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was then considered as a solution. It is in this context of
testing participatory methods that online maps appeared,
offering more possibilities for public participation than GIS.
2.2.1.
The emergence and criticisms of GIS
A GIS is defined as “a geo-referenced database associated
with software that enables the introduction of queries”
[PON 04]. This tool gave rise to a large number of uses as
listed in the French Society of Photogrammetry and Remote
Sensing (SFPT)
4
. For SFPT, a GIS is an “informatics system
which, starting from various sources, facilitates gathering,
organizing, managing, analyzing, combining, elaborating and
presenting
geographically
localized
information,
thereby
5
contributing
to
the
management
of
space”
quoted
in
[KOE 06, p.2].
It is possible to divide the historical development of GIS
into three distinct phases [COP 91, p.39]:
- The initial period, between 1950 and 1975: research on
the automatic processing of geographical information was
still
tentative
and
restricted
to
universities
in
a
few
Anglo-Saxon countries (mainly the US and the UK).
- The second phase extends until the beginning of the
1980s: GISs become the object of more ambitious research
projects and several cartographic agencies are created.
- The third phase lasts from the 1980s to the present: the
approach is focused on the uses made by the large public
with, as a result, a broader range of applications of GIS.
4
Société française de photogrammétrie et de télédétection
.
5 “[…] un système informatique qui permet à partir de diverses sources, de
rassembler, d'organiser, de gérer, d'analyser, de combiner, d'élaborer et de
présenter
des
informations
localisées
géographiquement,
contribuant
notamment à la gestion de l'espace”.
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