the long run: That the trend would be

to turn all the properties over to housing association type arrangements. There was

a concern about a lack of information about the tenancies on offer, about the

possibility of children inheriting these tenancies (some of this information is

available on MWHs website, although not in any great detail,) about the

proportion of social housing to private housing to be built, the level of provision

of housing to key workers and about the overall costing of the project: Where

would all the money from the sale of private housing go? They pointed out that

the whole project was based on what they saw as a gift of public land from the


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council to a private housing association, which was likely to basically operate as a

property developer. They expressed scepticism about MWH's stated ethos.

We arrived at the meeting slightly late, and I was introduced as a student doing

research on the regeneration. The meeting was the first of its kind and was chaired

by a consultant. There were nine residents and four Independent Tenants Advisors

(ITAs - consultants) present. As the meeting progressed the issue of the density of

dwellings and space standards emerged as a major area of concern. The ITAs

pointed out that there was a variety of different standards that might be applicable,

like the Mayor's plan for London, Barnets Unitary Development Plan, the

Housing Corporation standards and the Parker Morris standards (Morris, 1961.) It

seemed that most of the residents were, at best, only partially aware of thesestandards. The lack of one clear standard was cited as an issue by the ITAs.

It then emerged that each of the RAs was required to negotiate with their

respective regeneration authorities individually. This meant that each RA had

negotiated a different space standard for their estate. Some of them had

negotiated, with considerable support from their ITA, to get space at the highest

standard (Parker Morris) plus 10 %. By contrast the West Hendon RA was

struggling to make sure that their development conformed to minimum legal

standards on space and density. This issue seemed compounded by the lack of a

common standard, and by the residents being unaware of the relevant standards

and how they might access them. I had to go to the LSE library, to a rolling stack

in the lower ground floor and climb up a step-ladder to find a dusty government

publication to access a copy of the Parker Morris standards they are noteasily

available on the internet. I passed a copy of the Parker Morris standards on to

Elizabeth. Another issue was that it was difficult for tenants to evaluate the

regeneration schemes when they did not have access to accounts of how funds

would be allocated within the scheme. This stymied any discussion of if the

schemes would be providing social or key worker housing, or would be more

oriented as a private property development. These were concerns shared between

the RAs. I was disturbed that provision of these types of information was not an

integral part of the consultation process. I raised the issue of the individualised

approach to negotiating with one of the ITAs, (after the meeting was finished) and


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was informed that this was indeed a long term problem, and that Marilyn Taylor

had written on these types of issues (2002.)

On the way back in the car, Elizabeth brought up one of the other issues raised in

the meeting: That MWH had made a pledge to residents when they were asked to

vote for or against their regeneration proposal. That pledge was for bigger, better

homes. She maintained that it was a struggle to hold MWH to that pledge, to

even keep the homes at the same size as previously, mirroring what Derek had

expressed earlier. She did not see how homes were really going to be better

when the density of housing was going to increase so much.


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Composition of the group

Appendix 2 gives a slightly fuller profile of those that participated in the focusgroup. I had Elizabeth and Colin, both involved in the RA, but with Colin as a

leaseholder whilst Elizabeth was a council tenant. Then Sabrina, Elizabeth's

daughter, lived on the estate with Elizabeth, but was reported by Elizabeth as

beingforthe regeneration in as much as she saw the need for extra housing for

young people, being provided on the private market. There was also Fereidoon

Mostowfei, who is Iranian and runs a drycleaners on the Broadway, and so was

somewhat representative of business interests in the area. Finally there was Father

James Fullam, the Catholic priest from the Church on the Broadway, another

resident, living next to the Church, but not on the estate. I attempted to contact

other faith groups, but either failed to work out they existed in the area, or failed

to contact a representative, or to persuade them to participate.

The focus group took place in the Corner Cafe on the Broadway, at 7.00 p.m. I

recorded and transcribed the interaction, which was initially focussed around a

page from the MWH website (see appendix 3.) This was a loose focus, and the

question I asked was how did they feel about the way in which they had been

consulted with by MWH. The interaction took on a dynamic of it's own, guided

somewhat by my interventions (D=), which are shown in the transcript, (see

appendix 4: Each contribution to the focus group is numbered: e.g. (56), in

chronological order, for the sake of easy reference. The contributions are also

coded with the first initial of the participants: e.g. J=) I will not go through the

transcript chronologically, but will pick out what I see as the major themes.


