No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the authors.
Driving Forces of Citizen Participation in Urban Development Practice in Harare, Zimbabwe
Abstract
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.
... The failure to recognize the utility of street vending in the formal economy has resulted in numerous tensions and conflicts in most African cities between the authorities and the street vendors over issues in licensing, taxation, site of operation sanitation and working conditions (Bandauko & Mandisvika, 2015;Matamanda & Chinozvina, 2020;Resnick, 2020). In response, street vendors employ different strategies to access urban space (Steel, 2012). ...
... This somehow legitimizes the vendors and enables their voices to be heard collectively instead of individually as they engage in collective advocacy and agency when deliberating with the authorities (Nyemb, 2017). However, this legal process is not an option for many street vendors considering the cost implications of legal procedures (Matamanda & Chinozvina, 2020). Furthermore, street vendors form relationships with formal owners to help fight against their injustices, while other formal shop owners help them 'hide' their products when city authorities arrive and conduct blitz (Forkuor et al., 2017). ...
... It also follows that planners often have failed to adequately position some services based on the notion of modernity alluded to by Kamete (2020), which forces the vendors to take matters into their hands and strategically position themselves. Matamanda and Chinozvina (2020) have Again, the respondents all agreed with great enthusiasm that MN1R is a viable space for their business because it is closer to economic activities like the newly built hospital, garage and bars. Moreover, there is a high volume of traffic since the road is used by all residents residing in the northern side of Maseru. ...
This article explores the lived daily experiences of street vendors operating along the Main North 1 Road in the CBD of Maseru, Lesotho. This exploration considers how street vendors access and negotiate a claim for the right to the street. The challenges confronting these vendors in their daily hustling, including COVID-19 restrictions, are also examined. A narrative inquiry research design informs this article with data collected from interviews with purposively selected street vendors from Maseru. This primary data was triangulated with document analysis to increase the validity of the findings. The findings highlight strategies employed by vendors in Maseru that include integrating with the formal enterprises, diversifying their trades, resisting and frustrating certain decisions by the local authorities, and contributing to urban blight. A framework for interrogating and understanding street vending and its nuances is postulated based on the findings from Maseru. The article strongly appeals to the authorities to find more benign ways of integrating street vending into the production of cities.
... Hence, especially the curves or intersections, and also including the two-way one lane both need to be noticed as well as making some notes that need to be improved in the process of observation so that improve the safety. Matamanda and Chinozvina (2020) in their article named Driving Forces of Citizen Participation in Urban Development Practice in Harare, Zimbabwe explained that the civil participation in urban construction usually is good for mid-class or Elite level because of some influences or factors, but it is not good for poor group (Matamanda & Chinozvina 2020). This means mid-class and elites have the right to adjust or control some policies and acts. ...
... Hence, especially the curves or intersections, and also including the two-way one lane both need to be noticed as well as making some notes that need to be improved in the process of observation so that improve the safety. Matamanda and Chinozvina (2020) in their article named Driving Forces of Citizen Participation in Urban Development Practice in Harare, Zimbabwe explained that the civil participation in urban construction usually is good for mid-class or Elite level because of some influences or factors, but it is not good for poor group (Matamanda & Chinozvina 2020). This means mid-class and elites have the right to adjust or control some policies and acts. ...
... Thus, civil participation cannot merely incline to the mid-class or higher, but also needs to care about the poor group by listening to their voices, accepting their opinions or suggestion, and even making some policies or acts to incline to them. Plus, Matamanda and Chinozvina (2020) also cited Enslin's (2020) opinion that civil participation could be determined by citizenship as well as it makes citizens have values, identity, and rights (Enslin 2020). So, civil participation not only could help citizens provide their questions, and suggestions, but also it can make citizens seek a sense of identity, which means to make them feel they are a member of this community rather than be isolated, and these are rights for them so that nobody could deprive it. ...
This article will be based on the research on the impact of current traffic conditions on students and communities in Auburn City. According to this article, readers would be able to understand the current traffic situation that road layout, design problems, the situations of infrastructure construction, the degree of public participation, etc. in Auburn City. Besides, this article would follow the qualitative method's principles to provide detailed information through surveys, interviews, local observations, and analyses. To sum up, this article could guide readers to understand the truth of Auburn's transportation plan. The qualitative method could objectively explain and analyze how traffic conditions affect schools and communities, and the attitude of residents to community development.
... Citizen participation is fundamental to the sustainable and resilient development of communities and cities (Matamanda and Chinozvina, 2020). In Zimbabwe, it is well-articulated in the Regional Town and Country Planning Act (RTCPA), the Urban Councils Act (UCA) and the Constitution of Zimbabwe Amendment No. 20 of 2013 (GoZ, 1976(GoZ, , 2013(GoZ, , 2015 and in these, people are given a fairground upon which they can participate in community development issues at local and national levels. ...
