Sam Hickey
(University of Manchester)
Diana Mitlin
(University of Manchester)
Tim Kelsall
(ODI)
Abdul-Gafaru Abdulai
(University of Ghana Business School)
Format:
Panel
Streams:
Politics and political economy
Sessions:
Wednesday 6 July, -
Time zone: Europe/London
The political economy of urban reform in Africa: from analysis to action.
Panel P11a at conference DSA2022: Just sustainable futures in an urbanising and mobile world.
New research on the political economy of African cities, with a dedicated focus on dealing with covid-19, and on the role of coalitions in promoting more just and sustainable urban futures.
Long Abstract:
Urbanisation with little structural transformation has left urban economies under considerable stress. The Covid-19 crisis is acute and has had a disproportionate effect on urban areas primarily because of over-crowded under-serviced low-income neighbourhoods and the impact of lockdowns and other restrictions on mobility of urban economic activities. Gender disadvantages are acute, with women having relatively low remuneration and a considerable burden related to their role in social reproduction. African cities are also increasingly threatened by climate change.
These and many other challenges facing African cities are firmly embedded in problems of political economy and governance at multiple levels. Cities offer a valuable source of both rents and political legitimacy for elites at national and city levels. However, the frequently oppositional nature of urban populations often leads to tensions between urban voters and national governments. City governments seldom have the autonomy to deal with their challenges, being located within multi-levelled systems of governance that are often dysfunctional and which fail to afford them the fiscal, political and bureaucratic capabilities to address complex problems.
This panel will showcase new work that uses a political economy perspective to understand both the challenges facing African cities and the prospects for interventions and reforms that can address them. At least three sessions will be organised by the African Cities Research Consortium (ACRC), an international partnership based at the University of Manchester. This will include:
(a) One or two sessions based on the use of ‘political settlements’ analysis to help advance our understanding of the challenges facing African cities. A conceptual paper plus case-studies drawn from Accra, Freetown, Harare, Lilongwe, Maiduguri, Mogadishu and Nairobi will be submitted in advance. Expert chairs will ensure that an active discussion is organised around key themes.
(b) A session on the politics of covid -19, drawing both on “top down” interventions and the remaking of bottom-up coalitions pressing for reform in Kampala, Lilongwe, Mogadishu and Nairobi. Examines urban management and governance under the stress of the pandemic.
(c) A roundtable session focused on a paper on the role that ‘coalitions’ can play in navigating the politics of African cities in pursuit of more just and sustainable solutions. The lead author is Diana Mitlin and ACRC will compose a panel of both academic and policy experts, including from the global South, to discuss the paper and its implications for a new generation of reforms in African cities.
We will welcome other papers into this panel also use political economy analysis to unpack the challenges facing African cities and/or on how a new generation of politically feasible reforms aimed at tackling these challenges might emerge.
This paper seeks to reframe the politics of urban development in Africa through applying a political settlements perspective.
Paper long abstract:
African cities are critical to the continent's prospects of achieving environmentally sustainable forms of prosperity and poverty reduction. Can Africa cities help generate processes of national economic development? Can they be transformed in ways that secure more inclusive and sustainable futures for urban residents? The answers to these questions hinge to a large extent on the political and political economy factors that shape, at different levels, how cities and their systems operate in relation to different domains of urban development. African cities are comprised of systems that produce, circulate and deliver various resources, goods and services. These systems often fail to function effectively because they are poorly resourced, weakly integrated and governed in accordance with interests and ideas that undermine inclusive forms of development. This is apparent across multiple domains of urban development, whether economic, social or relating to the built environment. This paper sets out a conceptual framework that captures how the interaction of politics and political economy with city systems is shaping the prospects of African cities to generate processes of prosperity and poverty reduction. It does this by integrating cutting-edge thinking on political settlements, city systems and urban development domains into a new and holistic framework of analysis. This framework seeks to provide new insights into the challenges of urban development in Africa and to help guide the work of the multiple political and policy actors responsible for promoting and implementing reforms in African cities.
This paper explores the influence of Ghana's political settlement dynamics on the governance and development trajectories of Accra.
Paper long abstract:
Ghana's political settlement is characterized by broad-dispersed power configurations. Here, not only are elections closely fought between two political parties with equal strength, but also each party must co-opt a broad range of groups in order to be able to maintain ruling coalitions. These political settlement dynamics have a profound impact on the development of Ghana's capital city, Accra, which is characterised by the poor delivery of services in the context of rapid urbanization. Accra is such a politically-important city that national political elites do not want to lose control over it, given the city's role in shaping presidential election outcomes. Till date, the city's mayors are appointed by the President, typically on the basis of partisan political considerations rather than merit. Mayors are thus expected to mobilize votes and resources in support of the President's re-electioneering bid, while dispensing patronage in ways that allow national elites' control over the city. Central government's control over the city also takes the form of its rapid re-demarcations, such that the number of Accra's district councils increased by over 600% in less than two decades. The result has been the creation of multiple independent centres of power within the city, as each local council operates as an autonomous planning and development authority. In the absence of an effective centralized authority with responsibility for city-wide development, coordination among the city's numerous local councils has been weak, leading to inefficiencies in the planning and implementation of services that have spill over effects across the city.
