Hans Blumenfeld: a moderate defence of expertise in the controversial 1960s

Despite an impressive international career, the German city planner Hans Blumenfeld remains largely unknown. In The Transatlantic Collapse of Urban Renewal, Christopher Klemek depicts him as an apologist of authoritarian and technocratic urban renewal. This statement is puzzling because many post-war planners saw him as a humble left-wing progressive. Drawing from a close analysis of the writings and actions of Blumenfeld, in particular his work in Canada, this article shows that he was far from being an uncritical apologist of urban renewal in North America. He was always very sceptical but, as opposed to Jane Jacobs, he did not think that modernist urban planning had it all wrong. He always thought that progress came not only from citizens’ participation, but also principally from science and expertise. For that reason, Blumenfeld tried, on the one hand, to transform the language of city planning to answer criticism from citizens and activists, and, on the other, to retain the expertise to proceed from plan-making to a communication-process, as some professionals were beginning to advocate at the time.