1 The soft technologies of urban development – the need for a broader technology concept Lars Marcus & Fredrik Nilsson lars.marcus@chalmers.se, fredrik.nilsson@chalmers.se Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering Chalmers University of Technology 1. Introduction: the soft technologies of urban development Given current challenges of both social and environmental character in urban development, there is urgent need to not only improve our understanding of urban processes but also scrutinise the tools and skills necessary to successfully intervene in them. In this paper, central examples of such tools are identified in discourse, institutions and urban form, in turn relating to major practices in urban development, such as governance, planning and design. These tools are moreover identified as ‘soft technologies’ with many similarities to regular technologies but also critical differences. Based on the definition of technology by Brian Arthur as “the constant capture of new natural phenomena and the harnessing of these for particular purposes” (Arthur 2009, 22) we draw the conclusion that if regular technology typically captures natural phenomena for a purpose, soft technologies capture phenomena related to human abilities, such as perception, cognition and emotions. Tentatively we may suggest that discourse captures cognitive abilities related to rational thinking in the purpose to understand and convince; that institutions captures emotional abilities related to sense of community, justice, fear of shame or sanctions for the purpose of creating a certain social order; and that spatial form captures perceptual abilities for the purpose of physical navigation, cultural experience and other fundamental human uses. These three broad technologies are in the following scrutinised by first, identifying the human phenomena captured in them and second, discussing how a deeper understating of these may improve them as technologies. The aim is to contribute to a theoretical foundation of what we here call ‘soft technologies’ that may offer a basis for their further knowledge development, with the ultimate aim to improve practice. In extension, such a discussion opens for a broader conception of technology, important for issues of sustainability and societal development. However, we begin by setting the framework for these technologies and their related practices in the particular context of urban development. 2. The practices of urban development: governance, planning and design The context of the technologies and the related practices that we want to address in this paper is urban development. Important to note then is that what we talk about as practices are not professions but something that more directly relate to what people do in their professional activity. This means that the same practices may be found in activities performed in several professions. For instance, architects may in their professional activity come to practice both governance and planning as well as design. At the same time, it is often the case that there are certain practices that are more