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This article explores public participation and its impact on urban structures in Southern Africa. Often, public participation stands in opposition to existing legislation and prevailing urban policies. Using textual analysis and case studies of Harare, Zimbabwe, Johannesburg, South Africa and Luanda, Angola, this study concludes that the urban fabr...
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... excluded the African who had no voting rights whatsoever. However, the provision of such services and infrastructure and ultimately the development and shaping of the city was premised on apartheid laws that sought to segregate urban development processes based on race and ethnicity (see Figure 5). ...
Citations
... Similarly, cities in South Africa and the southern region, share the Table 2 16 identified most frequent urban strategies in African cities presented in the 243 selected papers. same challenges of informal settlements as in other African regions but they particularly have high occurrence of social and spatial inequalities and inaccessibility [112,113]. This is deeply rooted in the apartheid spatial planning history of segregation [114] in all main mega cities of the region. ...
Since the 1950s, African cities in a quest for modernity and prosperity have been urgently playing catch up to deal with the increasing demand for adequate urban systems and infrastructure. At the turn of the 21st century, many spatial planning models, technological trends, environmental challenges, and socio-economic realities are influencing African cities’ dynamics largely causing confusion and a lack of consistent planning policies. To efficiently guide a coherent and coordinated vision, frame an integrated long-term spatial logic, and give a precise direction for sustainable urban development, this paper aims to develop a localized and contextualised analysis of urban planning challenges and development strategies shaping African cities. The study provides a broad perspective looking at the potentiality of spatial planning practices to envision and transform urban life by prospecting integrated urban planning and development strategies to face increasing urban challenges in Africa. Through Systematic Literature Review (SLR) and machine-learning tools, the study brings, for the first time, consolidated and updated knowledge of urban planning practices in Africa. We analysed 243 urban studies, published between 2000 and 2023, in 107 African cities. We identified and scrutinised 17 most pressing urban challenges and 16 most applied urban strategies to address those challenges. Accordingly, the study’s findings suggest shifting the spatial planning paradigm towards urban resilience as an interoperable system of different spatial planning policies and their relevant urban development strategies. Furthermore, the study’s key arguments are to improve urban infrastructure and optimize existing cities to reverse environmental degradation and guide urban fast transformation to adapt and mitigate growing climate change catastrophes.
... Based on the above observations of context-less imported planning ideologies imported to many African countries, Watson (2014) cited in Chirisa and Matamanda (2019) laments that master planning in many African cities is just a pie in the sky. Ideologically speaking, most African planning laws have well-grounded statist and capitalistic philosophies whose major intention has been controlling physical development (Wekwete 1995). ...
... Harare is Zimbabwe's current capital and serves as the country's main political and administrative center. The city, established by the British colonial government in 1890, was known as Fort Salisbury (Chirisa & Matamanda, 2019). The term fort was borrowed from the concept of fortified cities and towns in medieval Europe, whose design was mostly influenced by the need to protect citizens from potentially hostile neighbors. ...
... During the colonial period, European modernist planning approaches of order, esthetics and economic efficiency guided urban development, while urban informality was not tolerated under these strict planning regulations (Matamanda, 2019). Urban development was concentrated within the city's boundary during the colonial period (Chirisa & Matamanda, 2019;Matamanda, 2019). Harare was also planned and developed based on the garden city concept, which resulted in the city being surrounded by a green belt, consisting of farmland and natural open spaces such as wetlands (Matamanda & Chirisa, 2014). ...
The development of new master-planned cities is a popular approach to decongest major metropolitan areas in different African countries, including Zimbabwe. This paper is an exploratory analysis of Zimbabwe’s New Capital City (NCC), being created roughly 20 kilometers outside Harare. Specifically, the paper analyzes the design of the NCC, the principles underpinning its production, the different rationalities used by policymakers for its legitimation, as well as the socioeconomic and spatial implications. Based on review of secondary literature, plans, and interviews with city planners and other professionals, the paper finds that the creation of Zimbabwe’s NCC represents urban boosterism, an active promotion of a city through development of large-scale urban development schemes and creating a new image for the city. The production of the new city is also underpinned by neoliberal motivations and imported ideas of urban planning which disregard the local planning urban context, where poverty and informality are prevalent. The creation of new master-planned cities must therefore strive to address these contemporary urban challenges rather than exacerbating them. The paper contributes to scholarly debate on the production of new master-planned cities in Africa and the Global South more broadly.
