Authority and Inclusion: Reconsidering Integration in a Fragmented Age

This paper explores the meaning of refugee integration in a fragmented age where multi-culturalism is said to be dead. It focuses on the results of recent research in four cities in South and East Africa, which showed an increasing tendency towards new forms of association that the author termed “communities of convenience”. The author reflects upon the lessons that these highly mobile African urban contexts offer for refugee integration in Britain

Passage, Profit, Protection and the Challenge of Participation

Accepting that successful 'development' is premised on a population's participation in a collective undertaking, we must understand urban residents' interactions and ambitions. In African cities being transformed by geographic and social mobility, it is umigration, urbanization, African cities, social cohesion, integration,

Passage, profit, protection and the challenge of participation

Accepting that successful 'development' is premised on a population's participation in a collective undertaking, we must understand urban residents'; interactions and ambitions. In African cities being transformed by geographic and social mobility, it is unclear what forms of inclusion, solidarity or mutual recognition are desired or possible among those who live there. This paper argues that the pursuit of three objectives - profit, protection and passage - shaping these cities' social formations in ways that limit the ability of official and non-official institutions to interweave popular aspirations - however temporarily - to promote a common and mutually beneficial future. The paper starts from the premise that the novelty of the emerging social forms within Africa's cities requires a willingness to induce: to build a conceptual vocabulary of belonging reflecting practices of those living in and moving through Africa's cities. Only after doing this will we have the building blocks for further debate. With this in mind, the paper works towards a pair of interrelated tasks. The first is to challenge three premises often informing discussions of mobility and urban politics: (i) the presence of a dominant host community or political order; (ii) that cities are destinations and not points of transit; and (iii) that state institutions are the primary source of exclusion and the most potent tool for fostering inclusion in a collective endeavour. Second, it considers one form of membership and inclusion that can emerge where the presumptions outlined above do not hold. In doing so, it points to a kind of 'tactical cosmopolitanism' a set of discourses and practices that can subvert ethnic or national chauvinism and restrictive migration or anti-urbanization policies and practices. Drawing primarily on examples from Johannesburg, it shows how migrants negotiate partial inclusion in transforming societies without becoming bounded by them. The paper ends by reflecting briefly on the challenges such tactics pose for generating a collective urban project

LSE Festival 2021: trying to keep people out of cities will drive them underground

States have tried to limit people’s movements in an effort to contain COVID-19. But keeping people out of cities denies them the ability to better their lives and escape from persecution and repressive hierarchies. Underground economies will flourish unless we empower city authorities to act independently, says Loren B Landau (University of Oxford and University of the Witwatersrand)

Human Development Impacts of Migration: South Africa Case Study

Controls on human mobility and efforts to undermine them continue to shape South Africa’s politics, economy, and society. Despite the need for improved policy responses to human mobility, reform is hindered by lack of capacity, misinformation, and anti-migrant sentiments within and outside of government. This report outlines these trends and tensions by providing a broad overview of the limited demographic and socio-economic data available on migration to and within South Africa. Doing so highlights the spatialised aspects of human mobility, trends centred on and around the country’s towns and cities. It also finds significant development potential in international migrants’ skills and entrepreneurialism. By enhancing remittances and trade, non-nationals may also expand markets for South African products and services. Despite these potential benefits, there are severe obstacles to immigration reform. These include a renewed South African populism; the influence of a strong anti-trafficking lobby; a European Union (EU) agenda promoting stricter border controls; poor implementation capacity; and endemic corruption among police and immigration officials. There are different, but equally significant problems in reforming frameworks governing domestic mobility including perceptions that in-migration is an inherent drain on municipal budgets. Recognising these limitations, the report concludes with three recommendations. (1) A conceptual reconsideration of the divisions between documented and undocumented migrants; between voluntary and forced migrants; and between international and domestic migration. (2) An analytical respatialisation in future planning and management scenarios involving regional and local bodies in evaluating, designing and implementing policy. (3) To situate migration and its management within global debates over governance and development and for ‘migration mainstreaming’ into all aspects of governance. The success of any of these initiatives will require better data, the skills to analyse that data, and the integration of data into planning processes.migration, urbanisation, governance, South Africa, policy reform, capabilities

Displacement and difference in Lubumbashi

Signs on the outskirts of the second largest city in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) welcome visitors to ‘the city of peace’. Lubumbashi has a reputation as a haven of tolerance in a violent nation but how are displaced people treated