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Issues that emerged during the Focus Group

Creating consensus

(2) J = They told me that the voting was,,, overwhelming,, uh in favourof,, uh the regeneration.

Father James begins by saying, in the context of having been visited by local

councillors, that it was put to him how strongly people had voted in favour of the

scheme. This mirrors my experience of MWH representatives and also of what

appears in their publicity materials, namely that there was a 62% turnout for the

vote (from estate residents) and that 75% were in favour (MWH, 2003.) Indeed

from the Urban Regeneration Handbookthefirstcriterion for a successful

strategic partnership is:

A strategic vision and framework, providing a clear picture of the desiredoutcomes, encourages partners to align their goals and objectives whilemaking appropriate contributions. Partnerships should be built on sharedinterests, joint understanding and action. (Carter, 2000: 56,)

It seems there is a strong emphasis here on legitimating the regeneration process

as consensual, and in laying down a strategic framework early on. However

Derek's comments, about the way the project wassoldto residents, problematise

this. Furthermore Sabrina's comments:

(119)S= And, I think that's all sort of, it's all, kind of lip-service, it's it'ssaying it's gonna be great, it's gonna be great, but it's, it's selling an idea,that, without actually really going into detail, without really...

So there is a sense of the consensus for the project being produced (or rather

seduced, Baudrilard, 1990,) through a technique of selling the project, without

giving any detail of what it will involve. This seems to be an ongoing issue in the

relation between the RAs and MWH. Sabrina recounts ((14) in the transcript) how

MWH seemed the least prepared during the exhibition when bidding alongside

two other companies. Her impression of them was of making vague promises

about the future without going in to any detail.

Fereidoon confirms this tendency towards vagueness when he points out that

business people on the high street were unclear if their premises were to be


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knocked down (190 & 194.) Elizabeth also explained earlier that she only got

involved when she was told that her street, Ramsey Close, was going to be

knocked down, after having been assured that it would not be (Sabrina reiterates

this see 196.) It seems clear that it is difficult for the resident's to have known

what they were voting for, when so many changes to the project kept happeningalong the way, and what information they do get is perceived as being very vague.

Colin sees this vagueness as a strategy of sorts:

(153)C= The detailed applica, the details, the intricate details will comewhen they've been given permission to do what they want, so it's

basically you are now stuck with whatever project we've got,

This issue seems particularly pressing in relation to the pledge that was given to

residents, which was the basis on which the vote was made. Elizabeth was upset,

as she had indicated before, that MWH did not seem to be keeping to the terms of

the pledge (130.) This supports what Derek reported about the difficult

negotiations currently under way about what bigger and better might mean, in

terms of room size, shape and window sizes, and also Elizabeth's earlier concerns

about outside spaces.

This issue extended into the meeting between the four RAs. It seems strange that

there should be no common standards by which Resident's Associations could

negotiate, no process from the outset for resident's associations to come together,

share information and form a common position. Derek maintained that the

meeting happened because he and other RAs called for it. There seem to be no

systems in place to ensure the residents have ready access to all the information

and standards relevant to the consultation process, from the very start.

Representation?

An obvious response to this criticism is that the RAs are there to make sure that

the vision continues to include resident's interests, since a full consultation is

taking place and resident's are being included at every stage. Indeed the Urban

Regeneration Handbook states as the lastcriterion of a successful partnership:

Partnerships should involve local residents and community organisationsas equal partners. This often requires a change in culture and way ofoperating to accommodate community participants. The involvement of

these groups is necessary to ensure their full commitment to achieving the


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jointly established goals and to ensure that they are the principlebeneficiaries of whatever action is taken. (Carter, 2000: 56)

But Elizabeth's perception of the process is slightly different:

(123)E= They've set up these groups for the residents to go to and theplanning and design group, supposed to mean we're in on the planning,euuh the management, and this regeneration group, but we had a bigargument with them in that they take minutes, but they never write in theminutes our objections or our concerns...

