Semi-structured interviews formed the second primary data collection method for the research study, being utilised to examine a number of issues related to Research Questions 2 and 3. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with a total of 28 stakeholders - a range of different actors who were engaged in the negotiation and assessment of the development proposed in the LCS planning application. The selection of interviewees thus followed a logic of purposive sampling, whereby the researcher samples on the basis of wanting to interview people who are relevant to the research questions (Bryman, 2004), and as such was based on an initial mapping of the key institutional stakeholders involved in the planning process, followed by the identification of the appropriate individuals to speak to in those organisations. A table detailing the interviewees, including their positions and respective organisations, is provided in Appendix 3.
85 The aim of interviewing appropriate individuals was, firstly, so to facilitate an understanding of the rationale for why the ODA was given responsibility to act as the planning authority for the Olympic ‘Legacy’ regeneration, followed by a desire to establish the nature of, and rationale behind, the evolution of the proposed ‘Legacy’ regeneration since the Olympic bid and the initial Olympic Games & Legacy planning applications in 2004 (see 5.2 and Appendix 5 for a detailed exploration of the UK Government’s main
‘Legacy’ objective documents and the relevant planning history of the LCS planning application). Interviews were therefore purposively conducted with ODA PDT officers, members of the OPLC as acting LCS applicant, and formal consultees, notably local borough officers, of the LCS planning application.21
Subject to this first round of interviews, in order to directly address Research Questions 2 and 3, interviews were also conducted to acquire a clear understanding of the actors who were engaged in negotiation during the planning decision-making process for the LCS, how they rationalised their arguments and were able to influence the nature of development, and how they were constrained in their actions. Actors were at first selected for interview by their names being referenced in LCS planning application documents, notably formal consultation responses. They were also chosen through their prominence at the LB Hackney and LB Tower Hamlets planning committees in which the boroughs’ consultation responses were respectively discussed, as well as through their attendance at the ODA’s planning committee meeting for the assessment of the LCS application. Further actors were selected on the basis of what has been referred to as the ‘snowball effect’, which is effectively by recommendation of preliminary interviewees (Devine, 2002; Bryman, 2004), with an awareness of their appropriateness maintained at all times. Thus, in order to answer Research Question 2, stakeholders were limited to the formal consultees of the process, as explained above, who were prominently engaged in the discussions and negotiations over the nature of the proposed LCS development. This included local borough planning and regeneration officers, Greater London Authority (GLA) planners, OPLC officers, and the members of the ODA PC. In terms of addressing Research Question 3, particular attention was afforded to the role
21 The term ‘formal consultees’ is used here to delineate those included in the formal consultation process of the LCS planning application by the ODA PDT (as necessitated for all planning applications by Section 71 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990) and thus those involved, with varying influence, in the assessment and negotiation of the LCS development. There were also a vast number of individuals and organisations who were not formally consulted by the ODA but could claim to be a ‘stakeholder’ by virtue of, inter alia, general public interest. However, they were not subject to the focus of the study, as manifest in the research questions and, moreover, given the limited scope and resources of a doctoral research project.
86 of the planner in the LCS planning decision-making process, specifically the planning officers within the ODA PDT, as they were ostensibly in charge of assessing and determining the outcome of the planning application and thus the nature of development to be delivered on site. As shall become apparent in subsequent chapters (6 to10), their agency was only partial and subject to the constraining actions of others.
As it was not possible to gain first-hand experience of day to day negotiations that occurred during the planning decision-making process for the LCS planning application, the case study involved undertaking interviews so to uncover the various actors’ different views and reflections upon the planning decision-making process. All interviews were undertaken on a one-to-one basis and lasted from between 45 minutes to 2 hours in length. The interviews were partially structured in that an interview guide was used to order a number of pre-determined open-ended questions, which helped to ensure the interviews covered similar themes and topics derived from the research questions, as well as allowing for triangulation of research data with other sources (a list of these interview questions can be found in Appendix 6).
For the interviews to be effective, I ensured that I had read and become familiar with the LCS planning application assessment report and the formal consultation responses so that I was aware of contextual issues such as the nature of the LCS development proposed and the rationalisations of the individual stakeholders and/or their representative organisations with regard to this. This assisted in the probing of issues that were deemed of importance and also helped in the selection of interviewees, as detailed above, based upon their involvement in the planning decision-making process.
Given this contextual understanding and the flexible approach taken to interviewing, the interviews were also tailored to encourage those interviewed to reflect and elaborate on the rationalisations they provided within the LCS assessment report and consultation responses to provide further insight into their respective positions with regard to the LCS’s development agenda and their influence in shaping it.
