AbstractMichael Batty redefines regeneration within the context of a wider system of urban reproduction. A spontaneous response to self‐organisation, regeneration is a force that can just as easily manifest itself in dereliction and decline. As part of a bottom‐up system, what role can there be for intervention by designers and policy‐makers? Batty suggests how urban planning needs to identify key points where small change can lead to massive change for the better, so as ‘to plant seeds that do not fall on stony ground’. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.