A hundred-year-old street market in Bangalore was demolished in the dead of night last month. The colourful stalls of vendors spilling out onto the streets were illegal encroachments, but how much history and local colour is lost by enforcing the law now after so many years of peaceful coexistence?
There is no better time to witness the shortsightedness of governments than around elections. With municipal elections just around the corner in Mumbai, a whole raft of new promises are being made to certain slum dwellers...
There are many celebrated ideas and personalities in urban development, but how many survive the test of time? Two writers reflect on the legacy of John Turner, a quiet hero of global urbanism.
Slum neighbourhoods are teeming with industry and commerce, yet the policy sphere still tends to treat them as residential spaces alone. What are the consequences of this misconception, and is it time to invoke a right to space, not just of housing?
Rather than turn to Dharavi, Ahmedabad would do well to look amongst its own social entrepreneurs for models to rehouse the poor and integrate them into their new roles as homeowners.
While economic development policies might contradict and undermine the needs of the urban poor, slums like Dharavi may incubate industries that can export to the world and should be embraced.
The current slum rehabilitation scheme creates incentives for developers to distort the housing market; civil society must challenge the rhetoric of 'free housing' to allow leaders to consider alternatives.
Timeyin Uwejamomere is Senior Policy Analyst for urban water and sanitation services and current Country Representative for Nigeria at WaterAid.
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The Global Urbanist is an online magazine reviewing urban affairs and urban development issues in cities throughout the developed and developing world.
Its readers are drawn from the urban policy and international development sectors, and include urban planners, officers in local, national or international government agencies, civil society leaders, and researchers.
