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viii  Contents

Variegated, evolving and experimental

neoliberalism – the search for the ‘perfect fix’ 119
Space, scale and politics 122
Neoliberalism ‘on the ground’ 124
Conclusions 125

6. Pragmatism 127
Introduction 127
What is pragmatism? 129
Planning and pragmatism 134
Discussion of pragmatism and planning 142
Conclusions 144

7. Planners as Advocates 146

Introduction 146
The politics of planning 146
Paul Davidoff and the planner as advocate 150
Pluralism 156
Advocacy in action? Planning Aid and
equity planning 160
Conclusions 167

8. After Modernity 168

Introduction 168
What are the modern and the postmodern? 169
Postmodern planning 171
Post-structuralism and complexity 180
Complexity and post-structuralism 184
Conclusions 188

9. Planning, Depoliticization and the Post-Political 191

Introduction 191
The emergence of depoliticization and the
post-political 196
Politics and the political 198
Planning, the police and the partition of the sensible 201
Planning, post-politics and depoliticization 205
Post-political planning into practice? 211
Conclusions 215
 Contents  ix

10. Post-Structuralism and New Planning Spaces 218

Introduction 218
Rethinking space and scale – a post-structuralist
perspective 220
The drivers of new spaces and scales of planning 228
Soft spaces of planning 235
Conclusions 239

11. Collaborative Planning 241

Introduction 241
Communicative rationality 244
The practical application of communicative rationality 248
Planning as a communicative process 252
Analyses of current practice 261
Approaches to planning 262
Communicative planning and the neoliberalization
of cities 263
Conclusions 264

12. Planning, Post-Colonialism, Insurgency

and Informality 267
Introduction 267
The diffusion of planning knowledge 269
What is post-colonialism and what does it have to do
with planning? 272
Planning and informality 281
Insurgent planning 285
Conclusions 288

13. Conclusions 291

Introduction 291
Tracking back: the influences upon planning theory 296
Conclusions and the future 301

Bibliography 309
Index 331
List of Tables and Figures

Tables

1.1 Categories of theory 17

3.1 Characteristics of complex and simple system 65
5.1 Common principles in alternative approaches
to planning 115
7.1 Policy processes in contemporary British public
administration159
8.1 Eight cities 188
12.1 Typology of diffusion 270
13.1 A typology of planning styles 298

Figures

1.1 The problem of perception 10

2.1 Healey, McDougall and Thomas’s map of theoretical
positions in planning theory in the 1970s 42
3.1 A system 56
3.2 Methodology for planning proposals 59
7.1 The ‘vicious circle’ of planning as a ­profession 156
8.1 Iterative and interactive process for complex
systems planning  187

Acknowledgement

The author and publishers would like to thank Patsy Healey for permis-
sion to use Figure 2.1, originally published in Healey et al. (1982) Planning
Theory: Prospects for the 1980s (Oxford: Pergamon).
x
1 What is Theory?

Introduction

When writing a book that seeks to tackle a large topic such as planning the-
ory there are important choices to be made about what to include, in what
order, and what narrative (if any) should connect the various ­elements.
In recent years planning theory has been characterized by fragmenta-
tion and diversification with a wide range of different u ­ nderstandings
emerging and increasingly talking past each other. At one end of the
spectrum are approaches that seek to understand and explain the pur-
pose and impacts of planning as a function of the capitalist mode of
­production (currently under the overused label of ‘neoliberalism’) while
at the other end of spectrum are post-structuralist approaches that reject
a single, totalizing way of knowing. There is nothing inherently wrong
with this s­ eemingly incommensurable and growing diversity (though see
Allmendinger, 2016 for an attempt at fusion of these two positions) but
there are there are some consequences, particularly when attempting to
decide where to draw the boundaries on what to include in a book on
planning theory.
The first consequence of this fragmentation amounts to a challenge
to the notion of planning theory itself. This goes beyond bemoaning the
continued existence of a theory–practice gap to argue that planning as a
social practice does not ‘need’ theory – it functions perfectly well without
it (for recent examples see Talvitie, 2009; Lord, 2014). The point is that
if the field of planning theory is so varied, incommensurable and unre-
lated to the practice of planning (which seems to carry on regardless)
then why bother trying to theorize it? Rather than theory the practice of
planning should be underpinned by experiential learning and reflection
(which sounds suspiciously like a theory of sorts itself). A related position
is that the ‘need’ for theory in planning arises not from the demands

1
2  Planning Theory

of practice but for other reasons. According to Reade (1987) planning

‘needs’ theory to elevate its existence and justify its claim to professional
status and all of the benefits that accompany this status. A third posi-
tion is the suggestion that planning theory does exist but is no more
than a justification for what planning and planners do to support capi-
talism. Planners help create a particular form of the built environment
that p ­ rovides the conditions necessary to maximize economic growth
and accumulation by coordinating infrastructure such as roads, sewers,
­housing, etc., while helping avoid economic crises by acting as ‘crisis
managers’ (see Harvey, 1985). P ­ lanning acts in the interests of capital
but needs to do so in ways that seem balanced, open and fair. Theory
provides a means by which planners can publicly justify their actions
and mask their true role. These positions – that planning doesn’t ‘need’
theory, that planners only theorize because that is what is expected of a
profession and that theory is just a ‘front’ for planning to mislead society
– question the very purpose of a book on planning theory.
A second consequence of this fragmentation is that it is difficult, if not
unwise, to provide a ‘story’ linking the evolution of theories in planning.
This is a popular and understandable approach in the social sciences
that helps capture the landscape of theory within areas such as planning
while also echoing the progressive nature of theory in the natural sciences
where theory is regarded as provisional and refutable: theories develop
and ‘improve’ as they are subjected to testing. Such a narrative is not only
rejected outright by some theories but also presents practical difficulties:
explaining how we ‘got to now’ highlights a growing plurality of positions
and lack of coherence that, at the very least, draws attention to the absence
of any clear and underlying body of thought for planning. It is also not
the case that theory in the social sciences progresses in the same ways as
in the natural sciences: one cannot ‘prove’ that restricting development
around the edge of a city encourages regeneration. There are too many
factors that are linked in complex ways to be able to single out cause and
effect. This lack of progression partly explains the proliferation of theory
in planning as new perspectives are added rather than replacing existing
ones. The outcome is that one can describe a fragmentation of positions
and theories and the reasons for this development but the impact upon
planning is to recall Wildavsky’s renowned suggestion: if planning is every-
thing, maybe it’s nothing (1973: 127).
The final consequence of fragmentation comes from looking back at the
ebbs and flows of theory where it is clear that some theories and schools
 What is Theory?  3

of thought are relatively enduring while others are the more e­ phemeral.
There are some ‘classic’ theories of planning that have helped shape
understanding and practice. In some cases the popularity and sustainabil-
ity of such theories have been in part due to their appeal to planners,
reinforcing a view of the profession as based around technical expertise
or progressive values. In other cases theories have been critical of plan-
ning and planners, portraying them as dupes or instruments of capitalism.
There is an element of fashion in the waxing and waning of theories as
academics are always looking for ‘the new’.
These issues could stop a book on planning theory before it has started.
Why bother with a book on planning theory? However, we can also
­consider the counter arguments. First, just because there is a growing
diversity of theories in and around planning it does not necessarily fol-
low that they are all of equal significance or validity. Second, we should
not reject the notion of theory because it does not accurately correspond
to social reality. Even if that reality is complex and difficult to theorize,
theory is important if only because it allows reflection of planning prac-
tice against something even if that something is wide of the mark. Theory
in the social sciences will always, by necessity, be much more limited in
scope and applicability than in the natural sciences. Third, we should not
dispense with theory for the fundamental reason that planning is largely a
public sector-funded and led activity and there needs to be a justification
for its existence and the intervention of the state in land and property
markets. Two related questions arise from any justification for planning
activity: what difference should planning make and what difference does it
make? The former question requires theory while the latter evaluates the
impact against that theory. There are significant methodological and prac-
tical problems in approaching both questions but this does not separate
planning from other areas of public policy and intervention. Finally and
most practically, planners theorize as an everyday activity whether they
recognize it or not. After all the very activity of planning is based upon a
theory that the world will be a better place (however defined) with it than
without it.
So there are arguments for and against theory in planning as well as
difficulties in actually theorizing planning. There are no easy or straight-
forward answers to such questions but they provide a backdrop to a book
that seeks to help inform. Yet in informing we also need to be wary of
being too helpful, of imposing a simplified and false understanding in the
desire for clarity. I discuss the underlying approach to this book more
4  Planning Theory

