Local authorities across the United Kingdom have adopted sustainable development policies within their planning documentation in response to the global climate crisis and socio-political challenges (Revell 2013). These policies to respond to a wider sustainability discourse in academia, business, and popular culture, as well as directives issued by national and supra-national organisations that have substantial environmental, social, and economic capacities to envision and direct change (Raworth 2017; McManners 2024). By comparison, local authorities in England have constrained environmental, social, and economic capacities. However, one pathway they can deliver sustainable outcomes is by issuing planning permissions for private developments (Yu and Fischer 2019).

This research applies Davidson’s novel typology for an exploratory categorization of sustainability ideologies in local planning decisions (Davidson 2014). It comprises a cross-case study of 21 officer reports issued by three local authorities in Greater London: the London Borough of Ealing, the London Borough of Merton, and the London Borough of Redbridge. It reveals that sustainability manifests differently across development scales, council planners encounter the complexities inherent in the ubiquitous sustainability discourse, different sustainability ideologies alter the traditional power relationships in development management exchanges, and sustainability and planning are heavily informed by context. The research also contributes to and expands the sparse academic literature at the intersection of sustainability and development management in England. The conclusion includes a reflection on applying the typology, avenues for future research, and recommendations for private and public sector planners to improve the reliability of decision processes, determinations, and overall organisational governance.

This research applies Davidson’s (2014) novel typology that categorises the sustainability discourse by the ideologies of its actors. Davidson defines an ideology, in accordance with Stilwell (2002), as “a system of belief that shapes behaviour, individually and collectively”. This novel categorisation is useful to unpack the sustainability discourse in organisations, such as local authorities, as it illuminates the socio-political ideologies that define decisions rather than critiquing the actions themselves, which local contexts and capabilities may influence. Davidson contends that explicit and implicit ideologies of social actors, including how actors frame the role of the market and innovation and how they accept the influence of institutions and context, are valuable inputs for understanding sustainability discourses as they define how individuals and organisations frame issues and solutions.

Table 1, presented on the following page, summarizes Davidson’s novel typology of the sustainability discourse. It identifies six ideologies and applies a three-tier tick system for the strength of each attribute as considered by their policy actors. The table shows a low-to-high continuum between neoliberalism and radical ideologies regarding relationship power dynamics and a reverse trend for substitutability of capital. The neoliberal position that market-based economies drive sustainable outcomes and ignore to limits to growth contrasts with the two radical positions that contend that growth is inherently harmful to sustainability and power imbalances lead to failings. The role of technology also decreases from neoliberalism to radical ideologies.

Academic researchers value Davidson’s typology and have applied it across various fields. Ferguson and Wollersheim (2023) adopted the typology in an analysis of the ideological underpinning of the related term “resilience”. They found that resilience was often conceived as an extension of neoliberalism as it shifted the responsibility for welfare and security from the state to the individual. They also deduced that resilience, like sustainability, morphed when applied in macro and micro institutional contexts. Salmivaara and Kibler (2020) discussed how Davidson’s typology contextualized “sustainable entrepreneurship” and illuminated the rhetoric and motivations for policymakers. They suggested that controversial solutions often emerged when policymakers’ rhetoric followed neoliberal and liberal paradigms. Kemper and Ballantine (2019) utilized Davidson’s typology to analyse and categorize “sustainability marketing.” They identified that a neoliberal marketing approach promoted sustainable productions, social democratic marketing highlighted lifestyle and behavioural changes, and radical marketing emphasized institutions and norms with critical reflection.

Other researchers applied Davidson’s typology in analyses of healthcare, community stakeholder cooperation, and national political elections (Rizvi et al. 2020; Timofejevs 2020; Luoma et al. 2024).

In the wider literature, academic researchers often employ categorisations to rationalize ubiquitous discourses. Goffman (1974) described how categories, also called frames, act as cognitive filters that “enable individuals or groups or organisations to locate, perceive, identify, and label.” These categories can operate as discernible systems, entities, and rules, while others may have no tangibility. Feldman (2011) stated that categorisations are “sets of shared assumptions, values, and frames of reference that give meaning to everyday activities and guide how organisational members think and act.” Cornelissen and Werner (2014) identified micro-level cognitive frames, meso-level organisational frames, and macro-level social frames (institutional logics) occurring simultaneously. Therefore, Davidson’s typology of sustainability discourses is an insightful method to assess how sustainability manifests in organisations.

This research adopted an inductive qualitative methodology that engaged non-numerical data sources via a cross-case method to understand how sustainability discourses manifest in planning decisions across three Greater London local authorities. In accordance with Yin (2003), a cross-case method was chosen as it retained the unique contexts of the cases and enabled the induction of general findings, enriched by subtext from each case.

