A community of 200,000 in Dhaka faces eviction to make room for "development". Is it time to rethink the concept, especially with a billion people now living in informal settlements worldwide?
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Articles on informal settlements
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Rebuilding informal settlements after a disaster must be done through learning from those who live in the settlements.
Indians were promised they would be included in planning 100 smart cities and that everyone would benefit. But many of the millions of slum residents have had no say in their homes being destroyed.
Women in developing countries are burdened by the lack of access to proper toilets in their homes, communities, schools and public spaces.
The rental housing market in Nairobi’s informal settlements offers its tenant households a perverse market outcome of higher prices for lower quality products
Paraffin stoves are used all over South Africa in millions of households and are the riskiest.
Kenya needs to complete its national digital land registry to increase transparency and efficiency of the city’s land.
Self-organisation initiatives taken by slum residents across Africa can help urban development.
The current debate about land reform in South Africa could open the door to reviewing urban land ownership issues.
New ways of managing water have emerged in some of Africa's urban and peri-urban areas.
The UN defines water and sanitation as human rights. Why not decent drainage too?
Research in Kenya’s capital found average levels of hazardous solid and liquid particles in the air within households were three times more than the WHO recommended maximum level.
A co-operative project that maps services in Dhaka shows how communities of citizens can be more than passive users of the digital platforms that increasingly shape our daily lives.
Informal settlements are often undocumented or hidden on official maps, but they house about a billion people worldwide. Their existence demands a more sophisticated approach to urban development.
As cities trumpet their liveability, creativity and greenness, many informal settlement activities are often relegated to the shadows.
Imagine cities competed to eliminate hunger, poverty, unemployment, crime and greenhouse emissions, and to offer housing and transport for all. Don't scoff – urban planning was once an Olympic event.
Thanks to life-skills training, girls who previously believed it improbable that they would go on to secondary school are now allowing themselves to dream about possibilities.
The past decade has shown a strong connection between political protests and the looting of foreign-owned shops in South Africa. Research shows that local leaders use protests to maintain their power.
Many African cities are sites of rapid urbanisation. To ensure that such societies are water resilient, it is necessary to address formal and informal forms of development.
Top contributors
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Research Fellow, Western Sydney University
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Senior Research Fellow, Digital Media, Western Sydney University
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Institute Associate, Institute for Culture and Society, Western Sydney University
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PhD Candidate, Australian-German Climate & Energy College, University of Melbourne
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André Stephan is a Friend of The Conversation.
Lecturer in Architectural Engineering, University of Melbourne
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Research Chair on Mobility & the Politics of Diversity. Migration; Urban Transformation, Xenophobia and Inclusion, University of the Witwatersrand
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Specially Appointed Professor, Center for the Study of Co*Design, Osaka University
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Professor of Political Studies, University of the Western Cape
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Senior Lecturer, Political Studies, University of the Western Cape
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Doctor of Philosophy, University of British Columbia
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Associate Professor, IRES, Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice, University of British Columbia
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Researcher, University of the Witwatersrand
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Assistant Professor, Division of Global Architecture, Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka University
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Research Scientist, African Population and Health Research Center
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PhD Candidate in Urban Planning, University of Melbourne
