Urbanization provocateur: Reaching urban planning-led development in Saudi Arabia

While urbanization has been a core feature of global urban development for centuries, it does not always lead to sustainable development outcomes, especially in global South cities where the phenomenon is rapid and often unplanned. Framed around sustainable development thinking, this paper intends to provide critical analysis of sustainable urbanization by examining the barriers, drivers, processes, and outcomes associated with urban planning-led development. A case study research approach was applied in three major cities in Saudi Arabia to present convergence and divergence of urbanization-induced growth and development outcomes as well as urban planning limitations in a region that scholarly research on urbanization is recently emerging. Our findings show the critical relevance of an engaging urban planning practice across different scales of cities, and to the critical strategy of public participation for the promotion of urban planning-led development to addressing infrastructure inadequacies, inequalities, and environmental deterioration.