Now clearly one criticism possibly levelled at those active in the RAs is that they

are not representative of the bulk of opinion on the estate: Indeed the way in

which the vote has become such a focus of antagonism seems to reflect this.

However, this does not really answer the question of how the RAs can operate as

equal partners. If they are meant to represent the estates, then surely there should

also have been a vote for them. Otherwise there is an imbalance of legitimacy

between proposals seen as having an official mandate, and RAs seen as not. If no

election is held, then it seems that for a meaningful consultation to be carried out,

the views of the resident's representatives need to be taken at face value, and

actively kept on the record as much as is possible. From this point of view,

accusing the RAs of not being representative is pretty close to admitting that the

consultation has not been managed properly.

Sabrina presented another way of looking at this problem:

(107)S= I think what you were saying about the consultation, uuhm, mysort of impression is that, I think if they could get away with it they

probably wouldn't have consulted anyone. I think that the only reason thatthe tenants are involved as they are to a limited extent,

(108)D= right,

(109)S= Is because, they have to, because they're the people, well notnecessarily the tenants, but say for example the freeholders who, the needto have compulsory purchase orders, so they have to have these peopleinvolved, and they feel obliged, I think that the Metropolitan feel obligedto involve them, but if they could get away with it then, they probably,wouldn't.

History

Colin, as someone who has lived on the estate for 20 years and who has had a


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features. What is looked at is an image, a vision rather than an unfolding drama,

and thus is compatible with a notion of a static consensus, rather than with a sense

of an ongoing consultation where things are genuinely up for renegotiation. The

other feature is that this metaphor is ultimately all about the future, and seems to

de-emphasise history, or learning lessons from the past. Another feature of theliterature is how everything is portrayed as new, exciting, and unique, not

exactly encouraging comparison with, and learning from, what has gone before

(See appendix 5 for an example of this kind of text.)

The issue of local residents not having the support or information they require for

operating within arenas of public consultation is not a new one for Barnet. The

effectiveness of the public inquiry into the Barnet Unitary Development Plan, of1990, was called into question for precisely this. A lack of understanding of the

details of planning procedures and standards meant that the inspector felt he

needed to take a very active role in scrutinising the plan, since residents were not

put in a position to do so (Webster and Lavers, 1991 : 805 806.) This issue has

also been phrased in terms of the issue of learning planning speak (Abrame,

2001: 193-196.) This could be seen as an issue of expertise, but from what I have

encountered it also seems to be an issue of basic information simply not being

available, never mind actively provided.

Density Description

(171) S= ...I think, sorry... I think that's one of the things about, I mean,when you say looking at their website and the pictures, I mean they, theylook very attractive, it looks like an area of maybe the city or somewhere

that you know like young London, somewhere that I'd probably like to live,but I think part of it is, uuh part of what doesn't come across from thegraphics is how dense it's actually going to be, I mean at the moment there'swhat 560 homes on the estate and they're going to increase it to, is it 2000?

(172) E= 680 at the moment, to two thousand

(173) J in background

(174) S= I mean at the moment it's quite dense as it is, so I mean to havethat many new homes in that one area, it doesn't, I don't think that comesacross here

(175) E= ...The traffic...


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(176) S= ...And I think the first time that I got that was from the model, theplan,

(177 ) D= Right

(178) S= It's what was it made out of? The proper

(179) E= Wood

(180) S= You now like the plans

(181) D= Scale model sort of thing

(182) S= Yeah, one of those, then when you look at that in comparison tothe, to the, the houses on the Broadway that are going to remain that yourealise the actual scale of the development,

Sabrina seems to be making a point of media criticism. She is, in part, referring

specifically to the colour printout of a webpage from the MWH site that I had

provided as a prompt (see appendix 3,) one of the images from which is

reproduced below:

Figure 4: Street scene. Source: Metropolitan West Hendons website.

This is the most dense looking image from that page, as far as I can see. It is

clear that the whiting out of the buildings in the background, and the focus on the

blue of the sky and the green of the trees minimises the sense of density and


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maximises the sense of space or naturalness.

