Trauma as Condition and Trauma as Claim: Advancing the Concept of Trauma in Planning Theory and Practice

This paper articulates a framework for considering the relevance of trauma in planning. Planners may encounter trauma as either a social-psychological condition or as a political claim, with distinct emphases on process or outcome, and in psychic or public realms. We apply the theoretical framework to a case in a city in the US South to empirically show how trauma-informed practice principles can paradoxically both be healing and retraumatizing for communities that seek to reform mainstream planning institutions. Our case suggests differentiating goals of personal healing and systemic justice to distinguish strategies of trauma as condition versus trauma as claim.