Planning a Provincial Territory in the Second Half of the 18th Century. The Integrated Approach of Armand-Joseph de Béthune-Charost.

Land-use planning has been well investigated in the contemporary period, especially since its institutionalization in the mid-twentieth century. However, little is known about the earlier periods. Moreover, while the state and national construction of the territory has often been investigated, local or regional experiences of territorial planning have been less well treated. Finally, the literature has focused more on representations of the territory than on practices and projects. This contribution proposes to understand an attempt to develop a province of France, Berry, through the land development action of one of its great owners, the aristocrat and philanthropist Armand-Joseph de Béthune-Charost. The originality of this action is that it aims, by an integrated planning of the territory, at the development and the enrichment of a province, the Berry, whose image he contributes to raise. On the other hand, it makes it a laboratory of experimentation of models that can be transposed elsewhere as well. Berry becomes the constitutive element of a system thought at the scale of the whole French territory, in which it is assigned the role of crossroads and hub.

Keywords: Land Use, Development, Regional Planning, France, Berry, 18th century.

Marie-Vic Ozouf-Marignier, Aménager un territoire provincial dans la seconde moitié du XVIIIe siècle. L’oeuvre intégrée d’Armand-Joseph de Béthune-Charost in "STORIA URBANA " 175/2023, pp 137-154, DOI: 10.3280/SU2023-175007