This text addresses a question of enduring interest to planners: can planning really bring about significant and positive change? In South Africa the process of political transition appeared to create the preconditions for planners to demonstrate how their traditional humanitarian and environmental concerns could find concrete expression in the reshaping of the built environment. The requirement that the segregrated apartheid cities be restructured, reintegrated and made accessible to the poor was high on the agenda of the new post-apartheid government, even prior to their election.

This text addresses a question of enduring interest to planners: can planning really bring about significant and positive change? In South Africa the process of political transition appeared to create the preconditions for planners to demonstrate how their traditional humanitarian and environmental concerns could find concrete expression in the reshaping of the built environment. The requirement that the segregrated apartheid cities be restructured, reintegrated and made accessible to the poor was high on the agenda of the new post-apartheid government, even prior to their election.