Book excerpt: The book discusses and organizes planning theories in a new way. Building on a foundation in scientific theory, both planning practice and the planning sciences are thereby classified and their inherent importance is organized in terms of knowledge generation. The core of the book is a knowledge-oriented systematization of planning knowledge in the form of planning theories, the topology of planning theories. The target audience of this work are academic as well as practical users from diverse disciplines with spatial impact, such as spatial planning, urban planning, regional planning, landscape planning, geography, urban studies, architecture and landscape architecture.