The Politics of Road Expansion

This book investigates how arguments for economic growth are perceived and advanced to promote road investment across the world.

In the literature, the relationship between building roads and achieving economic growth is heavily reliant on quantitative tools while ignoring the contextual details of roading projects. Using the Aristotelian concept of phronesis, the research undertakes six case studies from New Zealand, Britain, the United States, Pakistan, Brazil and Kenya. Phronesis is an intellectual virtue capable of incorporating practical problems and contextual details in everyday life. The concept was operationalised by devolving into three main questions, in which the roads policy direction, the associated processes and discursive pragmatism were explored. Detailed analysis of the following six projects has been carried out: MacKays to Peka Peka Expressway; London Orbital Motorway; Houston Interstate Highway 610; Lahore Ring Road; Mário Covas Ring Road and the Nairobi Expressway. The analysis provides the reader with a critical understanding of how roads are expanded using assertive policies without evidence of how economic growth will be achieved.

This book could be of interest to multilateral development organisations, researchers, students, policymakers and practitioners in the areas of planning, urban economy, public administration, transport economics, project management and development economics.