Engaging Impossibilism in Planning Practice. Reflections from the Case of Nicosia

This chapter applies the concept of impossibilism (initially developed by Marxist political theorists) to make sense of the bi-communal planning practices undertaken in a city structurally divided along lines of ethnicity and military occupation. The Nicosia Masterplan is a four-decade-long bi-communal initiative to comprehensively plan the city’s future, whether political reconciliation will be achieved or never. By pushing the notion of impossibilism beyond the limits of reform under capitalism—as Marxists have it—we aim to frame a planning process entailing a radical degree of political uncertainty as part of its mandate. In doing so, we are mindful but also critical of Hirschman’s possibilism as insufficiently accounting for the Cypriot planners’ experience of active disillusionment. Impossibilism describes a condition of political stalemate in which no realistic solution exists for the main problems of urban coexistence. However, planning actions are necessary to make everyday life tolerable. The conclusions discuss tactics and tools for enabling spatial planning when cities are suspended in a state of impossibilism with long-term socio-spatial imbalances.