... Defined as a process of empowering the mass by giving them a fairground to participate and the power to negotiate with the development delivery system, citizen engagement forms an important part of the urban development processe.It helps in the attainment of sustainable, inclusive and resilient cities (Nekwaya, 2007;Chikerema, 2013;Matamanda and Chinozvina, 2020). This becomes possible because, through the increase of social capital in the form of firm community relationships and shared norms and values, people earn the power to negotiate and make their concerns known Social capital is known to create social links, trustworthiness and reciprocity of norms (Putman, 2000) and through civil society organisations and public hearing fora, people's concerns may be heard (Chikerema, 2013). ...
... The article notes the unwillingness of some members of the public to participate in community meetings and the ability of some individuals to appear in community meetings more than one ward. Matamanda and Chinozvina (2020) stress that lack of will to participate by some people is based mainly on classism. There is a need to know that not everyone that attends community meetings is literate and also a need to explain the meeting agenda in simple language. ...
The article reports and discusses critical insights and foresight that emerged from a workshop on the role of citizen engagement in community development and council budgeting held on the 21 st and 23 rd of December 2020 in Harare. The article unpacks the reasons behind fake promises by Councillors and Members of Parliament (MPs) to gain public vote, the inability of those in power to represent the public interest and various reasons behind the lack of zeal by the community members to participate in community meetings. The workshop revealed that community members lack unity, in many instances, fail to contribute towards the budgetary process by councils. The workshop recommended the need for community members to come together regardless of party interests and participate in council budgeting for societal interest to be fairly represented. The article emphasises the active role of Councillors and MPs in luring citizens to participate in council budgeting and community development. The workshop concluded that for community development to thrive, citizens ought to be involved in community affairs. This article journeys into the lives of ordinary citizens and the challenges they face regarding participation in community-based development programmes and council budgeting.
... This study was conducted in Murewa District of Mashonaland East Province of Zimbabwe and interrogated the role played by both local authorities and public officials in encouraging ordinary citizens to participate in district development planning. This study will add knowledge on citizen participation and engagement in rural areas unlike other research on citizen participation that were carried earlier by McGregor and Chatiza (2019), Matamanda and Chinozvina (2020) and Chigwena and Ndiweni (2021) that had a bias on urban areas. The objective of this study is to examine the extent to which public officials in Murewa District encourage citizen participation and the bottlenecks that undermine this process. ...
... Although citizens can participate in decision making, public officials also play a role in determining participation. Matamanda and Chinozvina (2020) argued that participation of citizens is limited because planners assume that they have knowledge of what citizens want. This will lead to passive participation as citizens are left with limited role to play in the planning process of their community or district. ...
This study unpacks the role played by government authorities in stimulating citizen participation in local development. Citizen participation, being the core to sustainable development, has been of interest among development practitioners and scholars alike, with varying degrees of attention in its scope and how participation can actually occur. One of the observed trends is the critical role played by both local and national government authorities. Development planning is closely tied to citizen participation under clearly defined roles of the officials involved. The participation of citizens in local activities is not a voluntary process but a deliberate action of the authorities through various measures such as creating an environment in which everyone is equally important in contributing to change in the communities they live. The role of local and national officials has been on spotlight in developing countries, including Zimbabwe and in marginalised areas such as Murewa District of Zimbabwe. The Murewa District of Mashonaland East Province has been cited as an area in which citizen participation has remained low. The objective of this paper is to therefore examine the extent to which local authorities in Murewa District encourage citizen participation and the bottlenecks that undermine this process. Data were collected through primary data sources, including questionnaire surveys and interviews with selected local authority officials. The results of the study indicate that in Murewa District most citizens have never had the opportunity to propose policies to the council, individually or collectively as part of the local community due to the prohibitive role played by the local authorities. The study also established that citizen participation cannot be separated from the role of local and national public officials who should provide leadership and guidance to the development process and create the required democratic culture by implementing the decentralisation agenda, as stipulated in the Zimbabwe 2013 Constitution and through the adoption of participatory policy at all levels of government.
... Furthermore, when ecological resources are easily accessible by foot around the settlement, indicating high walkability, they are perceived as valuable resources that can be accessed regularly. This accessibility serves as a driving force for citizen participation in the city (Matamanda and Chinozvina, 2020). The more frequently and conveniently residents use blue-green spaces, which are significant urban ecological resources, the higher the recognition of its ecological value, social services, recreation and enjoyment, and other use values. ...
Free-download Link:
https://authors.elsevier.com/c/1j6tp14Z6tsr1F
... Street traders themselves face several operational challenges. The formal economy's failure to recognize the value of street trading leads to tensions and conflicts in many African cities, particularly regarding permit issuance, taxation, and operational conditions (Bandauko & Mandisvika, 2015;Matamanda & Chinozvina, 2020;Resnick, 2020;Matamanda et al., 2023). The Bellagio Declaration identifies six common global problems faced by street traders: lack of legal status and the right to vend, inadequate space or poor location, restrictive licensing, high regulatory costs, harassment including bribes and evictions, lack of services and infrastructure, and insufficient representation or voice (Mitullah, 2004). ...