in Chapter 2 but it is worth pointing out that there is no simple way of

capturing or communicating the scope and nature of planning theory.
However, this book does not stand alone. There are a range of books
and papers covering planning theory that, while they take a different
approach, complement this book – some general introductions and some
more focused on a particular area.
One way in which this book is distinguished from others is that I
try and tackle some of the issues outlined above by locating theories
within particular schools of thought. Planning is magpie-like if not
voracious in its expropriation of theories from other disciplines and
subjects, some of which are not really theories at all but more ways of
understanding and looking at the world. Often such Weltanschauungen
can encompass and frame theories. Is, for example, post-structuralism
a theory in the same way that collaborative planning is? I think the
answer to that is ‘no’ though post-structuralism has been highly influ-
ential in affecting how we think about planning and what we include in
such thinking. There are, as well, post-structuralist-inspired theories or,
at least, theories that fit within the cannon of post-structuralist thought
(see Chapter 10). Such theories help us understand the nature of space
(e.g. relational theory) as well as attempt to explain how the puzzle of
how seemingly more open and transparent planning has been accom-
panied by more disillusionment and discontent (post-political theory).
There are also self-proclaimed theories that fall within a broad,
­post-structuralist understanding though are not actually theories, such
as Actor–Network Theory, a point accepted by one of its main propo-
nents, Bruno Latour (2005).
What marks this particular book out is that it is written for those wishing
to better understand this fuzzy thing called planning theory (whether it
succeeds in that aim is another matter entirely) by engaging with a broad
interpretation of the notion of theory. I wrote the first edition back in
2002 for students of my planning theory course with just such a purpose
in mind. Since then things have become less, not more, clear and the
justification for this approach has been reinforced.
In the rest of this chapter I take up some of these themes and issues
about the nature of theory, both at a general level and between the natural
and social sciences. I distinguish between different kinds of theory before
turning to the idea of theory as discourse, that is, that truth and theory are
socially produced. Such a view highlights how we choose a theory amongst
many competing approaches to suit the circumstances and our values.
 What is Theory?  5

In a field such as planning with its significant scope for discretion and
choice this is an important perspective.

The nature of theory

Before we embark on any exploration of theory it is necessary to define

what we mean. The word ‘theory’ is used widely and can cover a variety of
meanings depending on the context or use. For example, it can be used
in a pejorative way to dismiss something as being impractical or unrelated
to reality, as in ‘this is all too theo­retical’. At the other extreme it can be
used in a more positive way to criticize a piecemeal or knee-jerk reaction
as in ‘this has no theo­retical grounding’. Beyond its rhetorical use the
word can also be used to cover a wide range of ideas or propositions,
from Einstein’s theory of relativity to the theory that the relationship
between birth and the relative position of the stars will influence daily
­experiences. The notion of theory then is a diffuse phenomenon. Regard-
less of problems with use and definition there are some general ideas of
what is meant:

Theory is an explanatory supposition which can be defined broadly or narrowly.

(McConnell, 1981, p. 20)

[A] theory is not a theory at all, until it has been used in practice over a consid-
erable period of time. (Reade, 1987, p. 156)

The main concern of social theory is the same as that of the social sciences in
general: the illumination of concrete processes of human life. (Giddens, 1984,
p. xvii)

In addition, theory is normally required to include some element of pre-

diction or prescription so as to guide action. Accordingly, theory could be
seen as having a number of elements; it abstracts a set of general or specific
principles to be used as a basis for explaining and acting, with the theory being
tested and refined if necessary.
While this definition would seem broadly uncontentious, I would argue
that it does not take us as far as we need to go. For a start, under this defi-
nition theory could cover a multitude of situa­tions; for example, it does
not tell us what distinguishes theory from conjecture or from ideas. Nei-
ther does it distinguish between the different uses and levels of theory;
6  Planning Theory

for example, can all theo­ries be used in different situations? This is par-
ticularly important in planning where it has long been argued that there
are theories of planning (why it exists and what it does) and theories in
plan­ning (how to go about it). Second, the definition ignores the con-
text of theory, particularly the social construction of knowl­edge. The idea
that theories or ideas are ‘objective’ or privileged views upon ‘reality’ has
been queried and rejected by philosophers for centuries. This is some-
thing that we will come to later but suffice to say here that theories can
be regarded as part of a discourse formation: words, statements, symbols,
similes, etc. that all mean different things in different contexts and are
dependent upon their context and wider understanding. Words are con-
tentious and ambiguous, and interpretations of meaning will inevitably
vary. This has important implications for the formation, interpretation
and evaluation of theory in different places. Finally, and linked in some
ways to the last point, theory in the social sciences is not immune from
the influence of power and its wider social context, that is, there are politi-
cal and temporal elements to theories. Some theories have been advanced
to protect or further expand the influence of powerful interests. Systems
theory, for example (covered in Chapter 3), is not just a way of thinking
about how cities ‘work’. It also has significant implications for the ways
in which planning should be undertaken that empowers certain groups
(planners) over others. This points to a need to examine the disciplin-
ary and historically variable relations of power and its influence upon
theories.
What we need, therefore, is an approach to theory that goes beyond
broad definitions and addresses the points above.

The differences between the natural and social sciences

The first distinction that is usually made in theory is between the natural
and social sciences. This may seem like an obvious difference to some but
there is a strong tradition that argues that social science theory should fol-
low the same apparently logical positivist approach as the natural s­ ciences
in trying to uncover general deductible laws and truths. In 1996 the jour-
nal Social Text published an article by the physicist Alan Sokal entitled
‘Transgressing the Boundaries – Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics
of Quantum Gravity’, which reflected upon recent developments in phys-
ics from the standpoint of postmodern cultural theory. The article was
a hoax that aimed to expose what Sokal and others saw as the nonsense
 What is Theory?  7

paraded by cultural theorists (some of which we cover later on in this

book). The point of the article was to expose some of the differences
between the under­standings and methodologies of the natural and social
sciences by satirizing them. As Weinberg pointed out in a response to
Sokal’s ‘paper’:

There are those ‘postmoderns’ in the humanities who like to surf through
avant garde fields like quantum mechanics or chaos theory to dress up their
own arguments about the fragmentary and random nature of experience.
There are those sociologists, historians, and philosophers who see the laws of
nature as social constructions. There are cultural critics who find the taint of
sexism, racism, colonialism, militarism, or capitalism not only in the practice
of scientific research but even in its conclusions. (Weinberg, 1996, p. 110)

The gap between the natural and social sciences is as broad as ever.
While Weinberg and others attack the relativism of some social science,
social scientists respond with criticisms of the reductionism of natural
scientists. The problem, as with many of these ‘debates’, is that both
sides were talking past each other. The realms of quantum physics and
postmodern philosophy have little to say or contribute to each other.
However, these are extremes. In planning, we deal with both social and
natural sciences. The justi­fication for many early planning controls was
the relationship between physical conditions (e.g. slum housing) and its
social implications (e.g. ill health).
Early sociologists such as Auguste Comte, Émile Durkheim and Max
Weber attempted to put studies of society on a more ‘scientific’ footing.
However, it was the logical positivists typified by the ‘Vienna Circle’ who
argued that if something was not observable then it was not verifiable and
if it was not verifiable then it was metaphysical and meaningless. While
logical positivism as an approach has been largely abandoned it contin-
ues to have an influence upon social sciences through the focus upon
empiricism. The idea of both science and social science being linked by
a search for general laws and causal explanations has in some ways made
social science appear inferior by comparison. For example, there is no
equivalent in the social sciences of a law explaining and predicting the
influ­ence of gravity. While there are still proponents of naturalism (the
view that, with adaptation, the methodologies of the natural sciences are
appropriate for the social sciences), the majority view is that society can-
not be explained in the same way in which we can explain the workings
of gravity; it can only be provisionally under­stood. The social sciences are
8  Planning Theory

