The Pathology of Arak's Urban Development from the Standpoint of Structural, Contextual and Behavioral Damages

In recent decades, the subject of urban development has gradually developed into a modern and dominant paradigm in the theoretical and academic literature on urban development and planning. Although it has been seen through different perceptions and interpretations, the paradigm generally emphasizes the sustainability and persistence of development for all and future generations. This development requires multilateral consideration of intricate dimensions of economic, social, political, cultural, and environmental issues on different scales. The literature results show that the physical development of Arak, as a metropolitan city in the middle part of Iran and close to the capital, is in an undesirable and unsustainable state. This unsustainability attracted attention to issues such as the land-use change from agricultural to residential, environmental destructions, traffic, urban furniture, slums, etc. Accordingly, the present research aimed at studying pathologically Arak urban development from the standpoints of structural, contextual, and behavioral damages. It also considered the points of view of Arak's residents. The residents' points of view were considered because of their familiarity with the issues of their city's urban development, and considering their experiences is a valuable act because it results in increased social capital and social participation. This is an applied and explorative research regarding its objective and method, respectively. The statistical population of the research was 384 persons, which included all Arak's residents 18 years old or older who were selected by multi-stage random cluster sampling, which was done according to the upper limit in Morgan's table. Affirmative factor analysis was used to analyze the data. The research model estimation was done and confirmed using Lisrel software. To assess the research model fitness, different indices were used, such as Chi-square of the degree of freedom, characteristic roots statistics, mean square error, P-Value, and CFI. Indices' values and comparing them with a fitted model showed the proper fitness of the structural model. The factors were ranked based on factor loading, and the conceptual model of urban development damages was presented in three groups structural, contextual, and behavioral. The model showed that structural damages included inability in providing income resources, the existing organizational chart, and lack of a clear organizational mission and objectives; The contextual damages included lack of citizens' participation in urban management and neglecting the costumers' opinions. Behavioral damages included lack of supervising the staff's performance, the influence of organizational culture on the staff's performance, lack of consciousness and knowledge among the staff, and lack of recognition of working standards.Accordingly, the citizens' opinions and prioritizing in removing urban development damages can be considered in Arak's urban development policymaking, which in turn will result in increased participation of the citizens in urban development projects and decreased urban development expenditures, increased social trust in the citizens and turn increased social order, increased social dynamics, increased social relationships in urban neighborhoods and among the citizens, this produces some benefits such as increased capabilities and skills of the citizens in solving problems all of which will result in more social protection for the citizens.