The research engaged three phases: data collection, coding, analysis and synthesis. In the data collection phase, the cases were read, and sustainability references were extracted from the text. Sustainability was referenced when it was explicitly stated or when a comment in the report reflected the WCED definition. In the coding phase, the references were tabulated and color-coded to surface ideological alignment with Davidson’s typology. The coding relied on the primary researcher comparing the extracted references to the Davidon’s typology descriptions, summarised in Table 1. Comparisons with key words and ideological perspectives, i.e., whether a market justification was given and relied on for a development, underpinned this coding phase; refer the active researcher involvement is acknowledged as a limitation. The coding was checked by the secondary researcher to ensure rationale coding outcomes. Duplicate statements were removed, and long statements were truncated. A cross-case analysis through the lens of Davidson’s typology was then conducted between cases within an application type (householder, minor, and major) and between the three application types to identify patterns, differences, and emerging themes. A synthesis process followed, where findings were generalized to answer the research question.

The cases were 21 reports issued by different planning officers at the London Borough of Ealing (243341HH, 243350HH, 243343HH, 243250FUL, 242997FUL, 242272FUL, 232967FUL), London Borough of Merton (23/P2751, 23/P2757, 23/P2860, 23/P2452, 23/P2512, 23/P2524, 24/P0368), and London Borough of Redbridge (0134/24, 2925/23, 3259/23, 1782/24, 2130/24, 3646/23, 1161/21). The cases were downloaded from the councils’ publicly available planning portals; the portals can be found via searching the council and the term ‘planning portal’ (London Borough of Ealing 2026; London Borough of Merton 2026; London Borough of Redbridge 2026).

The cases from each borough comprised three householder applications for residential extensions and similar small developments, three minor applications for constructing up to nine new residential units, and one major application comprising ten or more residential units. These categorisation of applications followed the definition of application types in planning law, policy, and practice; refer to The Town and Country Planning (Development Management Procedure) (England) Order 2015. The reports were issued between October 2022 and October 2024 and determined by delegated authority to capture regular planning processes. The applications were selected based on reverse chronological order where they met the research criteria. To avoid doubt, the political preferences of the councils are not relevant to the research, resulting in the exclusion of planning decisions made by political committees.

The three local authorities are classified as Outer London Boroughs in The London Plan (Greater London Authority 2021). The London Plan describes Outer London Boroughs as comprising mostly residential land uses and having significant potential for appropriate intensification over time, particularly for additional housing. The inclusion of Outer London Boroughs is justified as being similar to most urban environments across England. All the selected boroughs operate under the National Planning Policy Framework and London Plan, allowing for comparison.

The London Borough of Ealing is in west London, Greater London’s fourth largest borough, and home to approximately 300,000 inhabitants (London Borough of Ealing 2025). Its urban form is largely low-density two-storey houses spread around seven town centres. The London Borough of Merton is in south west London and home to approximately 220,000 inhabitants. Its urban form mostly comprises two-storey houses surrounding small retail and town centres (London Borough of Merton 2025). The London Borough of Redbridge is in north east London and has approximately 279,000 inhabitants. Two storey dwellings are common across the borough, and Ilford serves as the primary town centre (London Borough of Redbridge 2025).

The chosen method limited the research depth as it categorised the ideologies within the officer reports but did not identify the justifications for why the determinations aligned with certain ideologies. Interviews with the contributing planning officers would be a means to uncover this knowledge in a future research stage.

Another limitation was the number of cases within each application type, the assumption that each case was prepared to a similar quality under like circumstances, the total number of cases, and the restriction to three London boroughs. This ignores confounding variations, such as regional characteristics and pre-submission project conditions. Regional and other London borough may engage the studied ideologies differently across development scales. These limitations resulted from the resource parameters of the researcher and their focus on testing the application of Davidson’s novel typology on planning determinations. The results should not be interpreted as precise for all developments, locations, and contexts. However, due to the exploratory function of the research and the inclusion of three Outer London Boroughs with similar characters and typical urban forms, there is sufficient data to form an initial proposition that could translate to other urban areas in England and further research can test.

Lastly, the case study method was limited by the absence of a routine, as acknowledged by Yin (2003). Instead, it relied on an interpretation that is subject to the personal capabilities and context of the researcher. The absence of a routinized procedure, such as in a laboratory setting, was minimized by providing text extractions from the officer reports in this publication to enable scrutiny and replication.

The primary trend in the findings is that the sustainability discourse manifests differently across development scales within local planning decisions. Householder applications are considered sustainable when they respect the existing environment and community, minor applications gain planning permission when they balance disturbing the existing environment with new benefits to the site and setting, and major applications obtain planning permission when they deliver high future benefits that offset evident harm to the existing environment and leverage technological fixes to divert residual adverse effects. This phenomenon highlights the fluidity of the sustainability discourse within the development management context.

Another trend is that development management officers face the same challenges that researchers and practitioners encounter when engaging with the sustainability discourse, specifically, how to make the broad World Commission on Environment and Development (1987) definition applicable to single applications situated within complex local contexts. There is substantial discretion afforded to local authority planners in this determination process and little statutory and policy direction. The discretionary basis of the planning system in England, encapsulated by the ability to consider material considerations that can override and augment local plan directions, complicates the situation. It raises questions about how local authority planners adopt or are directed to favour, consciously or unconsciously, specific ideologies when making decisions. Also, whether the need for officers to create convincing justifications in their reports that can withstand planning appeals and judicial reviews results in the exhibition of more dogmatic ideologies. It is considered unlikely that planners assessing applications at different scales would hold distinct ideological positions that neatly align with Davidson’s typologies. The findings of Lombardi et al. (2011) from the Eastside regeneration project in Birmingham support this hypothesis as those interviewed expressed concern regarding the validity of some design justifications after decisions were issued. This research recognizes that interviews with planning officers would reveal the actual level of belief in the justifications and personal ideologies.