also dominated by what appear to be numerous conflicting theories based

on fundamentally different views of the world, for example Marxism and
liberalism. Giddens (1984) argues there will never be any universal laws
in social science because of difficulties with empirical testing and vali-
dation. One problem is separating theory from the society that is being
concep­tualized or theorized. Society has a habit of shifting values, mean-
ing and actions. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to test an idea or
theory of society that has been taken up by society, thereby shifting the
original grounds upon which it could be tested. Another issue concerns
the extent to which our worldview shapes what we see: observing and
measuring various dimensions of class, for example, requires us to believe
that such a phenomenon exists even though this is disputed. Measur-
ing class presupposes that we believe it exists, which is itself a political
position. There is an issue, therefore, of context and distance. The social
sciences can never fully divorce themselves from the subject that is being
studied. Ideas that seem radical and new at one time can be now accepted
as being ordinary and familiar. Social theory, therefore, not only reflects
upon society but can also shape it in a way that natural sciences cannot.
This is sometimes referred to as the difference between an ‘open’ system
(e.g. society) and a ‘closed’ system (e.g. natural laws such as gravity). But
this is not to elevate the natural sciences to a superior position where
science holds a monopoly on truth or reason. It is to say, however, that
science and social science study different mani­festations of reality in dif-
ferent ways. Nor is it to say that there are not issues with scientific theory
and methodology.
In the eighteenth century, the Scottish philosopher David Hume exam-
ined the inductive basis of science. Induction is an approach that examines
the available evidence and uses it as a basis for formulating laws and the-
ories. For example, if I observe 500 white swans I could conclude, on the
basis of induction, that the next swan I see will be white. However,
the 501st swan may well be black, thereby undermining my prediction.
Induction uses past informa­tion as a basis for the future and is the basis
of most scientific research. Generalizations or theories based on induc-
tive reasoning go beyond what is known and observable and as such
can never be ‘true’, or even probably true, and therefore much of sci-
ence is based on conjecture. This situation has come to be known as
‘Hume’s puzzle’. Hume and his eighteenth-century colleagues did not
consider this situation was anything more than an interesting philosoph-
ical point. After all, they were living in an age where Newton’s newly
 What is Theory?  9

discovered laws of motion had opened up much of the natural world to

human study and control and were themselves based on the inductive
approach. These laws ‘worked’, so why ques­tion the approach used to
generate them?
Actually, they did not work in all situations. Following the discov­ery
of quantum mechanics, Einstein’s theory of relativity and the newly
emerging sciences of chaos and complexity, Newton’s laws were shown
to be wrong in some circumstances. While for everyday purposes the
differences between the theories of Newton and Einstein are irrelevant
(Newton’s laws were good enough to take man to the moon and back)
they have been jumped upon by some social scientists as proof that the
natural sciences seek to grasp an objective reality that simply does not
exist. This led Karl Popper and others to conclude that no part of sci-
entific reasoning is above question, particularly if based on inductivism.
Instead of induction Popper developed an account of science based on
fallibility. Popper believed that there was no need for induction beyond
the basic human search for patterns and regularities. But as long as we
are aware that patterns and regularities can be wrong then the puzzle
holds no problems. Good conjectures or theories should therefore be
outlandish and provocative in order to test and falsify current theories.
Falsification rejects the idea that theories are true and instead sees them
as speculative or provisional truths that stand for as long as they are
not disproven. Using the swan example again, a fallible approach would
be to devise a hypothesis ‘all swans are white’. That hypothesis would
be tested through observation and would remain a ‘provisional truth’
until disproven. Using this approach human knowledge could progress
through a series of ever more falsifiable and accurate theories that can
never be proven.
Popper’s ideas have been extremely influential, though they have not
been without their own critics. One of the main problems with falsification
(as with logical positivism) is observation. According to falsificationists,
theory rejection is based on observa­tion. So if observation refutes a theory
then the theory should fall. But, as many writers including P­ opper himself
have realized, obser­vation statements are themselves fallible. Take a look
at Figure 1.1 Do you see a staircase from beneath or from above? It may
not be a theory that is wrong, it may be the observation. In modern phys-
ics much experimentation at the sub-atomic level can only be achieved
through the medium of instruments, making observation itself subject
to the accuracy of human-made forms of measure­ment. Consequently,
10  Planning Theory

Figure 1.1  The problem of perception

Source: based on Chalmers, 1994, p. 24.

according to this view theories cannot be conclusively falsified because

the observation statements that form the basis for falsification may them-
selves prove to be false (Couvalis, 1997, p. 63).
A further problem has been explored by Imre Lakatos who argues that
a theory should not be refuted simply because it is counterintuitive or
falsified. Many theories, as pointed out earlier, are a product of their time.
Both Copernicus and Newton battled to have their theories accepted, as
they were radical departures from contemporary thinking. The problem,
according to Lakatos, is that science will never abandon a theory unless
there is a better one to replace it. So, falsification is not enough. Refuta-
tion on its own appears to leave a vacuum, whereas scientists will actually
continue to use a theory even if it has been falsified until a better explana-
tion emerges.
This is an idea that has been most famously associated with Thomas
Kuhn (1970). Rather than the logical and abstract falsifi­cation view of
Popper, which saw science as a cumulative growth of knowledge, Kuhn
argued that science proceeds on the basis of revolution. Science works
with paradigms or views of reality that encapsulate current knowledge of
 What is Theory?  11

a subject. Once established a paradigm begins to be challenged when

researchers probe its limits. Problems then emerge that cannot be
explained by the paradigm and cannot be resolved until a new paradigm
emerges and the old one is abandoned. Different paradigms will have
very different worldviews, often making them incomparable. A classic
example used by Kuhn to illustrate this concerns what is generally termed
the ‘Copernican Revolution’.
The idea that the earth is at the centre of the universe had first been
advanced by Aristotle in the fourth century BC. This idea dominated sci-
ence and was reinforced by Christian doctrine. However, in the ­sixteenth
century the Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus developed a helio-
centric (sun-centred) theory that addressed some of the less convincing
aspects of the geocentric (earth-centred) approach. The problem was that
Copernicus could not prove some aspects of his theory and it did not
gain much support from the scientific community, who were still locked
in the geocentric paradigm. For over 100 years the ideas of Copernicus
remained a minority paradigm. It took the Italian physicist and astron-
omer Galileo to confirm the Copernican theories through observation.
Galileo observed that the motions of planets and stars changed in the ways
predicted by Copernicus. The scientific estab­lishment were unconvinced
and still wedded to the Aristotelian geocentric view. A more serious chal-
lenge was to come when Galileo’s ideas were denounced as heretical and
he was forced to renounce his theories. The heliocentric view could not
be recon­ciled with the Bible and therefore it was wrong (this decision was
reversed by the Pope in 1992). Galileo’s ideas were to influence Isaac
Newton and others, though it was not until the late seven­teenth ­century
that the heliocentric view of the universe was broadly accepted by
science – over 200 years since Copernicus first advanced it.
Kuhn uses the Copernican example as an illustration of the ways sci-
entific paradigms work. The geocentric and heliocentric views of the
­universe belonged to different worldviews – recourse to ‘evidence’ made
little difference. Again, Kuhn’s ideas have been highly influential not only
in terms of the explanation but also in terms of the criticisms and avenues
he has opened up. There is still a widespread assumption that the scientific
community in general and scientists as individuals are rational beings, that
is, that they will act in a way that will reject or choose theories on the basis
of evidence. As a result of Kuhn’s revolutionary view of scientific progress
attention turned to the subjective or normative aspects of science. This
focus on the subjective has been termed the relative view of science:
12  Planning Theory

Since for the relativist, the criteria for judging the merits of theories will
depend on the values and interests of the individual or community entertaining
them, the distinction between science and non-science will vary accordingly.
(Chalmers, 1994, p. 103)

Such relativism allows for different theories to exist side by side, each
claiming with equal validity that their view is just as correct or legitimate as
the next. This is not only true of, for example, Marxist versus liberal views,
but also of the dominance of science against other areas of knowledge.
Central to this relativist view of science is Paul Feyerabend (1961, 1978,
1981, 1988). Much of Feyerabend’s writings are motivated by a concern
with freedom and in particular the need to question the dominant role
given to science and the way in which it is perceived and presented:

Thus, while an American can now choose the religion he likes, he is still not
permitted to demand that his children learn magic rather than science at
school. There is a separation between state and church, there is no separation
between state and science. (1988, p. 299)

