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How does a profession that prides itself on standing for the common good and working through action –not mere analysis or gesturing- demonstrate its effectiveness in a city devastated by intractable political, economic, financial, health, and social crises? In this essay, I dive into the current context of planning in Beirut (Lebanon) where I have been deeply engaged for decades. Recognizing that planning is deeply embedded in the making of the ongoing overlapping crises in the country, I propose three pathways for thinking about a possible positive role for planning in these circumstances: (i) to (re)construct a source of legitimacy for planning by reconsidering who has custody over the planning process and how the legitimacy of planning is secured; (ii) to accept a "tactical" practice in which grand schemes are replaced with tentative, experimental, and incremental micro-interventions that may succeed or not in reaching an integrated vision and, (iii) to activate the performative dimension of planning, its ability to imagine shared spaces and allow for transgressing contemporary limited realities.

For planners, processes of complex spatial transformations today are comparable to uncharted land and an uncertain voyage. Many possible role images overlap and contrast to traditional and established ways of thinking and acting. The focus here is on navigating instead of controlling, about supporting instead of enforcing. Planning lacks tools to think and act when facing uncertainty. This paper proposes role-reflexive planning as an educational and experimental approach to thinking through different potentialities. It offers groundwork from the boundary between planning and transition studies, using role-based ideas as a bridge. It offers an overview about different roles that are relevant to working towards transformations as spatial planners. It develops an account of role-reflexive planning that connects between contexts, actions and back to individual modes of behaviour in planning processes. As a basis, this paper condenses experiences of a role-playing pilot workshop and discussions about potential elements of a transition towards "post-growth planning". It outlines how role-playing challenges the individual roles of actors beyond the game situations themselves. Conceptual ideas foster a renewed role-based debate on thinking and acting in the face of uncertainty and ways to navigate through the stormy waters of transformation.

SUMMARY Project appraisal methodologies have developed greatly during the last 15 years, and project planning is increasingly taking the place of macro‐economic planning in the developing countries of the world. However, flexibility must be maintained, if inertia is not to calcify the projects and strategies chosen. Eight procedural steps designed to avoid this are listed and discussed.RESUME Planification des projets et macroplanificationLes méthodologies d'évaluation des projets se sont développées rapidement au cours des quinze dernières années et la planification des projets remplace de plus en plus la planification macro‐économique dans les pays en voie de développement. Toutefois, il faut maintenir une certaine flexibilité, pour empêcher la force d'inertie de paralyser les projets et les stratégies choisies. Huit façons de procéder destinées à éviter cet état de choses sont décrites et discutées.RESUMEN Planificación de proyectos y macroplanificaciónLas metodologías de análisis de proyectos se han desarrollado mucho durante los últimos quince años y la planificación de proyectos cada vez sustituye más a la planificación macroeconómica en los países en vías de desarrollo del mundo. No obstante, debe mantenerse la flexibilidad, si no se quiere que la inercia petrifique los proyectos y estrategias elegidas. Se enumeran y analizan ocho medidas de procedimiento concebidas para evitar esto.