September 15, 2026
We're happy to celebrate that, in summer 2026, Wes Regan attended the World Planning Schools Congress in Finland, where he was awarded for the best PhD student paper.
The award-winning paper:
Planners, Influencers, and the Battle for Hearts and Minds in the Disinformation Age
By Wes Regan
Here Regan explores strain in the planning profession itself from the spread of mis/disinformation and conspiracism.
He examines how online influencers fostered backlash against planning work in England and Canada by spreading ‘conspiracist’ claims on social media about the concept known as the 15-Minute City (15MC), suggesting its rising popularity was proof of a conspiracy involving elites and local governments to introduce “climate lockdowns” in cities, similar to those experienced during the covid-19 pandemic (Barnett et al., 2023; European Digital Media Observatory, 2023).
Interviews and focus groups undertaken with thirty-four planners in the UK, Canada, and EU, in the wake of this backlash, explore the challenges they faced in responding to it and to mis/disinformation more broadly in relation to planning. Interview questions were informed by an analysis of over three-hundred news and magazine articles about the 15MC and backlash to it sourced from the UBC Nexis-Lexis database, and social media content of influencers noted in those stories, interviews, and focus groups. Findings examined in this particular paper are drawn from interviews with planners in Oxford, UK, and Edmonton, Canada, where this backlash was particularly strong and sustained, and received much media attention.
Findings describe a role of online influencers as a competing form of “epistemic authority in the digital public space” (Bartsch et al., 2025) to that of the planner, often monetizing misinformation in the algorithmic engagement systems of social media (Birchall, 2021; Ryan et al., 2020), with conspiracist claims acting as engaging and motivating stories about planning that appeal at an affective-emotional level (Boler & Davis, 2021) and ontological-epistemological level [i.e., what is concluded to exist and how we draw those conclusions] (Douglas et al., 2017; Konda, 2019) to explain urban planning and why people should be outraged about it.
Before Regan attended the World Planning Schools Congress, Regan voiced his gratitude and anticipation: "Very excited that I'll be speaking in Helsinki at the World Planning Schools Congress, where I'll be fretting about whether current planning theories and practices are adequate to withstand democratic backsliding and authoritarian populism today." He continued:
My research over the last couple of years has provided me with some sobering insight into the dynamics planners are facing as both publics and elected leaders alike are embracing fundamentally un-democratic values and norms.
After the Congress (and the award conferral to Regan), he commented:
I put a lot of effort into this paper but certainly didn't expect to win! ...My sincere gratitude to the reviewers and the conference organizers and all the volunteers... This has been a fantastic congress with plenty of highlights for me but this one definitely takes the cake.
A more thorough version of Regan's paper is in peer review and planned to come out next year.
Wes Regan's research
...focuses on trust relationships between governments and publics, and how it's affected by conspiracism, authoritarianism, and/or anti-government extremism.
Wes Regan has been on CBC Radio, TedTalks, and more, describing this same phenomenon and the extraordinary stakes involved. Want to see some more of his latest accomplishments? Visit SCARP's News Feed and use his name as a search parameter.
We're really excited to learn more about Regan's insights as they develop, and to see where his research takes him next! Congrats, Wes!