Image courtesy of UIA
The International Society of City and Regional Planners (ISOCARP) has contributed to the development of Shaping Responsible Urban Environments: Towards a Charter on Urbanisation, a cross-disciplinary initiative bringing together architects, urban planners, landscape architects, heritage specialists, and public health experts.
The Charter sets out ten shared principles for responsible urbanisation, drawing together commitments already held across the contributing organisations and translating professional expertise into clear, actionable messages for decision-makers, professionals, and communities. The Charter affirms urban environments as a collective responsibility and positions cities and territories as central spaces for advancing inclusive, resilient, and sustainable futures.
ISOCARP’s contribution to the drafting process was led by Vice President and Director for Publications Tijana Tufek Memisevic, ensuring that the Charter reflects urbanisation as a shared concern across disciplines, including architecture, health, heritage, landscape, and planning, rather than the province of any single profession, and framed the convergence of partner organisations as itself a response to the uncertainty and complexity of the present moment.
The planning perspective is reflected in the Charter’s understanding that urbanisation is not a problem to be solved but a continuous negotiation between competing claims on space, resources, and the future. It affirms that responsible urbanisation requires collaboration across all built environment disciplines.
“Responsible urbanisation is a central project of our time and demands a shared response,” said Elisabeth Belpaire, President of ISOCARP. “Through this Charter, ISOCARP reaffirms that planning must be involved from the start to help shape cities and regions that serve people and planet, and across generations. We are proud that the voice of planning, shaped through our global member community and advanced here by Dr. Tijana Memisevic, is part of our shared commitment with architecture, landscape, heritage and health.”
ISOCARP extends its gratitude to all aforementioned partners, the City of Barcelona, the UNESCO-UIA World Capital of Architecture programme, and the Fundació Mies van der Rohe Barcelona for providing the context and platform for this collaboration.
The Society looks forward to the formal launch later this year.