Investigating the Impact of Planning on Housing Construction Sector Development in Turkey

Recent studies have sought to model and understand the importance of economic change and population growth on the development of housing construction sector in Turkey (Alkay et al, 2015). The evidence suggests that the impact of economic fundamentals and household growth is only weakly related to construction (TUIK, 2015; TUIK, 2014). This suggests that, as identified in other contexts, there may be other important factors driving activity, including the prevailing policy regime and the business culture within the sector (Henneberry and Rowley, 2000; Jackson and Watkins, 2009). In the Turkish context, it is clear not only that these qualitative influences might be important, it is also evident that the way in which these factors impact on development activity is not uneven across space (Alkay et al, 2015). This provides the context for this paper which aims to provide a more qualitative investigation the impact of planning on the development of the housing construction sector at national and local levels. The paper examines the evolution of the policy and practice over more than a decade, during the institutional design of the planning system has been subject to significant change. These normative transformations have been based on reorganizing of existing institutions or organizing new institutions in an attempt to create the capacity to supporting greater levels of housing construction sector as much as an in the hope of solving the perceived problems with the planning system. This study focuses to reflect how and to what extend this restructuring has an impact on housing construction sector development. This paper draws on more than a dozen interviews with real estate practitioners and policy makers operating in different parts of the Turkish construction sector. The analysis offers the first impressions, and discusses the underlying influences on construction activity with particular attention paid to the causes of uneven spatial development.