Planners operate within a complex and often highly contested arena. In Practice, students will quickly build awareness of the complexity of the policy process – both in terms of development and implementation – and in the critical role that governance issues play in shaping decision-making and outcomes. In this course students will reflect upon academic debate regarding the institutional frameworks and actors involved in policy making and implementation, and bring into the classroom real world examples from their respective experiences in practice. The course encourages students to critically reflect on the nature in which policy decisions get made, are enacted, how they impact upon planning activity and to help understand how and why decisions get made in the way that they do, or how we assess whether those policies succeed or not through monitoring and evaluation. Drawing upon the cohort’s diversity of Practice experience, the course builds an appreciation of the actors and arenas, methods and institutions contributing to urban management and development so that students are able to engage with such processes effectively in professional life and be aware of the limitations and challenges that inevitable frame activity.