In a document I obtained when I went to the first meeting about the traffic

planning (Metropolitan West Hendon, 2003.) there is an overview of the site,

based on the old master plan that failed its planning application. (According to

Elizabeth this was due partly to high-rise buildings being placed too close to the

Welsh Harp.) It gave an overview of the area including information about

building heights:

Figure 5: Overview giving building heights, from the old master plan.

Source: Metropolitan West Hendon, 2003.

As Mark Hobart pointed out to me, the height here is represented as being warm

and cosy by being in red tones: A communal feeling perhaps. But what is also

interesting is that this type of height data is not easy to find now on the MWH

website. Here is an example of the type of overview given there, for the revised

master plan:


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Figure 6: Overview from the new master plan. Source: Metropolitan WestHendons Website.

Another overview is given (see figure 3 ) with some shadows on it, hinting at

building heights, but there is no direct indication of building heights mapped out

on the site. It seems that there is not even a thin description of density present on

the website, and thus no clear publicity on building heights for the new master

plan. This information is highly significant to lease-holding residents on theestate:

(313)E= Isn't there some reason you can't get a mortgage for a council placeover the 5th or 4th floor?

(314)C= You can't get it over, if the building's more than five stories high thenyou cannot get a mortgage for it,

(315)E= Even if you're only on the fourth say,

(316)C= Doesn't matter cos you're in a building, that's what I pointed out tothem,

(317)E= And they're all above that?

(318)C= There are some which are only four stories high, said to them I wantone which is four stories high or I go on the ground, I am not going in a

building which is five stories high.

(319)E= Have you got any guarantee that you will get a...

(320)C= I will make sure that I do notend up in a higher building.

(321)E= Well you have to or you won't get a mortgage out.


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Difference

I had been concerned that an overriding consensus had been reached in the group,

due to three of the participants (Elizabeth, Colin, Sabrina) being involved in, or

related to, the RA. However, when I announced the end of the focus group, and

the freeing of the formal context, an interesting discussion began:

(334) E= Well the council should be able to get money to re, even torebuild what is here. It's just a money making thing. It's all for profit.

(335)S= I'm not against it.

(336)E= Oh well nobody's againstit that being knocked and rebuilt, theover development people are against.

(337)S= Uhm, wellpersonally, from my point of view, I'm living inLondon and I know it's going to be over developed and I know that it's a

big city and I just want somewhere, kind of, if it's going to attract morepeople into the area, if it's going to bring the area up, if it's somewherewhere my friends will say oh what d'you live in West Hendon, (E in

background) that's like a real nice area...

(338)F= I think that's what's gonna happen.

(339)S= Well that's, from my point of view being...

(340)F= Injecting 2000 people in this area means more work, (S+E

object in background) you have to think it this way,

(341)S= I just don't...

(342)F= This is what I think, injecting more money to the area, thatbrings the work, more people is going to be in this area, morecosmopolitan as they explained it...

(343)S= ...Yeah...

(344)F= Yeah? So more shops,

Suddenly Sabrina and Fereidoon 's differing interests begin to be expressed more

strongly. The first thing that this seems to illustrate is that my normative influence

within the group, as controlling an interview context, had suppressed difference of

opinion, which emerged when the interview was over (the participants gave me

permission to use this material.) From this it seems likely that a regeneration /

consultation model that attempts to set up a strong consensus from the beginning

(I had actively encouraged them to express differences in opinion at the beginning

and throughout the interview) is very likely to lead to the masking of differences


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of opinion. The stress within MWH's publicity material on the community, as if

it were one entity, would only serve to accentuate this, perhaps mirroring the

problems encountered in participation in development in an international setting

(Mosse, 2001.) My experience of who it was that participated in MWH's open

meetings only reinforced this impression.

Fereidoon and Sabrina are not dissenting with what is going to happen: That more

affluent people will move into the area, perhaps also pushing prices up (see 227.)

