System, Practices, and Culture of Environmental Planning in the São Paulo Macrometropolis in Context of Climate Change: Debate from the Planning Artifacts

Environmental planning faces challenges in the context of climate change and extreme events as driving forces of socio-environmental transformations. Thinking about it in a complex territory such as the São Paulo Macrometropolis (SPMM) involves, besides understanding the relevance of broader contextual elements, relating them to the specificities of the territory. The objective of this chapter is to make a reflective exercise on possibilities of analyzing the planning process, through the proposition of an analytical framework that considers the planning system, practices, and culture. Based on the proposed new perspective, planning artifacts that address the environmental issue in SPMM and that are objects of master’s and doctoral’s studies of the authors are analyzed. They are: (1) the SPMM Action Plan, Integrated Urban Development Plans, and Master Plans; (2) Conservation Units; (3) Environmental Impact Assessment; and (4) Payment for Environmental Services. The purpose of this exercise is to explore the potential of the proposed analytical framework to broaden the understanding of the elements involved in planning processes.