This study investigates the relationship between street trading and urban planning in Enugu City, Nigeria, within the expanding informal economy of the global South. It particularly focuses on the perspectives of urban planners regarding the impacts and management of street trading. The research employed a mixed-method approach, including personal observation, questionnaires, and in-depth interviews, analyzed through basic statistical methods. Findings reveal that urban planners recognize the socio-economic importance and cultural relevance of street trading, despite its negative spatial externalities. Contrary to prevailing assumptions, planners favour negotiated solutions over forced evictions. This study highlights the need for inclusive urban planning practices that accommodate the socio-economic benefits of street trading while addressing its challenges, contributing to the discourse on sustainable urban development.
... This does not imply that he or she is not guilty; but, if you only concentrate on the Minister, you will be forced to settle for the answers that are the least difficult to understand because it only provides a portion of the overall picture. There is not a single entity that can be held solely responsible for the complexity of urban land governance (Matamanda & Chinozvina, 2020;Chiweshe, 2020). The control and governance of urban areas are significantly influenced by local politics, notably those that take place within the city of Harare. ...
... They adopted a 'modernistic approach' to planning and developing Harare, where agriculture was considered a rural land use. Rather, agriculture was considered an activity for the European elites who would engage in the white suburbs (Matamanda and Chinozvina, 2020). ...
A R T I C L E I N F O Keywords: spatial justice urban agriculture land use planning Harare A B S T R A C T The debate on urban agriculture in African cities has focused on the environmental consequences and the livelihood support to the urban poor. These debates are primarily centered on the urban policies and plans that largely fail to integrate urban agriculture, albeit its importance. This study expands on this scholarship but fo-cuses on the interplay of urban agriculture and spatial justice in Harare. We argue that urban planning in Harare is premised on classism and perpetuates spatial segregation, which manifests through different land uses in residential suburbs for the low-and high-income suburbs. Using an exploratory phenomenological approach, we interrogate the interplay through in-depth interviews with respondents from three study contexts: Hopley Farm Settlement and two suburbs, Hatfield and Glen-View. The primary data were triangulated with secondary data to increase the validity of the study. The findings challenge the common assumption that urban agriculture is essentially a survival strategy that the urban poor engage in to support their livelihoods. Rather, beyond the subsistence nature of urban agriculture practices among the poor, the current practice in Harare is characterized by a new group of elites who have commodified urban agriculture. Unlike the authorities' restrictive policies and strategies in poor neighborhoods, urban agriculture has been integrated into the official land use plans, becoming an integral land use activity in the affluent suburbs. This study draws attention to a largely overlooked aspect in literature on spatial (in) justice in the Zimbabwean context.
... This is not to exonerate him or her but focusing on the Minister alone will be settling for the all-too-easy explanations as it presents only part of the picture. The complexity characterising the regulation of urban land goes beyond a single party (Matamanda & Chinozvina, 2020;Chiweshe, 2020). It is writ large that local politics influence the regulation and governance of urban space, particularly within Harare City. ...
For years, urban scholars have underscored the value of pristine and functioning ecosystems, including urban wetlands, to human life. However, less well-understood is the role of local government (mainly urban municipalities) in preserving these wetlands, especially in African cities. Drawing on a Zimbabwean case study and utilising the Urban Sustainability Framework (USF), this article examines how and why the Harare municipality has failed to protect wetlands in and around Harare City by allowing for the expansion of infrastructural development in wetland areas despite the existence of city by-laws and planning policies regulating the built environment. The article further adopts a critical view of what the law prescribes for wetland preservation vis-à-vis the local government’s practical actions in preserving urban ecosystems. Such an enquiry lies at the heart of understanding the sustainability of cities in the Global South in the wake of various anthropogenic and other human activities wrought by the growing pressures of urbanisation. The analysis is pertinent in deepening our empirical understanding of the role of local government and cities in shaping local, national and global sustainability.
This book analyses urban planning in Anglophone, Francophone, and Lusophone Africa, exploring its history and advocating for new approaches. In a climate changing world, cities need to be reimagined and designed to be more sustainable, but despite being one of the fastest urbanising continents, Africa has generally weak urban planning systems. The chapters adopt multi-disciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches, combining insights from urban studies and policy sciences, emphasising existing gaps, particularly in decision-making, planning practice and inclusiveness, to offer an in-depth analysis of urban planning in Africa. The authors advocate for the reimagination of urban planning, debating new institutionalism, digital infrastructure, climate urbanism, gated communities, and smart mobility. The chapters provide both theoretical and practical contributions, and advance thinking, policymaking, and implementation of sustainable urban planning approaches in Africa, thus making the book indispensable for advanced students, researchers, and practitioners alike.