The ongoing debate between evolution and creationism in the USA is

a similar situation of competing worldviews that both appeal to differ-
ent legitimacies. In planning, such relativism is characteris­tic of post-
modernism and postmodern planning (see Chapter 8), though advocacy
(Chapter 7) also argues for a plethora of plans based around multiple
and ­competing viewpoints. In a similar vein, others have also focused
attention on Kuhn’s questioning of the objective nature of scientists
themselves. As Couvalis (1997) points out, scientists often appear to have
been influenced by external factors that have nothing to do with evidence
and more to do with whether a theory should bolster a particular social
group to which they belong. Barnes and Bloor (1982), for example, claim
that scientists always accept theories partly because of factors other than
purely scientific ones. They identify what they term a ‘strong programme’
that, rather like Kuhn’s paradigm, dominates think­ing, methodology,
interpretation and results. So, for example, students who want to pass
exams regurgitate the strong programme and, as science has been given
a dominant position in society, the public accept a ‘strong programme’
as ‘truth’. Barnes and Bloor do not claim that a ‘strong programme’ is
always wrong, but that it can be wrong. Scientists, researchers, students
and society come to accept it as a ‘truth’ or dominant discourse regard­less
of its validity.
 What is Theory?  13

Others, such as Longino (1990), have also persuasively argued that

the ways in which data are formulated and interpreted are also affected
by social values. Any number of theories can be logically consistent with
the same data. So if one theory is chosen over another there must be a
reason for this that has less to do with objective science and more to do
with social factors. While there is a great deal written on this topic (see,
for example, chapters 1 and 2 of Flyvbjerg, 2001 for a good discussion)
there is a final and increasingly influential contribution to this debate
that is worth including. Three sociologists, Bruno Latour, Michel Callon
and John Law initiated what is known as Actor–Network Theory (ANT) as
an approach to understanding the relations between science and society.
We will return to ANT when we discuss post-structuralism in Chapters 8, 9
and 10. Here I want to explore some elements of ANT thinking in relation
to the traditional distinction between the notions of theory and knowl-
edge in the natural and social sciences. ANT’s origins are to be found
in the relationship with the laboratory (science) and the external world,
a relationship opened up by Kuhn. Rather than a focus upon relativism
ANT emphasizes and explores the reliance and co-dependence of science
and society. Building upon the work of Kuhn and Foucault’s approach to
power and knowledge ANT argues that science is not ‘out there’, sepa-
rate from society but is, instead, thoroughly political. Such a view rejects
the distinction between nature and society, a distinction that is premised
upon knowledge providing a mirror on ‘nature’ for ‘society’:

Knowledge was an entity, to be held and used. It was produced by experts in

distinct institutions through processes that ensured objectivity. (Rydin, 2007, p. 52)

Latour and others challenged this understanding, seeing knowledge not

as an object but as embedded in sets of social relations:

The breakdown of this consensus [of the distinction between nature and
society] involved recognising that knowledge is constructed through social
processes and that institutions that generate knowledge will not necessarily
ensure neutrality. (Rydin, 2007, p. 52)

Latour’s exploration of Louis Pasteur’s successful search for a treatment

for anthrax in nineteenth-century France is held up as an example of how
the power and influence of science requires networks and allies beyond
the laboratory (Latour, 1987). Latour begins his analysis by asking
how Pasteur became such a great and influential scientist. The answer,
14  Planning Theory

according to Latour, is through the creation of a network of actors and

resources that spanned scientific and non-scientific locations, persuad-
ing and corralling different actors necessary for the successful roll-out
of a widespread vaccination programme. The distinction between the
laboratory and wider society was deliberately blurred by Pasteur through
the relocation of the laboratory to a farm and the extension of labora-
tory techniques to farming, e.g. disinfection, record keeping, etc., to the
point where ‘no one can say where the laboratory is and where society is’
(Latour, 1987, p. 154). Once established and successful Pasteur extended
this approach, transforming farming practices across France and chang-
ing society. Latour’s analysis points to the importance of actors and
networks in the consensus building and stabilizing process of scien-
tific influence. As well as the focus upon the importance of actors and
­networks Latour also criticizes the implications of such an analysis upon
traditional dualisms such as the distinction between society, structure and
agency. Broadly speaking (and I return to this point later in this chapter)
Latour and others have questioned notions of the social that exclude or
downplay non-human elements such as CO2, water or the ozone layer.
The argument is that such phenomena are not ‘non-social’ but actively
help create the social through their influence upon society: we should
not distinguish or separate an ‘active social world’ from a ‘passive
­natural-material world’ of things, objects and artefacts. Latour’s ­analysis
­highlighted how the anthrax bacteria was far from separate from the
social but actively shaped it through the changes required to eradicate it
as pursued by Pasteur.
The impact of ANT has been far reaching and goes far beyond the rela-
tionships between science and society. However, the point here concerns
how science colonizes sites beyond the laboratory, creating networks of
actors (human and, controversially, non-human) and flows of ‘power’ back
to the scientist and science (to return to Latour’s original question of how
Pasteur became such an influential scientist). Although many of these rel-
ativist and social constructivist views of science have been questioned and
are by no means uncritically accepted they are important in understand-
ing planning theory generally and much of the current writing on the
subject. The main points to highlight are that, first, the natural sciences
are not necessarily superior to the social sciences in terms of ­knowledge
accumulation. This is not to say that a broad social constructivist view
changes the nature of things themselves. The impact of gravity does not
vary depend­ing upon your culture, for example, nor does whether we call
 What is Theory?  15

Pluto a planet or dwarf planet change the nature of that mass in an ellip-
tical orbit around the sun. Rather than being anti-­scientific, such views
emphasize and highlight the social dimension of theories and method-
ologies and how knowledge is closely related to power. Going back to the
Pluto issue one can see that the heated debate on its classification within
astronomy had real implications if funding for research was available to
scientists to study planets rather than dwarf planets. This is turn could in
turn affect discoveries and the nature of knowledge itself.
Second, the critique of natural science is equally applicable to the
social sciences and helps us understand why we find a multitude of com-
peting theories and views of planning. In particular, it has relevance to
the grey areas between the two and, specifically, for fields such as plan-
ning, which draw upon approaches and knowledge claims from both
the natural and social sciences. The direct relevance for such views is
clear if one thinks of planners (as many themselves do) as ‘experts’ in a
particular field or, as John Law has put it, as ‘heterogenous engineers’
(Law, 1987) who attempt to bring together actors and elements regularly
confined to different fields, e.g. ‘the technical’, ‘the social’, ‘the natu-
ral’, ‘the economic’ and ‘the political’, assembling relations and defining
what are and are not political issues by deciding what constitutes ques-
tions of technical skill (see Metzger et al., 2014, pp. 16–18). For Rydin,
ANT raises fundamental questions of who decides what counts as knowl-
edge in planning. Rather than knowledge in the singular, planning is
replete with multiple knowledges representing multiple realities. There
is no recourse to facts to reveal an objective truth. Instead one needs to
ask why is some knowledge privileged over others and who decides what
counts as knowledge?
Finally, the relationship between power and knowledge as exercised
through discursive practices is a key theme of planning theory and under-
standing. Foucault’s approach to power as a normalizing force that works
through discourses and practices framing the everyday experiences of
people has helped focus attention in planning upon the assemblages of
power in the forms of knowledge and space (see Chapters 8, 9 and 10).

Unpacking ‘theory’