Regarding power relationships across the three development scales, local authorities are more accommodating to innovation and compromises in larger developments than in smaller developments. A potential cause for this trend is a recognition that larger developments often have significant financial backing, higher design quality, and good stakeholder involvement. Refusing or overly prescribing outcomes for large developments risks political backlash through councillors and communities who are in favour of the projects as well as generating industry hesitancy for future investment and development in the borough. The ability for financial contributions to the borough may also form a subtext that inverts the usual power balance in the authority-developer relationship. In contrast, smaller developments are not offered the same scope to dictate an acceptable outcome because their impact is localised, there is less community interest and benefit, and the development incrementality alters the environment rather than transforms it.

A further trend is that sustainability, within planning determinations in England, is heavily context driven. It is positioned in relation to its application rather than as a distinct and rigid framework and does not benefit from strict national and local guidance. As such, a hypothesis is that organisational norms primarily facilitate how sustainability manifests in local planning decisions. Academic support for this hypothesis comes from Lozano and Barreiro-Gen (2023) who identify that organisations often adopt a compartmentalised approach to sustainability. It likewise gains support from the findings of Besharov and Smith (2014) and Schuler et al. (2017) who provide evidence that organisations justify dissimilar approaches through rules, laws, and norms. Further research into the influence of organisational norms over planning officers’ agency in relation to sustainability policies and determinations would be required to further illuminate and test this claim.

A final reflection is that neo-liberalism holds the capital position in England’s planning landscape, as major developments, which have the greatest influence on places, are subject to neo-liberal approaches rather than other political ideologies. Can the national need for mass house building be achieved through other ideologies while staying true to their ethos? Or are large scale urban transformations exclusively neoliberal products?

This research investigated how sustainability manifests in local planning decisions. Through the lens of Davidson’s typology, it is evident that sustainability manifests differently across planning decisions, planners in local authorities encounter the complexities inherent within the sustainability discourse, larger developments are more able to engage in neo-liberal sustainability practices than smaller developments, and local authorities wield discretion to choose how they seek sustainable outcomes on a case-by-case basis.

The exploratory categorisation method benefited the research by offering clear lenses for the deduction of knowledge at a research junction that is lacking established frames. It proved that such a method can be applied to planning officer reports, offering a new approach for the critique of the practice-led sector. The research also profited from the certainty of Davidson’s typologies as the findings and themes are distinct. However, due to the rigidity of the method, the research lacked nuance that revealed why each determination adopted a specific ideology and the actual strength of these convictions. The legitimacy of the sustainability categorisations should also be questioned before knowledge can be generalized. The authors view Davidson’s typology as anchored in historical ideologies and largely theoretical, which risks reductionism. By framing all sustainability positions as ideologically driven, the approach risks flattening more nuanced or hybrid positions. It also cannot be assumed that the categorisations reflect the dominant local political administration in each of the three studied authorities. As such, the authors consider the categorises to be legitimate only when viewed through Davidson’s specific process and relevant for discussion purposes without further research.

Further research should interview planning officers to understand how organisational, personal, and application contexts influence determinations. Subsequent research could investigate how local planners balance the environmental, social, and economic objectives in their decision making, and which policies in the local plan they see as addressing these three dimensions of sustainability. Similar to Thornhill et al. (2025), a tally of sustainable development key terms and solutions, such as off-setting, green roofs, and biodiversity net gain, in officer reports could explore the related question of ‘what aspects of sustainable development are commonly found authorities’ reports, where they differ, and why or how do they differ?’ This question would supplement the ideological stocktake of this present research.

Based on the research findings, it is recommended that private sector urban development professionals design their proposals to align with the distinct sustainability ideologies applied across the development scales. Adherence to these categories will improve the likelihood of obtaining planning permission. Public sector planners and those employed within local authorities should recognize the varying sustainability ideologies and determine whether to adopt a unified approach when assessing sustainability or formalize their existing approach of applying different ideologies depending on the development scale via revised policy. It is the view of the author that the direction in national policy should be clarified regarding planning permission decision making to create a consistent approach across the development scales. If offsetting is acceptable for large schemes, small-scale developments should equally benefit, or large schemes should also be required to not exceed existing environmental thresholds. Recent biodiversity net gain policy could become model that is expanded to include economic and social aspects of sustainability. This approach would create a fair and holistic approach to sustainability that minimises some complexities when balancing the three pillars of the discourse. However, as with issues surrounding biodiversity net gain, training programmes may be required to help planners better understand the complexities inherent in sustainability, how ideological biases may influence determinations, and how to express or curtail ideologies in officer reports to better justify decisions. By making the sustainability ideologies more visible in planning processes, local authorities could improve the reliability of decision processes, determination periods, and organisational governance.