Increasing dry spells, droughts, and COVID-19-induced water demand exposed challenges in access, allocation and management of water in cities. Recognition of the right to water as a fundamental human right by the UN in 2010 marked a milestone in water governance. Nevertheless, in practice, water rights are still being negotiated, obscured and fought for, especially within cities in Africa. In Zimbabwe, despite adopting many initiatives, including policy reforms and technology advancements,erratic water supply, increasing pressure on communal water points, and proliferation of shallow wells continue unabated, reflecting the dissonance between the water right "on paper" and the practical realities on the ground. This paper explained the complex challenges inherent within the water sector and the potential prospects for effective water management in Zimbabwe basing on improved water governance. A desk-based review of past literature and a SWOT analysis focused on three dimensions: governance structure, governance processes, and key actors evaluated the current state's of Zimbabwe's policy, institutional and legislative frameworks. The findings revealed that policy and institutional reform have advanced at the national level and on paper; however, policy implementation is the main challenge at lower levels as it is patchy or insignificant. Furthermore, minimal capacitation exists at the technical and institutional level due to poor enforcement of regulations; however, civic engagement has improved consumer voice in water issues and may ensure efficiency in the water structures and curb corruption cases.
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.
Spatial governance pertains to the planning and management of activities in space, with the primary purpose of ensuring that the activities and development support and improves the sustainability of the urban system. Key considerations of sustainability are the health of the broader socio-ecological system and that of the people who live and work within it. Sadly, there are many spatial governance or development control approaches that cater only for one section of the population and ignore or harass other groups whose way of life and livelihoods do not conform to their vision. This chapter examines whether the spatial governance system is used to improve the lives and livelihoods of the poor by embracing informality and concentrating on controlling only the most critical activities that affect the health and safety of residents within the socio-ecological system. However, our findings revealed high levels of injustice, particularly to those who are considered dissidents or stand in the way of realising the image that the municipal and national government wishes to project to the world.
The youth in post-land reform Zimbabwe are engaged in struggles for land ownership, access and control. This article focuses on youth struggles from the grassroots to the national level. The struggles for land emanate from a number of factors among which are: elite alienation, the state’s failure to exercise its constitutional mandate of a broad-based land reform, weak economic structure, the conflation of party and state politics, political opportunity calculations and social justice concerns. The conflation of party and state politics has exacerbated the use of land for patronage purposes and led to further youth disenfranchisement and more parochialism, as demonstrated by the narrowing of the youth’s national struggle for land to a party political matter. This has subordinated youth land struggles to the dictates of party politics. Youth in the rural areas unable to access productive land embarked on informal land occupation as they waited for unfulfilled promises from the authorities. The youth struggles are at a crossroads as the state’s narrative, discourse and policy position shifts under a new administration and economic order premised on neoliberalism.
Seeking Urban Transformation. Alternative Urban Futures in Zimbabwe tells the stories of ordinary people's struggles to remake urban centres. It interrogates and highlights the principle conditions in which urban transformation takes place. The main catalysts of the transformation are social movements and planning institutions. Social movements pool resources and skills, acquire land, install infrastructure and build houses. Planning institutions change policies, regulations and traditions to embrace and support a new form of urban development driven by grassroots movements.
Besides providing a comprehensive analysis of planning and housing in Zimbabwe, there is a specific focus on three urban centres of Harare, Chitungwiza and Epworth. In metropolitan Harare, the books examines new housing and infrastructure series to the predominantly urban poor population; vital roles played by the urban poor in urban development and the adoption by planning institutions of grassroots-centered, urban-planning approaches.
The book draws from three case studies and in-depth interviews from diverse urban shapers i.e. representatives and members of social movements, urban planners, engineers, surveyors, policy makers, politicians, civil society workers and students to generate a varied selection of insights and experiences. Based on the Zimbabwean experience, the book illustrates how actions and power of ordinary people contributes to the transformation of African cities.
On the margins of Zimbabwe’s expanding capital Harare, the ruling ZANU–PF party promotes a view of access to urban land, housing and security as ‘gift’, conditional on demonstrations of party loyalty. This article discusses contestation over this form of partisan citizenship, making the following broader arguments. First, it argues that the notion of partisan citizenship draws attention to the role of party political affiliation as a source of differential entitlements in illiberal democracies, countering a tendency to emphasise ethno-regional, racialized or religious communal identities as the primary sources of graduated citizenship in Africa. Second, it casts clientelist subjection as a contextual and contentious domain of ideas and action, rather than presenting it as cultural persistence or reducing it solely to material bargaining. Third, the article uses the Zimbabwean case to caution against a tendency within debates over southern urbanism to celebrate land occupations and informal construction as political resistance and route to full citizenship. In these ways, the article offers partisan citizenship as a means of taking forward debates over re-configurations of citizenship in Africa’s illiberal democracies and the politics of precarious peripheries in the urbanising global South more broadly.
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 fabric and structure of Southern African cities are in a state of instability. The rise of public participation -"right to the city"-has given way to "cities of rebels" in which citizens react or rebel against urban policies and legislation. These forces threaten sustainable urban morphology and service delivery, complicating the roles of urban planners and managers.