After identifying and questioning the distinction between theory in the

social and natural sciences, as well as problematizing the idea of theo-
ry in both, we can now turn to some other questions set out earlier: for
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Again, he was with the Russians at Wangcheng before the port was
closed, and got the story of the Yalu fight. This through John Milner,
the American consul at Wangcheng, in whom he made a staunch
and valued friend, regretting that it was necessary to do so under the
name of “A. V. Weed.” Milner was an old World-News editor, a man
of stirring energy, and strong in the graces of the Russians at his
post. He was ardent to serve all American interests, and the World-
News in particular. He presented Routledge to General Borodoffsky,
who told the story of the battle; and there was a fine touch in the fact
that the general wept as he related the Russian defeat. The story
proved more complete and accurate than any which the
correspondents with Kuroki managed to get through the Japanese
censor. Kuroki’s great losses by drowning were for the first time
brought out. Borodoffsky declared with tears that the future of the
war must not be judged by this battle, as the Russian defeat was due
entirely to an error of judgment. Routledge was leaving Wangcheng
with the story when two British correspondents arrived. This
prevented his return. The Borodoffsky story was filed in
Shanhaikwan.
In a sea-going junk, the third week of May, Routledge crossed the
Liaotung Gulf, hoping to get into Port Arthur, which was not yet
invested. Instead, he stumbled onto the Nanshan story. From the
northern promontory of Kinchow he caught a big and valuable
conception of this literatesque engagement of the land and sea
forces, and returned with it to Chifu for filing.
Back to lower Liaotung again, in early June. In spite of every
precaution, one of Togo’s gunboats ran him down in Society Bay,
and he was sent ashore under a guard. Great luck served him,
inasmuch as there were no English with the Japanese at this place,
Pulatien, where he was held for ten days, while the officers debated
upon his credentials. It was here that Routledge encountered the
prettiest feature-story of the war—the duel of Watanabe and Major
Volbars, a prisoner from Nanshan. The Japanese escorted him to his
junk at last, and he put off with orders from one of Togo’s ensigns to
return no more to Kwantung waters. The battle of Telissu was fought
on this day at sea, and he missed it entirely. With English now in
Wangcheng and Chifu, Routledge ordered his Chinese to sail north,
and to put him ashore at Yuenchen, a little port twenty miles to the
west of the Liao’s mouth.
It was only by a squeak that the order was carried out. That was a
night of furies on the yellow gulf. Bent in the hold, thigh-deep in
tossing water, Routledge recalled the hovel in Rydamphur with a
sorry smile. It did not seem at that moment that the storm would ever
permit him to be maimed on land—or a woman to come to him. The
old craft was beaten about under bare poles in a roaring black that
seemed to drop from chaos. The Chinese fought for life, but the gray
of death-fear was upon them. Bruised, almost strangled, Routledge
crouched in the musty hold, until his mind fell at last into a strange
abstraction, from which he aroused after an unknown time. His
physical weariness was extreme, but it did not seem possible that he
could have slept, standing in black, foaming water, and with a
demoniacal gale screeching outside. Yet certainly something had
gone from him and had taken his consciousness, or the better part of
it.... It was this night that Noreen Cardinegh had entered at dusk her
little house in Minimasacuma-cho and met by the easel the visible
thought-form of her lover.
Day broke with the wind lulled, and the old craft riding monster seas,
her poles still to the sky. The daylight sail brought him to Yuenchen;
from whence he made his way northward by land to Pingyang. This
town was but an hour’s saddle to the east of the railroad and
telegraph at Koupangtze—twenty miles west of the junction of the
Taitse and the Liao river, and fifty miles west of Liaoyang. Here he
established headquarters completely out of the white man’s world,
rested and wrote mail stories for several weeks. Toward the end of
July, he set out on a ten days’ saddle trip toward Liaoyang, with the
idea of becoming familiar with the topography of the country, in
preparation for the battle, already in sight. It was on this trip that he
was hailed one afternoon by an American, named Butzel. This young
man was sitting on the aft-gunnel of a river-junk, rolling a cigarette,
when Routledge turned his horse upon the Taitse river-road, four or
five miles to the east of the Liao. Routledge would have avoided the
meeting had he been given a chance, but Butzel gaily ordered his
Chinese to put ashore. The voice was that of a man from the Middle
States—and Routledge filled with yearning to take a white hand. His
only friend since he had left Rawder in India was Consul Milner at
Wangcheng.
Butzel had journeyed thus deep into the elder world—as natural an
explorer as ever left behind his nerves and his saving portion of fear.
He hadn’t any particular credentials, he said, and hadn’t played the
newspaper game very strongly up to now. The Japanese had
refused to permit him to go out with any of the armies; and he had
tried to get into Port Arthur with a junk, but Togo had driven him off.
He had very little money, and was tackling China to get to the
Russian lines. It was his idea for the Russians to capture him, and,
incidentally, to show him how they could defend Liaoyang. In a word,
he was eluding Japan, bluffing his way through the interior of China,
and about to enforce certain hospitality from the Russians. A great
soul—in this little man, Butzel.
Routledge delighted in him, but feared for his life. He himself was
playing a similar lone-hand, but he carried Red-beard insignia,
purchased at a big price; and when he had ventured into a river or
sea-junk, he had taken pains to arrange that his receipt for a certain
extortion was hung high on the foremast. Thus was he ever
approved by the fascinating brotherhood of junk pirates. These were
details entirely above the Butzel purse and inclination. The two men
parted in fine spirit after an hour, the adventurer urging his Chinese
up the Taitse toward the Russian lines. He was not so poor as he
had been, and he yelled back joyously to Routledge that there wasn’t
enough trails in this little piker of a planet to keep them from meeting
again.
His words proved true. Poor Butzel rode back in state that afternoon,
his head fallen against the tiller and a bullet hole in his breast. Even
his clothing had been taken. The junk was empty except for the
body. With a heavy heart, Routledge attended to the burial and
marked the spot. That night he rode to Koupangtze, and, by paying
the charges, succeeded in arranging for a brief message to be
cabled to the World-News; also a telegram to the American consul at
Shanghai.
So much is merely a suggestion of the work that told for his paper
that summer. For weeks at a time he was in the saddle, or junking it
by sea and river. Except when driven to the telegraph, he avoided
every port town and every main-travelled road. He was lean, light but
prodigiously strong. A trencherman of ordinary valor would have
dragged out a hateful existence of semi-starvation upon the rations
that sufficed for Routledge; and none but a man in whom a giant’s
strength was concentrated could have followed his travels. The old
Manchurian trails burned under his ponies; and, queerly enough, he
never ruined a mount. He had left Shanghai on the first of February,
ill from confinement, the crowds, and his long sojourn in the great
heat of India. The hard physical life at sea in the Liao gulf and afield
in Manchuria, and, possibly more than anything, his life apart from
the English, restored him to a health of the finest and toughest
texture.
China challenged him. He never could feel the tenderness of regard
for the Yellow Empire that India inspired, but it held an almost equal
fascination. China dwelt in a duller, more alien light to his eyes; the
people were more complicated, less placable and lovable, than
Hindus, but the same mysterious stillness, the same dust of ages, he
found in both interiors; and in both peoples the same imperturbable
patience and unfathomable capacity to suffer and be silent.
Routledge moved in towns almost as unknown to the world as the
Martian surfaces; learned enough of the confusion of tongues to
procure necessities; supplied himself with documents, bearing the
seals of certain dark fraternities, which appeared to pass him from
place to place without harm: and, with a luck that balanced the
handicap of an outcast, and an energy, mental and physical, utterly
impossible to a man with peace in his heart, he pushed through, up
to Liaoyang, an almost incredible season’s work.
More and more the thought was borne upon him during July and
August that the coming big battle would bring to him a change of
fortune—if only a change from one desolation to another. He felt that
his war-service was nearing its end. He did not believe that Liaoyang
was to end the war, but he thought it would close the campaign for
the year; and he planned to conclude his own campaign with a vivid
intimate portrait of the battle. Meanwhile he hung afar from the
Russian and Japanese lines, and little Pingyang had a fire lit for him
and a table spread when he rode in from his reconnoissance.
Late in August, when the artillery began, Routledge crossed to the
south bank of the Taitse with a pair of good horses, and left them
about two miles to the west of the city with a Pingyang servant who
had proven trustworthy. On the dawn of the thirtieth he made a wide
detour behind Oku, nearly to Nodzu’s lines, and watched the battle
from Sha peak—one of the highest points of the range. He had
studied Liaoyang long through the intricate Chinese maps; and as
the heights had cleared the fighting-field for Bingley, so now did
Routledge grasp the topography from his eyrie during that first day of
the real battle. Similarly also, he hit upon Kuroki’s flank movement as
the likeliest strategy of the Japanese aggression, and he came to
regard it as a fact before starting for the free cable at Wangcheng
the following night.
This day netted nothing in so far as the real battle color was
considered. That night he closed up on Oku’s rear, crossing a big
valley and climbing a lesser range. Daylight found him in a densely
thicketed slope overlooking the city and the Japanese command. In
that hot red dawn, he beheld the bivouac of the Islanders—a
crowded valley stretching away miles to the east in the fast lifting
gloom; leagues of stirring men, the faint smell of wood-smoke and
trampled turf, the gray, silent city over the reddened hills, the slaty
coil of the river behind.
The mighty spectacle gripped the heart of the watcher; and there
came to him, with an awful but thrilling intensity, the whole story of
the years which had prepared this amphitheatre for blood on this
sweet last summer day.... Oppression in Tyrone; treachery in India;
the Anglo-Japanese alliance; the Russo-Japanese war—a logical
line of cause and effect running true as destiny, straight as a
sunbeam through all these huge and scattered events—holding all
Asia in the palm of history! Farther back, to the Kabul massacre, was
to be traced the red history of this day—the mad British colonel;
Shubar Khan!... And what did the future hold? If Russia called the
French and Germans to her aid, England, by treaty, was called to the
aid of Japan. America might be drawn by the needs of England, or
for the protection of her softening cluster of Philippine grapes.
Famine in a Tyrone town; a leak in one Tyrone patriot’s brain—and a
world-war!...
The click of a rifle jerked Routledge out of his musings. A Japanese
lieutenant and a non-commissioned officer were standing twenty
paces away. The enlisted man had him covered.
 TWENTY-SECOND CHAPTER
ROUTLEDGE STRIKES A CONTRAST BETWEEN
THE JAPANESE EMPEROR AND THE JAPANESE
FIGHTING-MAN, WHILE OKU CHARGES INTO A
BLIZZARD OF STEEL

