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Articles on urban slums

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Just another day in Nairobi’s Kibera slums. Slums are characterised by densely packed settlements with inadequate provision of services. Reuters/Noor Khamis

Slum health is not urban health: why we must distinguish between the two

Alex Ezeh, African Population and Health Research Center; Blessing Mberu, African Population and Health Research Center, and Tilahun Haregu, African Population and Health Research Center

Despite increased global awareness about poor conditions in slums, the health of their inhabitants is a little studied phenomenon.
Brazil’s favelas are famous, but so are its ambitious efforts to bring roads, water, electricity, and land rights to its informal urban settlements. eflon/flickr

Is this the end of slum upgrading in Brazil?

Patricia Rodrigues Samora, Pontifical Catholic University of Campinas

For decades, Brazil has worked to improve conditions in its poorest neighbourhoods: building roads, drainage, lighting, and safer housing. Will budget cuts end its ambitious slum-upgrading efforts?
The rear of 30-32 Oxford Street, an area of Sydney affected by an outbreak of bubonic plague in 1900. Wikimedia/NSW State Archives

Why 100 years without slum housing in Australia is coming to an end

Emma Baker, University of Adelaide; Andrew Beer, University of South Australia, and Rebecca Bentley, University of Melbourne

New research finds almost a million Australians are living in poor or very poor-quality housing, with more than 100,000 in dwellings regarded as very poor or derelict.
A colorized 1937 photograph of a shantytown on the outskirts of Seattle. photoretrofit/Reddit

In Rio’s bulldozed favelas, echoes of America’s shantytowns

Lisa Goff, University of Virginia

Like Brazil's favela dwellers, America's working poor felt a sense of pride and community in their shantytowns – and desperately resisted the powerful interests that sought to demolish them.
Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, is one of the fastest-growing cities in the world despite its ranking as one of the ‘least liveable’. mariusz kluzniak/flickr

Signals from the noise of urban innovation in the world’s ‘second-least-liveable’ city

Teresa Swist, Western Sydney University; David Sweeting, Western Sydney University, and Liam Magee, Western Sydney University

Bringing significant benefits to an emergent middle class, Dhaka's cultural, economic, environmental and political landscapes are being rapidly but unevenly transformed.
As machinery demolishes houses behind them, Jakarta police evict residents from the settlement of Luar Batang in April. Reuters/Beawiharta Beawiharta

Will Habitat III defend the human right to the city?

Paul Jones, University of Sydney

The world's informal settlements are growing at an unprecedented rate, with about one in four urban dwellers living in slums. We need to rethink how we view and deal with these people and places.

Related Topics

  1. Brazil
  2. Cities
  3. Cities & Policy
  4. Housing
  5. housing policy
  6. Poverty
  7. Public health
  8. Slums
  9. Urban planning
  10. Urban policy

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