Rwanda’s has made remarkable all-round progress over the last 25 years. This is usually attributed to a determined national government under single-minded leadership. This paper draws attention to two local drivers of Rwanda’s socio-economic development: community participation and a positive approach to urbanisation. Popular involvement in communal projects has helped to build and maintain many useful public facilities. It has also fostered social solidarity and dialogue between citizens and public officials. The positive urban policy has helped to create more efficient and liveable cities, which are driving economic prosperity and human development. Nevertheless, there is scope for greater consistency and alignment between top-down and bottom-up processes in order to improve the suitability and responsiveness of national policies and practices to grassroots realities.
This article examines the obstacles to public participation in a representative democracy and the approaches that can help to overcome these obstacles. Democracy is never perfect because of the inherent difficulties of developing democratic institutions, yet the drawbacks of representative democracy are considerably greater than those of direct democracy. We consider public participation as an element of direct democracy integrated into the structure of representative democracy in order to balance the power of the centre with that of the constituent members of the democratic system. We underscore the role of nomocracy, by which we mean promoting the power of equitable legal and other social rules over the power of the centre. In public participation, the functioning of rules faces greater obstacles than in other forms of democracy. Thus, the professionalism of planners and public administrators is particularly important in formulating these rules; it is even more important when the challenges of establishing rules are major or insuperable. We distinguish between two types of planning professionalism: teleocratic (based primarily on technocratic skills) and nomocratic (based on the nomocratic liberal approach). We recognize the significance of the former, but our main contribution to the debate on public participation is to emphasize the crucial importance and priority of nomocratic professionalism in overcoming the difficulties of citizen involvement and the shortcomings of representative democracy. To test our conclusions, we explore the practice TheorySlaev et al. research-article2019 Original Article 2 Planning Theory 00(0) of citizen engagement in the process of planning bikeway networks in several large Bulgarian cities, where public participation is frustrated by the prevalence of the teleocratic approach and the lack of nomocratic traditions.
Citizen participation is an important part of urban planning but few people participate, and most frequently they can do so only passively. This can result in excluding many people and to urban designs not reflecting people's wishes. In this paper, we explore the use of interactive, immersive public displays as facilitators for deeper participation in urban planning. We propose a novel approach that combines panoramic videos of locations with overlays depicting planned buildings. We evaluated it in a lab-based user study (N=21), where participants used a simple mobile client for interacting with a prototypical implementation to vote/comment on urban planning proposals. Usefulness, ease of use, ease of learning and user satisfaction were all rated highly by the participants. The pros and cons of the approach were further identified based on the analysis of the interview data. Overall, the results provide initial evidence that the approach succeeded in facilitating deeper participation.
Citizens' initiatives for climate action are actively encouraged by governments to enhance the resilience of communities to climate change. This increased responsibilisation of citizens has implications for the roles of governments. The degree of government involvement does not necessarily decline, but government roles may need to shift: from a regulating and steering government towards a more collaborative and responsive government that enables and facilitates community initiatives that are self-governed by citizens. However, we lack a conceptual understanding of such new government roles, as well as empirical insights into how local governments participate in citizens' initiatives and how they take up such new roles. In this paper, a "ladder of government participation" is introduced, which is used to explore the roles of local governments in citizens' initiatives for climate change adaptation in the Netherlands. The results show that local governments are slowly but gradually shifting towards more networking, stimulating, and facilitating roles. Key concerns of local practitioners are (a) a lack of flexibility and support of their own municipal organisation to facilitate citizens' initiatives, (b) uncertainty about the continuity of citizens' initiatives over time, and (c) a potential increase of inequity among citizen groups resulting from facilitating citizens' initiatives. An important finding is that the roles of local governments tend to be flexible, in that they can move from one role to the other over time for one and the same citizens' initiative depending on its stage of development, as well as take up several roles simultaneously for different citizens' initiatives.This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
This article assesses the legal and institutional framework around governance of wetlands and wetland-related ecosystem services in Harare, the capital city of Zimbabwe (member of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands). A mixed research methodology, comprising review of literature, interviews, document analysis, and Geographical Information Systems, forms the key methodology used in this study. Results from analyzed data show that lack of a clear and harmonized legal and institutional framework is leading the Harare's wetlands to rapidly shrink and affecting their ability to provide key ecosystem services, such as clean water, flood protection, recreational areas, and wildlife. In addition, both overlapping roles and functions among the various institutions and legislations are responsible for wetland management in Harare. Key recommendation emerging from the study points to the need to define clear boundaries and harmonization of key legislations to promote the sustainability of wetlands in Harare.
Fifteen years after Zimbabwe's political independence and Black majority rule, Rakodi (1995) concluded that Harare, the capital city, remained quintessentially a settler-colonial city. Then, Harare had not yet experienced the full impacts of 'neo-liberalism' as in Nairobi or the suburbanisation of office and commercial development as in Johannesburg. In view of significant political economy transformations since the 1990s, this paper aims to provide a systematic interpretation of ongoing transitions that characterise the city. Informed by a systemic spatio-temporal and historical analysis it illustrates how ongoing post-1990s foundational restructuring of the economy centred on jambanja has transformed Harare from a settler-colonial city to a highly informalised 'zhing-zhong' African city.