Queerly enough, Routledge’s first thought was that the moment of

the wound had come, but this was out of the question. These men
would not fire at him. They would send him to the rear under a
guard; or, worse, escort him to the command where the other
correspondents were held. The Englishmen would then suggest to
the Japanese that their captive had once proved a traitor to England,
and that it would be well to look deep into his present business, lest
he repeat.... He would miss the battle, be detained for a Russian spy
—and Noreen would hear.
Routledge was ordered to approach, and obeyed, swallowing
Failure. The lieutenant spoke English, but disdained to look at
proffered credentials. The sergeant gripped Routledge’s arm, and his
superior led the way down the slope through the lines of troops.
Many of the little soldiers of Oku were eating rice and drinking tea
from bowls; some were bathing their bodies, others cleansing their
teeth with great zeal, using soaps and pointed sticks. These meant
to be gathered unto their fathers that day with clean mouths. Down
and forward, the American was led, no word being spoken until they
were in the midst of Oku’s front. Here was the field headquarters of
some high officer of the left wing. Routledge breathed a hope that
action would be joined before he was ordered back. The unknown
commander stood in the centre of a thick protecting cordon of men.
Evidently he was too rushed at present to attend the case of the
detained civilian. Aides and orderlies spurred out with dispatches,
and others riding in took their places.
Three or four minutes had passed when certain commands went
ripping down the unformed lines and action was indeed joined. The
lieutenant was brushed away in the torrent of infantry which just now
swept over them, but the sergeant held grimly to his prisoner’s arm.
Oku had ordered the first charge of the day. This was the reeking red
splash on the map of all the world.
The soldiers leaped over Routledge and his captor. Shielding his
head from their boots and rifle-butts, the American looked deep into
the sweating brown faces that rushed past—red, squinting eyes,
upper lips twisted with a fury they could not have explained, the
snarling muscles drawn tight—and not a zephyr of fear in the
command! Some of the men still had their eating-sticks and bowls
and paper napkins. One stuffed the contents of a dish of rice into his
mouth as he ran—an eight-pound rifle clapped between his elbow
and ribs.
The correspondent warmed to the human atoms hurtling by and to
the sergeant who stuck so fast to his arm. There was something
tremendous in the delusion of these poor pawns who were doing
their cruel work so well. There was an infernal majesty in the huge
gamble for the old gray walls of Liaoyang on this gorgeous
morning.... War is immense and final—for the big devil-clutched
souls who make it—an achievement, indeed, to gather and energize
and hurl this great force against an enemy, but what a rotten
imposition upon the poor little obscure men who fight, not a tithe the
richer if they take all Asia! So the thoughts of Routledge surged. Into
the havoc, from time to time, he threw a sentence, wrung from the
depths of his understanding:
“... Once a father threw his children out of the sleigh to hold back a
wolf-pack—as he whipped his horse to the village. Would you call
such a man ‘father’?... Yet you call a nation ‘fatherland’ that hurls you
now to the wolves!... Oh, ye of mighty faith!... Pawns—poor pawns—
of plague, famine, war around the world—God, tell us why the many
are consumed to ashes at the pleasure of the few!... Oh, glorious
Patriotism—what sins are committed in thy name!”
The great system of Russian fortifications now opened fire upon the
Japanese charge. Men were falling. The bulk of the infantry
avalanche had passed, and smoke was crowding out the distances.
The long p-n-n-n-g of the high bullets, and the instant b-zrp of the
close ones, were stimulus for that fast, clear thinking which so often
comes close to death. Routledge’s brain seemed to hold itself aloof
from his body, the better to grasp and synthesize the startling actions
of the present.
The smoke blurred all but a finger-bone of the valley; yet from that
part he could reconstruct the whole horrid skeleton of a Twentieth-
century crime.... The brown line of Japanese rolled up against the
first Russian trench. Routledge thought of toy soldiers, heads bent
forward, legs working, and guns of papier maché in bayonet charge.
The works wore a white ruff of smoke, and its lace was swept by
stray winds down over the fallen....
The grip upon his arm relaxed. For a moment Routledge thought he
was hit, when the blood rushed down the veins of his arm where the
tightened fingers had been. He was free—and at what a cost! The
little sergeant was down—his legs wriggling and beating against the
American’s, the “red badge of courage” widening on his breast.
Routledge bent over him and looked long into the dying face—
forgetting the world and the war, forgetting all but the spirit behind
the hour.
The face was brown, oriental. In the corner of the mouth was a flake
of rice, and the coarse-grained dust of Manchuria was over all. The
eyes were turned back, and the ears were bad. Evolution was young
in the shape of the head and the cut of those ears—small, thick,
close to the skull, criminal ears. But the mouth was beautiful! It was
carved as if some God had done it—and on a fine morning when joy
was abroad in the world—and the perfection of the human mouth
was the theme of the day.
Routledge had not even water to give, but he said, “Hello.”
Deep understanding came to him from the dying face. He saw what
it meant to this little soldier to go out for his Emperor—saw the faith
and pity of it all. It was the smiling face of a man who comes home
after years of travail to the marvel of a loved woman’s arms.
“Sayonara!” the fine lips muttered. One of the sweetest and saddest
words of human speech—this Japanese farewell.
“Sayonara!” Routledge repeated.... The body jerked itself out, but the
smile remained. The whole story of the Japanese conquest stirred in
Routledge’s brain. It was all in the smile upon the face of the guard—
all in that one perishable portrait of joy.
Routledge had once seen the Emperor for whom this soldier died
with a smile. Though it was forenoon, he had been forced to put on
evening-clothes for the Presence. Mutsuhito came back to his mind
as he bent over the fresh corpse....
“He has no such mouth as yours, little sergeant,” he said in a swift,
strange fashion. “His head is not so good as your hard, bad head,
though his ears are better. He was dazed with champagne, as you
have never been. He had the look of an epileptic, and they had to
bring him a red-blooded woman of the people to get a son from him
—and that son a defective!... A soft, inbred pulp of a man, without
strength of will or hand or brain, and God only knows what rudiment
of a soul—such is the Lord of Ten Thousand Years, whom you die
for with a smile. You are greater than the Empire you serve, little
sergeant—greater than the Emperor you die for; since he is not even
a clean abstraction.... God pity you—God pity you all!”
The sun sent streamers into the white smoke drapery upon the
Russian bank. The Island Empire men were thrashing against it.
They met with their breasts the fire that spurted continuously from
the ledges. One man of a Japanese company lived to gain the top of
the trench. He was skewered on Russian bayonets and shaken
down among his writhing fellow-soldiers, as the wing of a chicken is
served upon a waiting plate. Running, crawling, Routledge made his
way down and forward.
The Japanese hope lives high above the loss of companies. It was a
glad morning for the Island Empire men, a bright task they were
given to do. Other companies, full quota, were shot forward to tread
upon the dead and beat themselves to death against the
entrenchment. A third torrent was rolled against the Russians before
the second had suffered a complete blood-letting.... Routledge saw
one five-foot demon wielding his rifle-butt upon the rim of the trench,
in the midst of gray Russian giants. For an instant he was a human
tornado, filled with the idea to kill—that Brownie—then he was
sucked down and stilled. Routledge wondered if they completely
wiped out the little man’s smile at the last.
He was ill from the butchery, and his mind was prone to grope away
from the bleeding heart of things; still, he missed little of the great
tragedy which unfolded in the smoke. And always Oku, unparalleled
profligate of men, coiled up his companies and sprung them against
a position which Napoleon would have called impregnable—Oku,
whose voice was quiet as a mystic’s prayer. The thought came to
Routledge that the women of America would tear down the capitol at
Washington with their hands, if the walls contained a monster who
had spent the blood of their sons and lovers as Oku was doing now.
A new tumult in the air! It was like an instant horrid crash of drums in
the midst of a violin solo. Artillery now roared down upon Oyama’s
left wing.... The wildest dream of hell was on. Routledge, crawling
westward through the pit of fire, saw a platoon of infantry smashed
as a cue-ball shatters a fifteen block in pool.... Westward under the
Russian guns, he crawled through the sun-shot, smoke-charged
shambles, miraculously continuing alive in that thick, steady,
annihilating blizzard of steel—his brain desperate with the rush of
images and the shock of sounds. Over a blood-wet turf he crawled,
among the quivering parts of men....
Silence. Oku stopped to breathe and pick up the fragments.... From
far up on the Russian works—it was like the celestial singing in the
ears of the dying—began a distant, thrilling music. Some regiment or
brigade, swinging into the intrenchments to relieve a weary
command, had burst into song.... Once before Routledge had caught
a touch of this enchantment, during the Boxer Rebellion. He had
never been able to forget Jerry Cardinegh’s telling of the Russian
battle-hymns at Plevna.... Great emotions bowed him now. Another
terrace of defense caught up the song, and the winds that cleared
the reeking valley of smoke carried along the vibrant inspiration.
Every Russian heart gripped the grand contagion. From terrace to
terrace, from trench to trench, from pit to emplacement, that glorious
thunder stalked, a company, a battery, a brigade, at a stride. Each
voice was a raw, dust-bitten shout—the whole a majestic harmony,
from the cannon-meat of Liaoyang! Sons of the North, gray, sodden,
sorrow-stunted men of pent misery and unlit souls—Finlander,
Siberian, Caspian, Caucasian—hurling forth their heart-hunger in a
tumult of song that shook the continent. The spirit of All the Russias
giving tongue—the tragedy of Poland, the clank of chains, the
mockery of palaces, the iron pressure of frost, the wail of the wolf-
pack on frozen tundras, the cry of the crushed, the blind groping of
the human to God—it was all in that rhythmic roar, all the dreadful
annals of a decadent people.
As it was born, so it died,—that music,—from terrace to terrace, the
last wavering chant from out the city walls. The little Japanese made
no answer. Routledge could not help but see the mark of the beast in
contrast. It wasn’t the Russians that bothered Oku, but the Russian
position. Kuroki would pull them out of that.... Song or steel, they
would take Liaoyang. They prepared to charge again.