Interviewee access and recruitment
In terms of the organisation of interviews, every care was taken to ensure that any approach to gain consent from potential participants was undertaken with thought and due respect. All of the interviews were formally arranged via e-mail. On a number of occasions I had already briefly introduced myself to prospective participants prior to the e-mail request at the Tower Hamlets and Hackney’s planning committee meetings that were held to formally respond to the LCS planning application’s notice of consultation or
87 at the actual LCS committee meeting. This introduction, I believe, did assist in forming an initial rapport with the potential interviewee, enabling them to ‘put a face to the name’.
Within each e-mail request for an interview, a number of key elements were included to uphold ethical standards and ensure research transparency and fully inform prospective interviewees about the nature of the research (see Appendix 7). A short briefing note (a generic copy of this can be found in Appendix 8) was also attached to the e-mail. The note elaborated on my employment and academic background and the aims and objectives of my research, and was tailored to take into consideration the role and institutional setting of each of the prospective participants. The interview questions were generally not provided within these initial interview e-mail requests, unless a potential interviewee requested to see them in advance. Such a request only occurred once from one of the officers who had worked for the OPLC.
One of the positive and, perhaps, surprising aspects of the interviewing process is that out of the 29 people I contacted to request an interview, 28 accepted the invitation. All interviews except one were conducted in a quiet area or room within the everyday institutional setting of the interviewees. It is difficult to discern why all of those who I approached for an interview kindly obliged. I can only speculate that, given general media attention relating to the ‘legacy’ of the Olympics, it was occasionally a result of individuals being keen to express their knowledge and get ‘their side of the story’ across.
Moreover, timing was also important as most interviews were conducted after the decision had been made on the LCS planning application, and thus interviewees may have felt more open to discussing the development and any perceived sensitive matters regarding its nature and the planning process. However, I also believe that it was largely due to a sense of public obligation to which they willingly offered their time, considering many held positions within publicly accountable bodies.
Preparation of interview guide and formulation of questions
The formulation of questions for each interview was guided by the desire to maintain a flexible, semi-structured approach, with a number of the questions being tailored to the respondent’s institutional setting and their particular interest in the LCS planning application. This enabled the questions to specifically examine how each interviewee framed and understood the main issues of the LCS development and planning decision-making process. A flexible approach also allowed for themes and emerging topics to be probed further through additional questioning to encourage elaboration in responses
88 offered and for interviewees to discuss issues they felt were most pertinent (Devine, 2002).
The interview questions, however, were produced in a rigorous manner to ensure that the main issues that necessitated scrutiny were covered. Whilst the interviews were generally arranged with less taxing questions at the beginning, followed by more difficult and potentially sensitive questions in the latter part of the interview when the participant was feeling more comfortable, there was a conscious effort to ensure that the interview guide structured questions systematically to answer each of the main research questions and sub-research questions that are presented in Section 1.4 (an example interview template containing general questions and topic areas can be found in Appendix 6).
However, such preparation did not negate the important specificities of each interviewee which emerged from their personal understandings, organisational role and institutional context. Indeed, the flexibility upheld in the semi-structured approach facilitated the conversational nature of the interviews allowing, as noted above, for each interviewee to also address the issues that they felt were most interesting with regard to the LCS development.
Conducting the interviews
It was essential that some key formalities were observed whilst conducting the interviews, with the first being introducing myself, followed by confirmation of permission to record the discussion, along with a reassurance of the confidentiality of comments made during the interview. A brief overview of my research was then provided. I took the opportunity here to build a degree of rapport with the interviewee by highlighting my shared interest in planning and urban regeneration and informing them of my experience as a planning officer in a London borough. This experience actually assisted me in gaining familiarity with the jargon and technical terms planners’ use in everyday practice.
This was useful as, firstly, it ensured that the language I used in interviews was comprehensible to the people who I was engaging with (Bryman, 2004) and, secondly, enabled me to exhibit a sympathetic awareness of the complex nature of the work that planners are involved in. By emphasising, when appropriate, this knowledge and the interests that I shared with the interviewees, whilst promoting my non-judgemental identity as a researcher, I sought to create a momentary ‘positional space’ that engendered a level of trust, respect and cooperation in the interview encounter (Mullings, 1999). Moreover, demonstrating an awareness of planning practice provided the ability to proceed more hastily into the details of key issues of the LCS planning application.