They are pointing out that, from where they are standing, this is not necessarily a

bad thing, for instance because it will stimulate business or result in new places to

go out and spend time (381,399.) However, for Sabrina this evaluation is very

contingent on detailed information about what these outcomes might be:

(233)S= ...Yeah, affordable accommodation it'll be somewhere get my

foot on the property ladder maybe being a resident here will have the

opportunity to, I don't know, maybe have first call or whatever and the

idea of the area coming up as well like maybe get like I dont know a lot

of people object to to it but from my point of view like some trendy bars

or some like like you know kind of more sort of going out like area I,

that was what I was quite excited about but I think that's what it was

initially but now it just looks like there's no way I'd ever be able to

afford one of them on the private market and it's just, it's targeting a

completely different sort of idea of what...

So even for those residents that feel that they have a lot to gain from the

regeneration, this is only likely to be meaningful for them if there is some

financial detail provided about how much the new properties are likely to cost,

and what proportion of them will be social housing, key worker housing,

supported by housing association phased ownership schemes etc. This mirrors the

concerns raised in the meeting of the four RAs about a lack of financial

information about the regeneration proposals.

Fereidoon gives an indication of the political will behind the regeneration on the

part of the council, in the context of his application for a restaurant license:


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(386) F= They're gonna have more coffee shop this and that, otherwise toget an A3 license for a shop like that... (S breaks in) ... I tried it in Camden,its a nightmare.

(387) S= ...When you applied for this, did you have to change the land use,did you have to change it to an A3 use?

(388) F= Yes.

(389) S= You did, so because normally there is lots of objections to thatkind of thing, but they encourage that you're saying...

(390)F= Yes. It was very easy,

(391) E= Yeah.

(392) F= If you wanted to do it in Camden you had to go to one of thesefirms, specifically applying for these things, and you pay them thousands of

pounds.

(393) S= ...Because Camden's.

(394) F=...And I managed to get it myself.

(395) F= It was very easy. I knew it, this part is not going to be affected, butthere is the willingness.

(396) E= Yeah.

(397) F= With the council, that this area should be injected with morepeople, so they need more things.

Donal, in his own commentary on what is going on, pointed out that Barnet has a

conservative council and a Labour MP, and that the conservative council would

not be upset if more affluent voters moved into the borough. The MP had sent a

letter to constituents, detailing his concerns about the consultation process (see

Appendix 6.) In addition there had been a certain amount of confrontation

between one of the main Councillors pushing for the regeneration (Brian

Sallinger, Conservative) and Mr Dismore, reported in the Local Barnet Times (see

Appendix 7.)

It would seem from all of this that differences of interest are very much driving

the regeneration process, and that local people are very much aware of this. This

means that a consultation model that is formed around the idea of an early fixed

consensus or vision, and a unitary sense of the community is unlikely to draw

people in, or make them feel that the issues that they see as important are being

addressed.


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Discourse: More than just text and reception.

In this study the social construction of space is addressed in relation to practices

of mediation. What is interesting within this is that the subjectivities of home are

precisely what are disarticulated in this public discussion of the social

construction of space. The subjectivity of residents is obscured behind public

discourses on the quantity of floor space and so on. This raises the question: Is

Media Studies, by focussing on the private aspect of the subjectivity of home,

not in danger of reproducing an a priori liberal division between the private and

the public. But surely one major aspect of what is so interesting about non-

face-to-face practices (i.e. of mediation, where people dont see eye-to-eye, as it

were,) is that they cross this division in so many ways, (Morley, I must note, is

well aware of this, see 1992: 270-289.)

It is always possible to ask, when faced with the bewildering complexities of

discourse theory, what difference does it make? Apart from the irony of

discourse theory being precisely about the production of similarities and

differences, this seems like a very searching question. One way of putting asimilar criticism is to ask we may talk about it in this way, but does that mean we

actually do it in this way? Now discourse theorists can protest that it is precisely

that gap between text and practise that discourse inhabits. But they are hampered

in this if they focus mainly on the linguistic or textual aspects of discourse. Now

this is a strong argument for an ethnographic approach to discursive practices, but

what is at stake here?