Hopley is a peri-urban community situated in Harare, the capital city of Zimbabwe. The majority of the people that live in Hopley are forced migrants who came to reside in here in the wake of the forced migration campaign named Operation Murambatsvina. Forced migration and internal displacement leads to the dispossession of one's home and shelter. In addition, forced migration is also associated with deprivations of basic services such as health. This paper draws from data gathered from the experiences of ten displaced women in Hopley community collected through semi-structured interviews. It focuses on perceptions of internal displacement in relation to sexual and reproductive health. The paper uses the women's narratives to unpack the implications of being dispossessed of one's home and in a sense, one's body and the women's rights in the context of their bodies. Social Constructionist Theory is used to contextualise these women's lived experiences in terms of sexual and reproductive health rights. Findings suggest that the women in Hopley are victims of double vulnerability, stemming from their displacement, which has deprived them of their homes and in turn also led to the 'dispossession' of their bodies.
This paper focuses on wetland ecosystem services and how they can be sustainably utilised in urban areas to preserve and conserve the ecosystem services they provide. It examines the land-use planning system in Zimbabwe’s capital city, Harare, and how it integrates the issue of wetland ecosystem services. It also highlights the opportunities and constraints associated with integrating the wetland ecosystem services into land-use planning. This integration is evident in efforts to rehabilitate and conserve existing wetlands and to construct new ones. Until now, efforts to connect land-use planning and wetland ecosystem use have proved futile, especially given the multiplicity of wetland users and the diverse perceptions that these stakeholders have about them. A documentary review, key informant interviews and field observations were used to gather data for this study. Lessons were also drawn from cities that were designed with wetlands in mind. It was found that although wetlands are a critical part of the urban landscape, Harare’s planning policies largely fail to take this into account. It was concluded that urban land-use planning has the ability to control the sustainable use of the wetland ecosystems through development control in wetlands.
Urbanization is an essential determinant of social change. For social change to take place, the process of urbanization requires extensive management (through urban governance). This paper outlines the context of Zimbabwe’s urban governance system by focusing on the historical and recent trends in urban governance and urbanization. In particular, our emphasis is placed on how pre- and post-colonial governments advanced social change through urban governance. In both pre- and post-independence Zimbabwe, local government is a political reality that ruling regimes manipulates, associates with and advance political interests. Politics continue to shape and destabilize a functioning, independent, and autonomous form of urban governance in Zimbabwe. Urban governance remains under incessant threat from central government. Central-local government contestations are leading to poor service delivery; a development that is affecting social change. The article argues that the politics, governance, and institutional behaviors in urban centers of Zimbabwe deteriorated severely calling for a restructuring of urban governance.
Background: This article examines approaches for integrating ecological thought in inner-city revitalisation with a special focus on the inner-city of Harare. It is an exploration and possible (re-)framing of the garden suburb approach that is strongly rooted in the garden city concept with the aim of enabling the attainment of the City of Harare Vision 2025 that the city leaders and managers have envisioned.
Methods: The methods used to collect data included key informant interviews, field surveys and in depth analysis of secondary sources.
Results: Past initiatives in seeking to transform the inner-city of Harare into a vibrant environment proved futile with little effect on the face lifting of the critical space. This is partly because just socio-economic planning approaches were adopted.
Conclusions: The article concludes that the absence of ecological planning among other factors of finance and political will explain the non-effect of past revitalisation of the inner-city of Harare. Given this explanation, we suggest sustained inner-city revitalisation that conforms ecological planning to the city’s 2025 vision and beyond.
Their shack settlement labelled “too informal” to receive basic service provision, the residents of Marikana informal settlement, in Potchefstroom, North West province, South Africa, planned and executed what was locally referred to as “DIY formalisation” in order to politically appeal to the city council to provide them with services. During this formalisation, residents themselves laid out stands and streets and installed water infrastructure in an effort to claim their rights to access to the city and its infrastructures, and to assert their aspirations to a modern, urban life. Without formal municipal services, life in Marikana could be characterised as “raw life,” to use Fiona Ross’s term — an incomplete life in the midst of poverty and suffering. Drawing on Ross’s notion of “respectable life,” I argue that DIY formalisation in Marikana ensured what I call “buoyant life”: the DIY formalisation, and specifically the water infrastructure, enabled not only physical life but also political life (in the form of claims to citizenship and respectability) to be buoyed up against the curtailing tides of state abandonment.
Using the concept of ‘competitive authoritarianism’, this briefing examines how the governing Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front (ZANU–PF) retained power in the July 2018 presidential, parliamentary and local government elections. It advances that, having come to power through military assistance in November 2017, the new ZANU–PF government instituted cosmetic political reforms to gain domestic and international legitimacy while maintaining financial networks and tentacles on public institutions. This briefing posits that, with a huge funding base, abuse of public resources and massive vote buying, materially, Zimbabwe's 2018 elections were heavily slanted in favour of ZANU–PF.