This paper aims to better understand how 'competing' centres of power in Freetown shaping development trajectories, who is driving and funding them, and how they are shaped by, and shape, political dynamics.
Paper long abstract:
In 2004, Sierra Leone launched an ambitious decentralisation programme with the promise of taking government closer to communities, increasing participation and improving development outcomes. However, almost two decades since the return of popularly elected local councils, this ambition is yet to be realised, with political tensions underlining centre-city relations, especially when the latter is controlled by a party different from the council. Nowhere have these tensions manifested themselves more than in Freetown, given the city's political, economic and social importance and unrivalled role in the national political settlement. While the central government has sought to retain influence at the city-level by resisting functional devolution, stymying initiatives that would support independent revenue generation for the city and even creating new positions to counterbalance the authority of the elected Mayor, this paper argues that the contestation between the city and the centre is just part of a highly complicated political settlement that makes implementing a reform agenda very difficult. The council itself is not a monolithic entity, with various blocs having interests that need to be managed, whilst the city's business community and groups of residents also leverage political connections to advance their own development agendas. Understanding how these 'competing' agendas look at these issues, who is driving and funding them, and how they are shaped by, and shape, political dynamics will be a key contribution of this paper. Its findings can improve development actors understandings of the political terrain upon which they work.
Drawing from a historical perspective, the paper sheds light on the nature of Kenya's political settlement and how this has impacted the political economy of Nairobi City.
Paper long abstract:
Over the years, Kenya's political settlement has been marked by ethnopolitics; a predominance of crony capitalism; elite interests, pacts, and bargains as well as strong control over the instruments of state patronage. This character of the Kenyan state has impacted heavily on the provision of public goods. It is in this context that this paper investigates the nature of Kenya’s political settlement and its implications on the political economy of Nairobi city. As evidence shows, since the 1980s, the national government has experimented with diverse governance models aimed at improving the delivery of services in the city. These models range from the Nairobi City Council, Nairobi City Commission, the Constitutionally sanctioned County Government of Nairobi, and a notable reversal through the Nairobi Metropolitan Services. In spite of these attempts, the delivery of critical public goods in the city remains poor, while the city politics remains highly enmeshed with the national-level politics. Efforts to build a socially inclusive city remain a mirage. To the political elite, Nairobi City remains a valuable ornament that should never escape their control, but their vision of the city remains blurred. Besides unresponsive state apparatus, the governance of Nairobi City is complicated by a populace that does not treat the city as their home. This limits opportunities to bring into account duty bearers in the city in addressing the service provision challenges. However, the ideals espoused in the Constitution of Kenya 2010 offer a potential pathway for Nairobi's renewal and regeneration.
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Diana Mitlin (University of Manchester)
Tim Kelsall (ODI)
Abdul-Gafaru Abdulai (University of Ghana Business School)
Short Abstract:
New research on the political economy of African cities, with a dedicated focus on dealing with covid-19, and on the role of coalitions in promoting more just and sustainable urban futures.
Long Abstract:
Urbanisation with little structural transformation has left urban economies under considerable stress. The Covid-19 crisis is acute and has had a disproportionate effect on urban areas primarily because of over-crowded under-serviced low-income neighbourhoods and the impact of lockdowns and other restrictions on mobility of urban economic activities. Gender disadvantages are acute, with women having relatively low remuneration and a considerable burden related to their role in social reproduction. African cities are also increasingly threatened by climate change.
These and many other challenges facing African cities are firmly embedded in problems of political economy and governance at multiple levels. Cities offer a valuable source of both rents and political legitimacy for elites at national and city levels. However, the frequently oppositional nature of urban populations often leads to tensions between urban voters and national governments. City governments seldom have the autonomy to deal with their challenges, being located within multi-levelled systems of governance that are often dysfunctional and which fail to afford them the fiscal, political and bureaucratic capabilities to address complex problems.
This panel will showcase new work that uses a political economy perspective to understand both the challenges facing African cities and the prospects for interventions and reforms that can address them. At least three sessions will be organised by the African Cities Research Consortium (ACRC), an international partnership based at the University of Manchester. This will include:
(a) One or two sessions based on the use of ‘political settlements’ analysis to help advance our understanding of the challenges facing African cities. A conceptual paper plus case-studies drawn from Accra, Freetown, Harare, Lilongwe, Maiduguri, Mogadishu and Nairobi will be submitted in advance. Expert chairs will ensure that an active discussion is organised around key themes.
(b) A session on the politics of covid -19, drawing both on “top down” interventions and the remaking of bottom-up coalitions pressing for reform in Kampala, Lilongwe, Mogadishu and Nairobi. Examines urban management and governance under the stress of the pandemic.
(c) A roundtable session focused on a paper on the role that ‘coalitions’ can play in navigating the politics of African cities in pursuit of more just and sustainable solutions. The lead author is Diana Mitlin and ACRC will compose a panel of both academic and policy experts, including from the global South, to discuss the paper and its implications for a new generation of reforms in African cities.
We will welcome other papers into this panel also use political economy analysis to unpack the challenges facing African cities and/or on how a new generation of politically feasible reforms aimed at tackling these challenges might emerge.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Wednesday 6 July, 2022, -