One clue comes from the study of discourse within organisations. Organisational

studies being, to a large extent, about getting things done collectively, has seen a

negative response to what is portrayed as nominalism in discourse theory (Reed,

2000,) of reality being seen as defined by what you call things. However, the

response to this charge is fairly robust, in as much as discourse and organisation

itself can be portrayed as synonymous (Chia, 2000.) How can people operate to

get things done collectively without forms of collectively institutionalised

discourse? This conflict seems to focus debate on those features of discourse that


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are constitutive of the possibility of action in a particular situation. These are

precisely the features of discourse that are less prone to the charge of nominalism,

in that they are precisely the features of discourse that tend to be performative i.e.

that are constitutive of what is possible and thus real.4

This opens up a set of questions for Media Studies that I cannot adequately trace

out in full here, but perhaps I can illustrate with an example. Out of Bounds is a

book about the mediation of sports (Baker and Boyd, 1997.) The book is

contextualised in the introduction, in terms of sports being a discursive

compliment to enterprise, a drama within which can be articulated the values of

competition, teamwork, sportsmanship, drive to succeed etc. But what is not

included, is study of how, or if, these discourses are put into play in the

workplace: To look at if they become incorporated into the discursive practices of

enterprise. Now clearly this would need to be an ethnographic study, to try and

approach the specificities of how these discourses might be mobilised and

mobilising. Now whilst not, by strict definitions, a Media Studies piece of work,

it would clearly be a means of following through on what the reception of

mediation means in practice.

United States of Democracy?

Is a sense of an underlying realism, or state (or globality, Giddens, 1997)

leading to a notion of convergence in understanding through communication

(Habermas, 1987,) towards some state of consensus or unity, really compatible

with notions of democracy? Is democracy not tied to the pluralistic notion that

there are many valid ways of approaching the world, and that these all need to be

admissible into discussion? (Torfing , on Mouffes conception of pluraldemocracy, 1999: 252-255.) Once a consensus is formed and solidifies, many

ways of seeing the world are likely to become incompatible with the consensus

arrived at, it's underlying presuppositions and metaphors, and the political will of

those supporting that consensus. A process that is built around a single vision

4The problem with the term real being used in this context, is that constituting what is possible

necessarily involves some element of seduction (Baudrillard, 1990,) in as mush as things arenever directly represented, but represented as by situated agents (Goodman, 1981.) Thus the

notion of a necessary direct relation between an act constitutive of what is possible and someunderlying reality is untenable. Nationalism is a striking example (Anderson, 1983.)


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from the beginning, and one that is driven by a great deal of non-negotiable

economic and political pressures, is therefore unlikely to be seen as being strongly

democratic. This seems to be confirmed by the way in which opposition, in this

case, seems to have been necessary to ensure that the regeneration project stayed

within legal limits. This seems to confirm the theoretical observation thatsupporting the ongoing articulation of differences of interest is a significant factor

in attempts to achieve forms of democracy that are meaningful for those

participating in them (Ibid.)

However the issue here is not simply one ofover-determination. Where there is a

wish to be part of, or have influence on, some over determined social scheme of

how things shall be done collectively (a discourse, institution or form oforganisational practice) then access to the over-determinations, or forms of

discourse, of these collectivities is a critical pre-condition to power (when seen as

the ability to influence events or rather practices.) The residents in this study not

only faced over-determination in the form of a vision for regeneration that they

felt was being thrust upon them, but also under-determination in the form of not

having access to the timings of meetings, to the details of the proposals, to the

relevant standards, to financial information about the regeneration schemes and so

on. They were left not able to put forward their own articulations of these socially

over-determined organisational narratives. In this case it seems that there is indeed

a certain de-reifying tendency in the ways in which market, or economistic,

organisational discourses are played out here. There is the specific over-

determination (reification) of housing densities, but also the under-determination

of the project management of a tendering process that retains flexibility for the

contractors, at the price of certainty and intelligibility for those being consulted.

This seems, in this study, to be a fairly specific process. The details of the

regeneration scheme are what is at stake here. That is a large part of what really

matters for those being consulted. But the negotiation is also implicated in wider

discursivepractices of economistic governance. These practices are clearly

discursive, and to a significant extent contingent upon this, in that they have been

contested at every stage, by the House of Commons Council Housing Committee,

by Andrew Dismore MP and by the RAs (who have obtained strikingly different


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outcomes in their negotiations so far.) These findings seem to confirm an overall

sense of capitalism undermining the meaning-making that is implied by a notion

of democratic citizenship, through both reification and de-reification (Dean,

2003.) These discursive trends seem to unfold in specific ways that seem highly

significant to the outcome, especially for those, supposedly meaning-making,citizens. So whilst it seems valid to investigate these types of processes at the

level of public policy (Taylor, 2002,) it also seems important to look into these

issues from an ethnography-of-mediation perspective, of how these policy

messages are received and played out. This is an approach that seems able to

explore what the many interpretations of public scrutiny of decisionmaking,

might mean in practice.