... Urban morphology analyses settlements by using cartographic sources to set up process of development by comparing historic maps [10]. Special focus of urban morphology is change in city form since origin and comparison of cities [11]. Recently, subfields developed in urban design i.e., landscape urbanism [12], sustainable urbanism [13], water-sensitive urban design [14] and strategic urban design [15]. ...
Qambar city is the head quarter of Qambar-Shahdadkot district in Sindh province of Pakistan. The city is at latitude 27.5911425 and longitude 68.008461 or 27°35′28.1′′N 68°00′30.5′′E on the earth’s surface. There is no published book or research paper available to describe the urban design and planning history of this city. The city has no comprehensive plan document to explain how conscious planning and urban design took place. No sequential records available about the formation and transformation of Qambar. Therefore, primary question explored in this paper i.e., how this city formed and transformed over the time with an integrated approach of urban morphology. The proposed approach is developed by integrating existing approaches of urban morphology developed internationally. The knowledge contribution of this paper is the novel approach of Integrated Urban Morphology for exploring undocumented and unplanned cities where no data available about the urban design, development, and planning history. To explain the usefulness of this approach the city of Qambar, Sindh, investigated and its brief findings are given in this paper. The value contribution of this research to industry, expected in the form of improvement in methodological approaches within the planning, development, and urban design professions. Vis-à-vis integrated urban morphology, remote urbanised settlements will be delved into with minimal professional expertise and financial, managerial resources to contribute merit towards urban planning, urban design, and urban development of uncharted urban contexts.
... This rapid rate of urbanization has been concomitant with urban development practice characterised by authoritarian rule, infringement of citizen rights and marginalization of some citizens' rights based on political affiliation (McGregor & Chatiza, 2020;Ndakaripa, 2020). The failure of urban development which largely remain informal, escalation of social conflicts, increasing poverty and development plans that always cause conflicts from citizens makes this study critical (Chirisa & Matamanda, 2019;Hove et al., 2020). Therefore, we situate this study in this context and seek to understand the drivers of citizen participation in urban development practice in Harare. ...
... Power is central in politics and tends to be used in a coercive manner to silence or intimidate individuals resulting in implications on public participation (Chirisa & Matamanda, 2019). Foucault (1982) defines power as the ability to influence decision making by those who determine the norm, which results in certain individuals influencing citizen participation. ...
Citizen participation enhances urban development by contributing to the attainment of inclusive, sustainable and resilience cities. However, citizen participation is not a given because cities are arenas of conflict where different stakeholders claim their right to the city citizen participation is not a given in cities. We argue that citizen participation is constructed and influenced by multiple factors that benefit the elites while disadvantaging the poor. Three case studies (informal settlers in Hopley Farm Settlement, street vendors at Coca Cola vending site and civil society group at Monavale Vlei) in Harare, Zimbabwe were used to determine the drivers of citizen participation in urban development. Data were collected through primary and secondary data sources that include questionnaires, interviews with selected city officials and document analysis. NVivo 12 Pro enabled the thematic and content analysis of the secondary data and the interviews while Kobo data collector was used to aid the data collection and analysis from the questionnaires. The findings reveal that the legislation provide for limited 'citizen' participation in urban development, especially for the poor due to the construction of citizenship. Moreover, politicians also manipulate the participation process through clientism and at times democratic channels were not considered while the lack of civic culture to participate among the citizens has also been noted. We conclude that the citizens' ability and motive to participate tends to be limited, and at times based on classism as evident from the case of Monavale Vlei.