In the disorder of the next charge Routledge crossed the railroad and
passed out of the Japanese lines. Late afternoon, as he hurried
westward for his horses, he met the eyes of Bingley. He was not
given a chance to pass another way. The race for the cable was on.
 TWENTY-THIRD CHAPTER
ROUTLEDGE ENCOUNTERS THE “HORSE-
KILLER” ON THE FIELD OF LIAOYANG, AND
THEY RACE FOR THE UNCENSORED CABLE AT
SHANHAIKWAN

To each man the intention of the other was clear as the purpose of a
fire-department’s run. One of them would file the first uncensored
story of the great battle. Bingley had given up his chance to follow
the Japanese army, and had set his stony face to freedom for this
end—and England could not have horsed a man more unwhippable.
Routledge, striding into the sunset, toward the place he had left his
mounts, discovered with a smile that his pace was quickening,
quickening. The character of the man just passed was an inspiration
to rivalry. Moreover, from a newspaper standpoint, the issue at hand
was big among dreams. The Great God, News, is a marvellous
master. Would England or America be first to connect with
Manchuria by wire? World-News or Thames? If New York beat
London, Dartmore would trace the story.... Dartmore had been a
savage. Bingley had been a savage.
Routledge laughed aloud. He had long since put away any
resentment toward either of these men, but there was vim, and glow,
in getting into the struggle again. He felt that he had earned his entry
to this race. He had counted upon taking the chances of discovery.
Already Bingley had seen him, and the word would go back; but the
result of it would require time. He had long planned to close his own
campaign for the year, even if the Japanese pushed on to Mukden.
He would go deeper, past following, into China—even to the Leper
Valley.
It was a momentous incident to Routledge—this meeting with the
“Horse-killer.” The quick, startled, sullen look on the face of Bingley
—not a flicker of a smile, not even a scornful smile, to answer his
own—had meant that Cardinegh, dead or alive, had not told.
Bingley found the highway two miles west of the railroad, and
spurred south in the darkness at the rate of about seven miles an
hour. He meant to do six or seven hours of this before resting his
mount.... Between twelve and one in the morning—and at most
twenty miles to go! If there was anything left in his horse, after an
hour’s rest, so much the better. Otherwise he could do it on foot,
crossing the river above Fengmarong by six in the morning. This
would leave two hours for the last two or three miles into
Wangcheng. As for the other, without a mount, Bingley did not
concede it to be within human possibility for him to reach the
Chinese Eastern at any point to-morrow morning. Evidently
Routledge had not planned to get away so soon. It would take
eighteen hours at least to reach Wangcheng by the river, and
Routledge, aiming westward, seemed to have this route in view....
With all his conjecturing, Bingley could find no peace of mind. Even if
Routledge had not planned to reach travelled-lines to-morrow, would
not the sight of a rival, with his speed signals out and whistling for
right of way, stir him to competition? Such was his respect for the
man who had passed on, that Bingley could not find serenity in
judging the actions and acumen of Routledge by ordinary weights
and measures.
Any other British correspondent would have hailed the outcast with
the old welcome, notwithstanding the race-challenge which his
appearance involved. On the morning he left Tokyo, five months
before, Bingley had also promised Miss Cardinegh to carry the news
of her father’s confession and death to Routledge, if he should be
the first to find him. It did not occur to Bingley now, isolated as he
had been so long, that this was the first time Routledge had been
seen. Moreover, in their last meeting, at the Army and Navy ball,
there had been a brief but bitter passage of words. Bingley was not
the man to make an overture when there was a chance of its being
repelled. Finally, the sudden discovery of a trained man, with
carnage behind and the cable ahead, was a juggernaut which
crushed the life from every other thought in his brain.
Routledge found his horses in excellent condition. The Chinese
whom he had brought from Pingyang had proved faithful before, but
with all the natives, not alone the banditti and river-thieves,
emboldened by the war, the safe holding of his property was a joy
indeed. At seven in the evening, the sky black with gathering storm,
he left his servant, rich in taels and blessings, and turned westward
along the Taitse river-road. This was neither the best nor the shortest
way, but Routledge preferred to be impeded by ruts, even by
chasms, than by Japanese sentries. With Bingley’s full panoply of
credentials it would have been different.
Sixty-five miles to ride, a river to cross, an audience with Consul
Milner, a train to catch, to say nothing of enforced delays by the
possible interest of the Japanese in his movements—all in fourteen
hours.
As Bingley conjectured, the chance meeting had hastened the plan
of Routledge. He had intended to reach Wangcheng the following
day, but by no means in time for the morning train; in fact, he had
determined to tarry at the American consulate until the decision from
the battle should come in. Wangcheng had changed hands since his
last call at the port, but he counted on the wise and winning
American to be as finely appreciated by the Japanese as he had
been by the Russians. Milner would get the returns from the battle
almost as soon as the Japanese commander at the base. The one
word victory or defeat, and a line covering the incidental strategic
cause, was all that Routledge needed for a startling story. He had
mastered the field, and Oku had supplied a rainbow of pigments.
Bingley, having left the field, would not loiter on the road to the cable,
nor would he halt before reaching an uncensored cable—therefore
Shanhaikwan to-morrow night! Routledge did not care to accept
second place, if hard-riding would win first. He faced the longer
journey, and also set apart an hour before train-time for an interview
with the Consul. It was eminently plain to him that this day had
marked the crisis of the great battle, even if it had not already ended
with nightfall. The unparalleled fury of Oku’s assaults was significant
to this effect. To-morrow would doubtless bring the verdict; and all
day to-morrow he would be on train to Shanhaikwan, in touch with
Milner by wire at every station. Even if he reached the cable with the
battle still raging, he could file the story of the great conflict, as it was
synthesized in one man’s brain—up to the point of the historic last
sentence.... Even as he rode, the lines and sentences fused in his
mind, a colorful, dashing, galvanic conception that burned for
expression.
On and on, hours and miles; cloud-bursts and flashes of lightning to
show the trail ahead—until he came to doubt his watch, even the
dawn of a new day, in the pressure of the illusion formed of dragging
hours and darkened distances.
The rains helped to keep his mounts fresh. Every two hours he
changed. The beasts had been long together, and either led with a
slackened thong. He ran them very little, and it was after midnight
before he dulled the fine edge of their fettle. They were tough, low-
geared Tartar beasts, heavy-breasted, short in the pasterns, and
quartered like hunters—built for rough trails and rough wear.
Routledge slapped and praised them, riding light. It would take more
than one gruelling night under such a horseman to break their
hearts.
Two hours after midnight the rain ceased, and the wrung clouds
parted for the moon. The hill country was passed. Routledge moved
swiftly along the river-flats. It was the second night he had not slept,
and his fatigue was no trifle, but he was drilled to endure. It was not
in him to make a strongly reckonable matter out of muscular stiffness
