Socially Restorative Urbanism: The theory, process and practice of Experiemics

Using case studies, interviews, and empirical sources, this book analyzes the strategies and impact of Internet use by civil society actors and asks how useful it is for their work -- does the availability of Internet tools change the way citizens' groups work, does it influence their effectiveness, and does it do so differently in Japan from other countries? Four fascinating studies take a closer look at the role of the Internet during the history textbook controversy; strategies of small citizen's groups; comparisons between internet use in Japan, Korea and Germany; and how the internet is used as a platform to discuss the dispatch of Japanese troops in Iraq. Isa Ducke has produced an original work that will be of interest to students and scholars of Japanese politics, media and information technology and civil society.

Table of Contents:
Part 1: Beyond Boundaries: developing the concept of Socially Restorative Urbanism 1. New Age-ing Cities: in search of a new discipline for socially oriented urban design 2. Balance of Control at the Margins 3. The Socially Restorative Urban Environment Part 2: In Search of the Edge 4. The Edge as Socio-spatial Concept 5. Transitional Edge Anatomy: laterality, extent and locality Part 3: Experiemics 6. The Need for Participative Processes 7. Experiemics Development Conclusions

About the Author :
Kevin Thwaites teaches and researches socially responsive landscape architecture and urban design at the University of Sheffield. Research interests centre of the development of Experiential Landscape, the theory and philosophy of urban landscape design and particularly how spatial and experiential dimensions of urban life converge to influence human psychological health and well-being. Alice Mathers is Innovation Manager at the Tinder Foundation and a Visiting Scholar in the Department of Landscape at the University of Sheffield, UK. Her work is driven by an interdisciplinary approach to people-environment interactions, which straddles the academic boundaries of landscape architecture, planning, sociology, disability studies, human geography and environmental psychology. Her doctoral and post-doctoral research with disabled people seeks to challenge current professional and societal constraints that inhibit the involvement of under-represented communities in environmental planning and design, and has received considerable attention from policy-makers and the international academic community. Ian Simkins is a freelance lecturer, a Chartered Landscape Architect and the managing director of Experiemics Ltd, the consultancy of Experiential Landscape, whose overall strategy is to develop and apply an integrated approach to teaching, research and practice. The work has developed theoretical principles and practical methodologies focused on socially inclusive approaches to landscape and urban design, participative practices and experiential mapping methodologies.