This article examines the implications of the land and agrarian reforms on ‘aliens’ and its multiplying effects on citizenship and their rights in Zimbabwe. It also interrogates the contested nature of citizenship in relation to land, agriculture and the rights of aliens. This is premised on a background where a frosty relationship has existed between aliens and the government, making them victims of the country’s land reform programme. Settler colonialism is shown as having partly contributed to contemporary challenges and despite its demise, it continues to influence land and agrarian disputes between the government, indigenous Zimbabweans and aliens. It is against this background that this article interrogates and tells a unique story of inclusion and exclusion in rural Zimbabwe. The country’s land reform programme is shown as having had deep seated socio-cultural, political and economic implications some which are now only becoming evident now. The paper uses strong field based empirical evidence, adopts an interpretive life history research approach and uses the conceptual lenses of T.H. Marshall’s distinction of social citizenship (civil political and economic) to show how land reform has reconfigured rural social and economic relations. The article shows that in post land reform Zimbabwe, citizenship remains a contested issue and socially, economically and politically aliens are at a disadvantage and are failing to enjoy the rights and privileges which are due to them as enshrined in the country’s laws. The article concludes that despite the politics of inclusion and exclusion in rural Zimbabwe, aliens continue to positively contribute to socio-economic and political processes in the resettlement areas.
The purpose of this article is to examine the link between political and socio-economic dynamics of illegal street vending and national security in Zimbabwe using the case of Harare. Scholarship has increasingly focused on the interface between the urban informal economy and politics in Zimbabwe. However, the nexus between illegal street vending and national security emerges as a major gulf which this article attempts to fill. Using the human security concept as its framework for analysis and relying on data collected through focus group discussions, observations and interviews with street vendors and different officials as well as content analysis, the article argues that the illegal street vending’s negative effects on human security threaten national security. On the whole, the negative effects of illegal street vending that have the potential to prompt national insecurity include lawlessness, environmental pollution and public health hazards as well as, though arguable, providing a ready recruiting ground for violent mass protests which attract the attendant police violence thus generating social unrest. The article concludes that the deterioration of human security conditions due to illegal street vending endangers national security.
The geographical landscape in South Africa (physical, social and economic), was profoundly influenced by the policy of apartheid. This chapter analyses the rise and demise of the apartheid city and is divided into four sections. The first section focuses on compounds and locations, which marked the early phase of colonial segregation, and was often implemented under the guise of health concerns and slum clearance programmes. Municipal officials also viewed locations as a mechanism to control the influx of Africans into cities. The Natives (Urban Areas) Act of 1923 represented the first Union attempt to control, manage and segregate urban Africans. The Group Areas Act (GAA) of 1950 was one of the key instruments used to reinforce the ideology of apartheid and is the theme of the second section. The demise of the GAA and the rise of ‘grey’ and free settlement areas are discussed in the third section. The final section reviews post-apartheid segregation and desegregation trends. There are remarkable continuities between the apartheid and democratic eras in terms of socio-spatial inequalities, and neoliberal policies tend to reinforce race and class segregation, rather than radically challenge the apartheid urban landscape. Although all race-based discriminatory legislation has been scrapped, the legacy of apartheid will be visible in the South African landscape for a long time.
The heated controversy over “citizen participation,” “citizen control,” and “maximum feasible involvement of the poor,” has been waged largely in terms of exacerbated rhetoric and misleading euphemisms. To encourage a more enlightened dialogue, a typology of citizen participation is offered using examples from three federal social programs: urban renewal, anti-poverty, and Model Cities. The typology, which is designed to be provocative, is arranged in a ladder pattern with each rung corresponding to the extent of citizens’ power in determining the plan and/or program.
This study examines the efficacy of adopting the sustainable city framework as an urban planning agenda with a view to addressing the dilemma of informal settlements in Harare, Zimbabwe. Data were collected through document review which was triangulated with key informant interviews. Thematic and content analysis was then used to analyse the data. The results of the study show that informal settlements in Harare are a result of a multiplicity of factors which include political economy, uncoordinated planning, invasion of land by land barons and inappropriate planning ideologies. The planning approaches to address informal settlements also tends to be too harsh at times when evictions are used though there are some instances where it is commendable-regularisation by UDC. The study recommends the adoption of planning approaches that conform to the local realities in Harare as well as considering the sustainable cities framework.
Urban governance has been thrust into the spotlight in the wake of the Sustainable Development Goals adopted by the United Nations in September 2015. A number of the 17 goals assume strong urban governments with the requisite powers and financial capacities to restructure the functioning of regional economies so as to establish transition pathways toward more sustainable societies. South Africa, and Johannesburg’s metropolitan government in particular, represents an instructive case study of precisely this kind of local government. South Africa adopted one of the most far-reaching systems of decentralization with the advent of democracy in the mid-1990s and enshrined local government autonomy within the constitution of 1996 along with the provision for integrated metropolitan governments. Significantly, these authorities have the powers and fiscal resources to confront conflictual and irresolvable differences in the city, which are inevitable outcomes from decades of oppressive racial government. The article explores the history of democratic decentralization reforms in South Africa and Johannesburg with an eye on analyzing the significance of the Corridors of Freedom flagship initiative of the Johannesburg metropolitan government. This exercise affords a critical perspective on the latest generation of strategic planning and prioritization in metropolitan South Africa.
