Interrogating differences: A comparative analysis of Africa's informal settlements

Urban development in Africa is a very diverse and ambivalent phenomenon with aspects that do not fall neatly into global standards. Informal settlements therefore challenge governance by standards. We argue that quantifying and interrogating differences offers a better basis for governance. By drawing on a comparative analysis of three different informal settlements in Sub-Saharan Africa, this paper explores what differences reveal about the governance of informal settlements. The paper uses an urban societal metabolism approach, focussed on gender, energy and health, based on questionnaires and focus group discussions in Enkanini (Stellenbosch, South Africa), Mathare (Nairobi, Kenya), and Kasubi-Kawaala (Kampala, Uganda). The contribution of the paper is both empirical and theoretical. Empirically, we provide new evidence about the metabolism of urban informality at multiple levels of analysis: the individual, the household and the settlement. Findings show the gender asymmetries in urban poverty and the intricate links between energy choices, health and economic status. Theoretically, we argue that different levels of analysis produce different understandings of urban informality, and that analyzing informal settlements only by population aggregates means missing information. We conclude by arguing that understanding differences leads to the formulation of modest and localised goals, which are better able to take into account the complexity of urban informality

Design and Poverty : A Review of Contexts, Roles of Poor People, and Methods

Design is essential to fulfil unmet or under-served needs of resource-poor societies, supporting their social and human development. A great deal of design research has been undertaken in such low resource settings, and is discussed under different names, such as ‘community development engineering’, ‘humanitarian engineering’, ‘appropriate technology’, ‘design for development’, ‘design at the Base of the Pyramid’, etc. This has created an important need to know what has been examined and learnt so far and to plan for further investigation. To address this, we review a broad range of literature, with close examination of 30 design studies in this field. This reveals a multifaceted picture, showing a great diversity in investigation and reporting of attributes of context (income, rural and urban, design sectors, countries, and gender), the roles of poor people (consumers, producers, and co-designers), characteristics of research methods employed (e.g. descriptive and prescriptive, data collection methods, qualitative and quantitative aspects, and unit of analysis), and design topics. Based on the review results, we offer recommendations for further research, identifying concerns that researchers ought to have about this field and suggesting ways in which research in this field can be undertaken and reported