Dr Peter Lee BSc, MSc, PhD

• BSc (Hons.) Bristol University
• MSc (distinction) Computing Science University of York
• Ph.D University of Birmingham  

Dr Peter Lee is Reader in Collaborative Planning at the Centre for Urban and Regional Studies, University of Birmingham. He was previously Research Associate at Heriot-Watt University, School of Planning and Housing (1992-1994) and Research Assistant at Bristol University (1989-90 and 1991-92).  Peter has worked largely in the area of poverty, social exclusion, housing markets and spatial planning and, as PI or Co-I, delivered almost 100 research, consultancy and CPD projects. 

Peter’s research has contributed to planning, housing and social policy interventions that benefit disadvantaged households and communities and have had a major policy impact at all spatial scales.  His work has balanced academic enquiry with policy impact research, consultancy and knowledge transfer.  He has made a significant impact on local, regional and national housing policies and has influenced research on urban and regional planning internationally, having held research grants across Europe, Japan, Brazil and South Korea.  Peter is committed to developing planning, housing and regeneration research and practice that is inter-disciplinary, works at scales, is context specific, collaborative and inclusive.

Dr. Lee leads or contributes to the following modules:

• Research Methods (Postgraduate)
• Urban Regeneration and Renewal (Postgraduate)
• Understanding Neighbourhood Poverty (Undergraduate)

Peter supervises doctoral research students in the area of collaborative planning & urban futures and housing and social inclusion.

He currently supervises the following students:

James Bowles The role of geospatial data in third sector service provision: developing a framework for research and practice (2018-2021)

Gina Hasibuan Sustainable Affordable Housing Development in Indonesia (2016-2019)

Upuli Perera Socio and environmental governance in affordable housing delivery through urbanism based neighbourhood planning Commonwealth Scholarship (2013-2017)

Naeemah Yusof Planning and developing a walkable city as barriers for elderly’s walkability (2014-2018)

Students successfully supervised in the past 5 years:

Abdulmohsen Alshebli Transition to an alternative urban planning pathway for Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (2018)

Tae Suk Kang The Existence and Causes of Social Exclusion on Public Rental Housing Estates in South Korea: The Universalism of the Undeserving Poor (2014)

Monir Moniruzzaman Rural women, energy poverty and energy justice in east central region of Bangladesh (2016)

Potential students interested in similar areas of research can contact Peter directly.

2016-2019: USE-IT! (Unlocking Social and Economic Innovation Together), European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) Urban Innovative Actions (UIA) (€3.64m) http://www.uia-initiative.eu/en/uia-cities/birmingham

USE-IT! (Unlocking Social and Economic Innovation Together) aims to link micro assets in poor neighbourhoods to macro assets (capital and infrastructure projects) in order to reduce displacement and maximise economic and social benefits of urban development for marginalised residents. USE IT! is a collaboration involving fourteen city and regional partners across the public, private and third sector.  The research is developing a group of community researchers that are engaging on urban transformation projects around Icknield Port Loop, which is undergoing regeneration and connecting local communities to planning activities within the university.

European Commission ERA Net ERA-NET Co-fund Smart Urban Futures Call: Smart Shrinkage Solutions - Fostering Resilient Cities in Inner Peripheries of Europe (3S RECIPE); (€1.7m) (2017-2020): A partnership with seven cities and academic institutions across Europe developing, testing the resilience of policy solutions on urban shrinkage.

The democratic foundations of the Just City: Power sharing and urban planning politics in three European cities (£225k - Swiss national Science Foundation) (2017-2020): An international comparative framework for analysing just planning politics integrating earlier work on spatial planning systems, urban political leadership and institutional power sharing. The project investigates the role of political leadership and the conditioning role of their regulatory, institutional context directed towards the ideal of the Just City in three case study cities: Birmingham, Zurich and Lyon.

Responding to Slow Burn and Sudden Shock Events (JSPS – with Toyohashi University and Waseda University, Japan): This research aims to explore how policy responses to slow burn and sudden shock events in two Japanese regions affected population shrinkage have adapted to different kinds of shocks.  By differentiating between ‘slow burn’ and sudden shock events we aim to re-position the concept of redundancy within social scientific debates on resilience and how adaptive capacity and agents of change need to develop an evolutionary response to crises and slow-burn events.

Socio spatial inequalities: exclusion, segregation, fragmentation and resilience in public housing in Brazil and UK (FAPESP,2016): Brazil with the aim of understanding commodification processes and public policies on  housing; this will be used to develop broader model of resilience for ODA countries undergoing commodity exploitation and rapid urbanisation.

2012-2013: Planning Responses to ‘Shock’ and ‘Slow-Burn’ Events: the Role of Redundancy in Regional Resilience (UK and Japan) (ESRC and JSPS)

2012: Open Source Food Distribution: Delivering Distributed Food Manufacture to Enhance Resilience (EPSRC)

2010-2011: Conceptualizing and measuring resilience: the critical role of redundancy (University of Birmingham)

Research groups

• Centre for Urban and Regional Studies
• Resilience and Urban Living
• Society, Economy and Environment

• Member of organising and development committee for West Midlands Futures (2010~)
• Member of Audit Commission’s Housing Markets best practice advisory panel (2007-08)
• Seconded head of research and strategic intelligence, Birmingham City Council, Housing Department (2003-2004)
• Member of Joseph Rowntree Foundation housing investment and neighbourhood change Steering Group  (2005-2007)
• Member of Numeric Date Sets in Teaching and Learning Task-Force (ESRC/JISC) (2000-2003)
• Member of deprivation and housing satisfaction JRF Steering Group  (1998-1999)
• Inaugural Chair Moseley Forum, Birmingham (1998-2000)