Institutional challenges to sustainable urban regeneration

Non-governmental organizations (NGO) can help to develop public spaces in the society, turn into part of development paradigm in the society, develop space of public trust in the society, and help to shrink government (municipality). They also can contribute to environmental challenges. Non-governmental organizations are able to align people with municipalities as well as implementing programs tailored to the needs of citizens; therefore, considering the significance of the research subject with the aim of applying non-governmental organizations in the administration of urban affairs as an integral element of urban planning, we deal with the institutional challenges to sustainable urban regeneration. The results suggest that the role of NGOs is inevitable in all areas of society; however, failure to use non-governmental groups in different areas of national planning has its root in history, the causes of which can be explored in three factors—sovereignty, people, and international system. The most important challenges to failure to apply non-governmental organizations in the field of urban planning are found to be weakness in private and public sector from the viewpoint of authorities, formation of asocial and negative look at non-governmental organizations, severe politicization of policy making environment, and making decision about urban affairs, etc. In order to achieve urban regeneration in cooperation with non-governmental institutions, the way authorities look at these institutions should change in the first place, and non-governmental organizations are recognized as new actors in the field of urban development and planning, and legally speaking anoperational position rather than theoretical is specified for them in the field of urban planning and policy making.