Urban form in African cities is dynamic, unpredictable and in constant flux. Urban morphology remains mostly undocumented in Southern Africa as an emerging region. Current processes of informal land occupation, changing suburbia and incremental settlement transformation patterns present fragile, yet interesting morphological characteristics that are worthy of interpretation. How are we understanding, representing, and anticipating changing southern urban form and what is the value-add of understanding urban morphology in Southern Africa? In the absence of any formalised network of ISUF in Southern Africa, there is the potential to make a meaningful contribution to urban morphology and its associated processes and agents. Three case study perspectives from practice, research and teaching are explained to understand urban form in South Africa, as follows: 1). community-led data collection on urban form and social practice based on evidence from experiences in Cape Town townships; 2). area-based partnerships based on examples from informal settlement upgrading in Khayelitsha; and 3). deliberate and engaged teaching and learning currently taking place in the urban design programme at the University of Cape Town. Urban morphological approaches in the global south must be multi-scalar, relevant, valuable, and most importantly, affordable. This requires stripping out of irrelevant principles and techniques and focusing on low-cost, low maintenance and sustainable AI and labour-intensive of understanding the changing city. The future development of African cities needs to take a significant stand on the role of socio-economic realities, political action, local agency, and their relationships with urban form.
This paper sought to examine the challenges and government support for urban small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Zimbabwe and offer policy direction for further development of the sector. Previous studies that explored challenges facing the urban SMEs in Zimbabwe paid little attention to government support and policy strategies to develop the sector further (Chigwenya & Mudzengerere, 2013; Thebe & Ncube, 2015). This study intends to fill this gap. Using a qualitative research design, we gathered data from 25 purposively sampled SMEs through in-depth interviews. Data were analysed using content analysis. Results revealed that urban SMEs face several challenges, including access to finance, lack of technical and management skills, and stringent government regulations. Although the government implemented some policies to support SMEs, these measures were inadequate. The government should set aside more resources to support the sector, including SMEs clustering and establishing more business incubation centres to facilitate technology and skills transfer. The government should also strike a balance between the regulatory laws of the sector and its development to achieve sustained growth. More importantly, the government’s urban plans should incorporate the pressing demands of climate change in building inclusive, resilient, and sustainable cities of the future. The study proposed areas for future research
Climate change, population growth and industrial activities continue to threaten water security, especially in the semi-arid regions. Demand management policies are essential in minimising the effects of acute water shortages. Such policies require information on household water consumption patterns and their behavioural practices. This study examines household water consumption behaviour and the adoption of water-efficient appliances in Johannesburg, South Africa. The study uses probit regression models to analyse survey data collected from 889 households during the period November 2017 to February 2018. Results show that while most households do not have water-efficient appliances installed in their homes, they do practise water-efficient behaviour. Older respondents as well as males and lower-income respondents are found to be more likely to practise efficient water-use behaviour. However, biographical variables do not generally influence the adoption of water-efficient appliances. These results are essential for policy-makers when formulating targeted water demand management policies. Thus, policy-makers should focus more on younger people, women and higher-income households when developing campaigns on efficient water-use behaviour. HIGHLIGHTS
Households generally do not have water-efficient appliances installed in their homes.;
Households practise efficient water consumption behaviour.;
Biographical characteristics determine water consumption behaviour.;
Biographic characteristics do not determine the adoption of water-efficient appliances.;
Results inform water demand management policies in South Africa, a water-scarce country.;
The human ecosystems model is used to explore the human impact on urban ecosystems in Harare. The chapter explores several questions: What are the urban ecological risks in the postcolonial city? How do residents perceive urban ecosystems? How do politics and urban governance systems exist to regulate or manage the relationships between humans and urban ecosystems? The chapter reveals that urban ecosystems are complex and fragile spaces that face multiple stressors associated with increasing urbanisation. The nature and characteristics of the urbanisation process have resulted in degradation, downsizing or loss of open spaces and protected areas such as wetlands and public parks. Land and water resources are increasingly polluted due to the dumping of solid waste and the run-off of chemicals and fertilisers from urban agriculture. The continued degradation of the environment is deeply disturbing and challenges the notion of stewardship of the environment where communities value ecosystem services and, hence, act as good stewards of their environment. Furthermore, political ecology features in the urban ecology literature and influences environmental sustainability together with unclear and overlapping statutes and governing institutions, or gross neglect of the legislation on the urban environment.