Inconclusion

Media Studies seems to partly be built on the often unspoken premise that there is

an important relation between practices of mediation and democratic practices.

And yet we seem hampered by the apparent gap between the texts of media and

the texts of democracy. It would seem that the connections can only be found

in practice. One area of linkage that is ripe for exploration is the articulation of

mediation and organisation as sets of practices. Some traditionally oriented

examples might be the ways in which media professionals modify their practices

in response to and in anticipation of the over- and under-determining moves of

politicians. The same study could be carried out in reverse, in the [rare] instances

where ethnographic access to political life might be a workable research strategy.

But in the spirit of the asylum (Foucault, 1989) I would venture that the most

fruitful place to explore this connection is where both mediational and democratic

/ political practices contribute to the re-forming of the lives of those that are not

personally considered as being a part of the public.


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Would you like to discuss what is happening here in WestHendon?

Would you like to join a group of 3-5 people, to discuss the West Hendonregeneration project? The discussion is likely to last around an hour. I am hopingto bring together people drawn from groupings in the area, such as local faithgroups, people in business together, or people attending groups together such as atthe multi-cultural centre.

My name is Daniel Taghioff. The discussions are for a small piece of research formy MA dissertation. I am studying the Anthropology of Media at the School ofOriental and African studies, University of London. I am looking at the ways thatthe West Hendon regeneration project communicates with the public. I am

interested in how residents and local business people feel about these messages,and also the other ways that they find out things about the project.

If you are interested in discussing the regeneration project and its likely effects, orhave any questions about this, then please contact me by the following means:

CONTACT DETAILS REMOVED


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Elizabeth Fitzgerald is 49-58 years old. She has lived in West Hendon for 9years, She was born in Ireland. She is a Catholic. She is a housewife.

Sabrina Fitzgerald is 19-28 years old. She has lived in West Hendon for 9

years. She was born in Dublin in Ireland. She sees herself as White Irish Roman Catholic. She is a trainee Solicitor.

Rev. James Fullam has lived in west Hendon for 19 years. He was born inDublin in Ireland. He identifies himself strongly with the Catholic Community.He is a Catholic Priest.

Fereidoon Mostowfei is 39-48 years old. H has lived in West Hendon for 18months. He was born in Iran. He is a Muslim. He runs a laundrette anddrycleaners on West Hendon Broadway.

ColinParsons is 39-48 years old. He has lived in West Hendon for over 20years (too long, he says.) He was born in Edgeware. He is a Roman Catholic(sort of, he says.) He works as a Telephone Engineer.

Donal Savage is 29-38 years old. He has lived in West Hendon for 3 years. Hewas born in Belfast in Northern Ireland. He has converted from Catholicism toJudaism. He works as an IT consultant.


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(Downloaded from MWHs site, July 2004)

Improvements will be made to Hendon Station.

A new drop off point and taxi rank at the station will be provided and a

pedestrian route will be developed to connect the station with the heart of West

Hendon.

To find out more about the proposals for transport click here.

Greening West Hendon

York Park will be redesigned with residents and relocated to create a safe

environment in which to play, socialise or just enjoy the peace and

tranquility of the Welsh Harp and Site of Special Scientific Interest.

Landscaped 'green corridors' will link the beauty of the Welsh Harp through

the new residential areas to the heart of West Hendon.

We will work with English Nature and local conservation groups to retain

and enhance the areas natural features.

Key enhancements could include improving water filtration, the

managed coppicing of some willows, creation of new ponds for

amphibians and the provision of new hides.

We will create better access around the Harp, this could include a new

pedestrian bridge across the Silk Stream.

To find out more about the proposals for the environment click here.


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Daniel Taghioff, MA Anthropology of Media, School of Oriental an

rebuilding the plot

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