The urban studies literature has extensively analysed the modernist, developmental or neoliberal drivers of urban restructuring in the global South, but has largely overlooked the ways in which governments, particularly those with authoritarian characteristics, try to reinforce their legitimacy and assert their political authority through the creation of satellite cities and housing developments. From Ethiopia to Singapore, authoritarian regimes have recently provided housing to the middle class and the poor, not only to alleviate housing shortages, or bolster a burgeoning real estate market, but also to ‘order power’ and buy the loyalty of residents. To evaluate the extent to which authoritarian regimes realise their political objectives through housing provision, we survey nearly 300 poor and middle class respondents from three new housing projects in Luanda, Angola. Alongside increasing social and spatial differentiation brought about by state policies, we document unintended beneficiaries of state housing and uneven levels of citizen satisfaction. We explain that internal state contradictions, individual agency and market forces have acted together to re-shape the government’s efforts to order power.
The dominant theory of elite power, grounded in Weberian bureaucracy, has analyzed elites in terms of stable positions at the top of enduring institutions. Today, many conditions that spawned these stable ‘command posts’ no longer prevail, and elite power thus warrants rethinking. This article advances an argument about contemporary ‘influence elites’. The way they are organized and the modus operandi they employ to wield influence enable them to evade public accountability, a hallmark of a democratic society. Three cases are presented, first to investigate changes in how elites operate and, second, to examine varying configurations in which the new elites are organized. The cases demonstrate that influence elites intermesh hierarchies and networks, serve as connectors, and coordinate influence from multiple, moving perches, inside and outside official structures. Their flexible and multi-positioned organizing modes call for reconsidering elite theory and grappling with the implications of these elites for democratic society.
The heated controversy over “citizen participation,” “citizen control”, and “maximum feasible involvement of the poor,” has been waged largely in terms of exacerbated rhetoric and misleading euphemisms. To encourage a more enlightened dialogue, a typology of citizen participation is offered using examples from three federal social programs: urban renewal, anti-poverty, and Model Cities. The typology, which is designed to be provocative, is arranged in a ladder pattern with each rung corresponding to the extent of citizens' power in determining the plan and/or program.
From liberator to dictator: an insider's account of Robert Mugabe's descent into tyranny
- M Auret
Auret, M., 2009. From liberator to dictator: an insider's account of Robert Mugabe's
descent into tyranny. David Phillip Publishers, Claremont.
Happy anniversary Joburg: 130 years old and still growing
- B Ballard-Tremeer
Ballard-Tremeer, B., 2016. Happy anniversary Joburg: 130 years old and still growing.
https://www.sapeople.com/2016/11/18/130-year-anniversary-joburg-johann
esburg-south-africa-history/.
Vendors, cops in a battle of wits. The Herald
- L Dzenga
- R Ngwenya
Dzenga, L., Ngwenya, R., 2018. Vendors, cops in a battle of wits. The Herald, 22
Education and democratic citizenship: In defence of cosmopolitanism
- Enslin
Enslin, P., 2000. Education and democratic citizenship: In defence of cosmopolitanism.
In: Leicester, M., Modgil, C., Modgil, S. (Eds.), Politics, education and citizenship.
Falmer Press, New York, pp. 149-150.
Making better places: The planning project in the twenty-first century
- P Healey
Healey, P., 2010. Making better places: The planning project in the twenty-first century.
Palgrave Macmillan, London.
Sustainable Development in Africa
- M Kamiya
- B Namano
Kamiya, M., Namano, B., 2015. Sustainable Development in Africa. UN-HABITAT,
Nairobi.
Democracy works: rewiring politics to Africa's advantage. Picador Africa
- G Mills
- O Obasanjo
- J Herbst
- T Biti
Mills, G., Obasanjo, O., Herbst, J., Biti, T., 2019. Democracy works: rewiring politics to
Africa's advantage. Picador Africa, Johannesburg.
Monavale Vlei, an inspiration and case study. The Standard
- R Mitchell
Mitchell, R., 2012. Monavale Vlei, an inspiration and case study. The Standard, 28
The graceless fall of Robert Mugabe: The end of a dictator's reign. Penguin Books
- G Nyarota
Nyarota, G., 2018. The graceless fall of Robert Mugabe: The end of a dictator's reign.
Penguin Books, Cape Town.
Data management and data analysis (Data collection: KoboToolbox)
- V Olajide
Olajide, V., 2019. Data management and data analysis (Data collection: KoboToolbox).
Available at: file:///C:/Users/2016104669/Downloads/data_collection_
KoboToolbox.pdf.
Monavale Vlei, an inspiration and case study
- Mitchell
Vendors, cops in a battle of wits
- Dzenga