89 Finally, I believe the ability to show a degree of understanding of the challenges met by planners in their day-to-day activities at the beginning of the interview did help nurture a candidness from the planners that were interviewed who perhaps felt that they had a
‘sympathetic ear’ when addressing the complexity of the LCS planning decision-making process. Also, local borough’ planners, being aware of my local authority experience, often assumed that I was aware of the fact that the development priorities of the borough were a key ‘material consideration’ in the assessment of planning applications given their representation in local planning policy, and thus given their frustrations with the LCS planning process addressing these priorities, they were often uninhibited to make this concern known in detail. Nonetheless, I sought to remain aware of possible bias and sought to discern answers to questions that appeared subject to bravado or intended to
‘please the interviewer’ (Devine, 2002; Denscombe, 2003). This reflexivity and awareness of bias also extended to the nature of the questions being posed, as I was always conscious of the phrasing of a question so not to lead the interviewee into answering in a certain way.
However, the ability to relate to the interviewee because of my professional planning experience was not always an advantageous overture, as I was to find out at my first interview. Having disclosed my familiarity with the planning process to a councillor from a local borough, I proceeded with the interview, asking a number of questions regarding how effective he felt the LCS planning process had been in securing benefits for local residents. The councillor became wary of such probing, often referring the question back to me, as he assumed that I would know the answer to my own question. This was, of course, not the point; the questioning was aimed at getting the councillor to express his own reasoning and rationality with regard to the issue at hand, regardless of any prior knowledge I may possess with regard to the bureaucratic functioning of the planning system. But, nevertheless, my eagerness to build a rapport had in fact scuppered an early openness and unreserved dialogue with the interviewee, provoking the councillor into a defensive position. Whilst the councillor did relax as the interview progressed, as I persevered in a cordial and responsive manner, it was an important lesson that I would take with me for the rest of the interviews - that flexibility and a degree of intuition is needed in the initial rapport building with each interviewee.
Recording and Transcription
All of the interviews undertaken were recorded using a digital voice recorder, with consent sought verbally from the participant prior to the interview commencing. The
90 rationale behind recording the interview was that it would allow for a natural conversational style, which would be difficult to ensure if preoccupied with taking comprehensive notes (see Dunn, 2010), as well as for examination of the participant’s answer both during and after the interview (Bryman, 2004). However, recording each interview did not result in the abandonment of taking notes altogether. I consciously decided to take some notes so to reduce the possibility of ‘mental wandering’ and sustain concentration. Selective note taking was also useful in documenting what I believed to be key points made by the participant, along with any particularly anomalistic responses, including those perceived to be resulting from bravado or ingratiation whereby the subject under discussion is distorted by the interviewee overemphasising their role or influence or providing an answer based upon a preconceived idea of the motive for a question and therefore what they believed I wanted to hear.
I was also cognisant of how the audio recorder may have affected the participant’s responses, reminding them of the formal nature of the interview. I sought to confront this as practically as possible by, as described above, noting instances of ostentatious or stunted responses. There was also the possibility of suspending the recording if it was deemed to be problematic (Bryman, 2004), although I found this was not necessary as participants had willingly agreed to be interviewed and therefore generally ‘loosened up’
despite any initial anxiety over being recorded.
All of the interviews were transcribed as soon as possible after their occurrence so that they could be recalled in detail and recorded accurately, therefore assisting examination of the participants’ responses. The decision to transcribe the interviews was based on the view that it provides the researcher with a form of data that is far easier to analyse than having to continuously move back and forth through an audio recording (Denscombe, 2003). Whilst laborious, the act of transcribing the interviews certainly assisted in reflecting on the information received, and therefore facilitated the analysis of emerging themes that formed part of questioning in subsequent interviews. For this reason, I transcribed the first 12 interviews, although for the remaining 16 interviews, as well as the all-day LCS planning committee meeting, I decided to pay for professional transcription as this was more time efficient given the sheer amount of work involved.22 Upon receipt, I would examine each of the professional transcripts undertaken to ensure
22 The transcription process was indeed arduous with over 300,000 words of meeting and interview transcriptions produced by myself and my assistant.
91 their accuracy and, as with my own transcribing, this examination would enable immersion in the data, providing a preliminary form of analysis.
One further issue to highlight relates to the issue of anonymity. The aforementioned e-mail request for an interview stated that it could be conducted anonymously, and this was also reiterated verbally at the beginning of each of the interviews. However, not one of the interviewees requested this, although I made the cautionary decision to give anonymity to all participants in the final thesis. This is due to the fact that, whilst those interviewed did agree to speak to me in a professional capacity, they referred to others involved in the LCS planning decision-making process as well as the tensions and disagreements that occurred. Thus, given that the planning and implementation of the post-Games development is still ongoing and will continue to be subject to scrutiny, providing anonymity enabled me to maintain a critical analysis of the LCS planning decision-making process without compromising the position of any of the actors involved.
There were a couple of occasions during an interview whereby the interviewee stated that what they were about to say was ‘off the record’. These moments were treated as such and therefore are not included in the research data.