and cuticle abrasions. True, rain softens the glaze of a saddle, and
long riding on the sticky leather tears the limbs, but Routledge had a
body that would obey so long as consciousness lasted. He used it
that night.
Five-thirty in the morning; daylight; sixty miles put behind. Ahead far
in the new day he discerned the Japanese outposts of Fengmarong;
and on the right hand was the big, mottled Liao, swollen with flood. If
he were to be detained by the Japanese, he preferred it to be on the
opposite bank—the Wangcheng side. Routledge rode up to the ferry-
scow and called for service. Yellow babies were playing like
cinnamon-cubs on the shore; two women were cooking rice and fish;
two men were asleep in the sail-tackle. These he aroused. They
helped him with the horses, half-lifting the weary, trembling beasts
aboard. Cups of tea; rice with black dressing, as the scow made the
opposite landing at a forty-five degree angle! A quick and safe
crossing; and two hours for the Japanese lines, the American
Consul, and the Chinese Eastern!... A distant call through the
morning light! Bingley, horseless, imperiously demands the return of
the craft to the Fengmorang bank.
Routledge had hoped to be missed by the other, at least until train-
time. He smiled at the compelling incidents of the race thus far, and
at the surpassing prospects—even though he chilled at the thought
that the Japanese in Wangcheng would have big excuse to detain
him if Bingley intimated that his rival had once betrayed England to
the Russian spies on the Indian border. Consul Milner would sweat,
indeed, to free him against that....
Yet Routledge had a feeling that he would win against Bingley. Work
had always favored him. So far he had borne out the prophecy that
he would not be wounded in battle, in a manner past astonishment. It
was no less than a miracle—his escape from the firing of both
armies at Liaoyang. Often during the night-ride he had thought of the
wound that was to come to him—thought with a chill of dread of the
lawless country he passed through. Now, with Wangcheng ahead,
and in touch with the safe-lines of foreign-travel—the chance
seemed minimized once more. There must be significance in this....
He looked back and saw the Chinese beating up against the river to
the Fengmarong landing, where Bingley waited, doubtless frothing
his curb.
At the edge of the town Routledge was arrested by a five-foot
Japanese sentry, and was locked with his world tidings in a garrison,
lately Russian, which overlooked Wangcheng’s little square. He
wrote “A. V. Weed” on a slip of paper and asked to have it taken to
Consul Milner; then sat down by the barred window to watch the
Consulate across the Square. It was now seven o’clock. The train
left in an hour, and the station was a mile away. Minutes dragged by.
An enlivening spectacle from the window. The “Horse-killer” is being
borne across the Square under a Japanese guard! The little sentries
at the edge of town have been busy, this sweet-smelling morning
after the rain! Even at the distance, Routledge perceives that the
Englishman’s face is warmed with a lust for murder, and he hears
the Englishman’s voice demanding his Consul. Bingley is borne into
the garrison, and his voice and step are heard throughout the halls.
The voice continues—as he is locked in the apartment next to
Routledge’s.
Fifteen dreadful minutes. Bingley is a noisy, unlovely devil in the next
room, beating against his bars. Routledge remembers what Hans
Breittmann said of the caged orang-outang: “There is too much ego
in his cosmos.” The “Horse-killer” does not know that his rival is so
near—as he cries unto his heaven of martial law, for artillery to shoot
his way out of this town of beastly, pig-headed Japanese coolies!... A
Consul appears in the Square. It is not the natty Milner, but an
elderly Briton, with a cane and a presence, who just now asks to be
shown to Mr. Bingley.... The two talk softly for several minutes—a
harsh interval for Routledge.
“I shall do what I can as promptly as possible, Mr. Bingley—trust
me,” concludes the Consul, and his cane sounds upon the flags
once more—diminuendo.
“Remember, I must be on my way at once,” the “Horse-killer” shouts
after him.
Seven-twenty. Where was Milner?... Routledge wondered bitterly if
the Gods of War had turned their faces from him at last. A low laugh
from Bingley. Milner was crossing the Square hastily, but did not
approach the garrison—instead was admitted to the big building
occupied by the Japanese headquarters.
“God, I’d hate to have to depend upon an American Consul at a time
like this,” is heard from the “Horse-killer.”
Routledge’s nerve was taxed to smile at this.... Seven-thirty. Consul
Milner reappears in the Square, this time followed by two Japanese
officers of rank.... Routledge’s door is unlocked, and he is called out
into the hall.
“This is the gentleman—and I’ll vouch for him.” Milner observes,
holding out his hand to Routledge. “Weed, my boy, how are you?
Missed the train last night at Yopanga, I suppose, and came down
the river. Didn’t you know we’re a closed port down here?”
“Yes, but I knew you were here, Consul. The battle’s on at Liaoyang,
I understand.”
The eyes of the men managed to meet. The Japanese officers
bowed politely, and the two Americans left the garrison.... Bingley’s
voice is loudly upraised. The Japanese officers politely inform him
that the order for his release has not yet reached them.
“Milner,” said Routledge, “would it complicate matters if I fell upon
your neck and wept?”
“Wait till we catch the train, Weed. That’s what you want, isn’t it?” the
Consul whispered.
“Badly.”
“So I concluded when I got the slip from you. That’s why I went to
headquarters to fix things before coming here—saved a few minutes.
Also I told my Chino to get up the carriage. It’ll be ready.... Our
British friend will have to get his business transacted at once or he
won’t get off for Shanhaikwan this morning.... Great God, Weed, did
you get the battle—any of it?”
“I was with the left wing all day yesterday, Consul—it seems like a
month ago. Oku was beating his brains out against the Russian
intrenchments.”
They were crossing the Square. Bingley’s voice reached them: “Oh, I
say, American Consul, prod up my man a bit—won’t you?”
The agonized face behind the bars took the edge off his own
success to Routledge. He knew what these moments meant to the
“Horse-killer.”
“Unfortunately, I’m not on speaking terms with the British Consul,”
Milner observed lightly to Routledge, as they hurried to the carriage.
“I take it that Kuroki has crossed the Taitse—what have you heard?”
Routledge inquired quickly.
“Just that much,” Milner replied. “The Japanese here say that Oyama
will enter the city to-day. Kuroki pontooned the river two days ago.
What you saw was the terrific effort of the Japanese to hold the bulk
of the Russian army in the city and below while Kuroki flanked.”
“Exactly. I’m doing the story on those lines. I’ll be in Shanhaikwan to-
night. You’ll get the decision to-day probably—wire me anywhere
along the route, Consul?”
“Of course.”
“The World-News will get you Tokyo for your next post,” Routledge
said with a laugh. “All I need is the single sentence—‘Oyama wins’ or
‘Oyama loses.’ By the way, the Japanese have got two good horses
of mine——”
“I’ll see to them.”
The carriage reached the station at two minutes before eight.
“It looks as if you had it all your own way, Weed,” Milner observed
with a laugh. “God! you’ve got the world at your feet—the greatest
newspaper chance in years. You’ll give ’em a story that will rip up the
States. Show ’em pictures—never mind the featureless skeleton—
show ’em pictures, Weed!”
“I’ll try, Consul,” said Routledge, with feeling.
The station-boys were clanging their bells. The eyes of both men
were fixed upon a clot of dust far down the road.
“Weed, my boy,” said Milner excitedly, “the race isn’t won yet. Your
rival is going to make the train.”
The huge figure of the “Horse-killer” was sprinting toward them, less
than two hundred yards away.