Paper short abstract:

This study examines the production of legality and illegality in the water sector in the informal settlement Kibera in Nairobi and shows how both the formal state-owned institution and informal providers draw on notions of legality and formality to establish their position and authority.

Paper long abstract:

This study examines the production of legality and illegality in the water sector in Nairobi, with focus on the informal settlement Kibera. My point of departure is that in practice there is no such thing as formal or informal water in Nairobi, as most of it comes from the same source, running through the same pipes. Through the case of a certain water scheme, called ‘chambers’, I study how the state-owned local water provision company Nairobi Water and Sewerage Company strive to produce formal and legal water provision in the water sector in Kibera by delivering water to informal water providers. The material infrastructures, especially the pipes, play a central but ambiguous role in this, as they are used to both establish and undermine the project, and only sometimes succeed in regulating the water and carrying it to the intended destination. The company’s attempt to legalize, formalize, and capitalize on the informal water sector can largely be perceived as a failed project but does however give the informal vendors “an air of legality” (Lund 2020) which works to legitimize their business. The guise of water as being formally provided to the vendors in Kibera, moreover bolsters the legitimacy of the water provision company since it makes it seem as if the institution is living up to its responsibility as water service provider. In this way, both the formal state-owned institution and vendors in the informal settlement draw on notions of legality and formality to establish their position and authority.

Paper short abstract:

This paper identifies challenges and opportunities related to sustainable partnerships around wastewater management in complex urban arenas, focusing on what the inclusion of a range of state and non-state actors means for partnership legitimacy.

Paper long abstract:

Sustainable water and wastewater management systems demand effective, rule based, and coherent relations and partnerships between a plethora of different statutory and non-statutory stakeholders across local, national, and even international levels. We present preliminary findings from ongoing work in urban Ghana where a range of existing socio-political and economic power relations and divergent institutional developmental trajectories present challenges as well as opportunities for the production of viable relations between wastewater users and providers. Existing literature suggests that the making of sustainable partnerships demands outreach to a broad spectrum of stakeholders to develop a sense of ownership and recognition of public infrastructure, and that viable partnerships depend on establishing and maintaining legitimacy. Building on these insights, the paper provides evidence from Tema, Ghana, and the experiences and activities of different state institutions and their interactions with different societal actors. Here, we see that, on the one hand, viable partnerships need to embrace a spectrum of stakeholders, but on the other, the inclusion of different, and increased numbers of stakeholders may undermine the ability of planners to establish broad based legitimacy. This may especially be the case in complex urban arenas where ambitious sustainability agendas are pursued by a plethora of NGOs, donors, government, and private sector interests.

Paper short abstract:

The paper focuses on divergence between state institutions related to sustainable wastewater solutions in urban Ghana. Findings suggest the inability of state actors to overcome organisational challenges to pursue ambitious policy results in the informalisation of wastewater management.

Paper long abstract:

There are many different state actors and institutions involved in urban wastewater management. Sustainable solutions demand coherent and effective operations across a variety of different state actors that go beyond increasing resource levels, training, or introducing technological know-how. State stakeholders with often competing interests and agendas include locally elected government officials, central government appointed ministerial figures, policy making professionals and bureaucrats, officials in land planning commissions, and environmental protection agencies. This paper focuses on social processes of state actors around wastewater management and identifies political and institutional stumbling blocks for sustainable solutions in urban Ghana. The paper suggests that the relative inability of state actors to satisfactorily overcome such challenges and pursue ambitious policy results in the informalisation of wastewater management, which, in turn, may result in effective, context specific solutions, and which as rationalisation processes may also reproduce the territorial jurisdictions of individual state institutions. Still, the practical norms of different actors may also undermine more broader objectives of coherent, and rational, city-wide solutions. In a wider perspective, the paper contributes to studies looking at how the everyday actions and practices of state actors allow and hinder the making of sustainable cities. Here we see how the (re)production of state actors’ practical norms in everyday urban governance are products of compromises and contests with more powerful organisational forces, including the political cultures of the individual state institutions actors work for, and which may be challenged by new and far-reaching sustainability objectives.

Paper short abstract:

Centered on the ubiquitous Polytank, plastics and plastic infrastructures dominate water provisioning in Ghana. How are these systems sourced and accessed amid the vagary of global supply chains? What is the relationship between on-the-ground operational configurations and wider material economies?

Paper long abstract:

Water tops the list of global concerns. UN Sustainable Development Goals prioritize clean water for all. In Africa, multilateral and bilateral aid promote water access via investment in water infrastructure and the privatization of national water works. This is evident in Ghana where Ghana Water Company LTD oversees national water infrastructure. Another stream of water privatization, however, flies under the radar. So ubiquitous, it is barely noticed as worthy of commentary or recognized for its primacy to national water provisioning. Large scale 500-10,000 gallon plastic water storage tanks – commonly known by brand name Polytank – are the backbone of national water supply for wealthy and poor alike, both on and off grid.

This paper investigates the sourcing of these fundamental systems of subsistence. What are the origins of their components, distribution channels and bottlenecks, workarounds, and means of access? What is the larger political economy and corporate structure through which these objects – their raw materials and means of manufacture -- circulate and stabilize?

Research findings suggest that these seemingly informal and individualized solutions, even if imperfect, offer Plastic Infrastructure: Water Works and Material Economies in Ghanaflexible, ‘plastic’, infrastructure uniquely adapted to circumstances which formal, top-down interventions should better take into account. Notably, they offer a model of infrastructural accessibility and need to be recognized as key partners in system expansion. Further, solutions should take seriously the materials and components that account for their plasticity and adaptability. The expansive character of these water economies defies the strictures of water governance narrowly conceived by states and development agencies.

Paper short abstract:

This paper traces the negotiations over access to maps and knowledge, and the practical work of re-mapping the sewerage system in Tema, Ghana through manual interventions in clocked sewerage manholes, to understand the complex interconnection between infrastructure, urban change and politics.

Paper long abstract:

Mapping is an important tool for urban governance. It entails power. So does the control of access to historical and contemporary maps. Quayson (2014) describes how a researcher in quest for maps of Accra is send from one institution to the next until she returns in vain to her starting point. The lack of access to quality information on the city has leads the researchers to increase their focus on ethnographic sources that induce lived experiences onto the city. However, not only researchers lack proper access to maps of cities, in the port city of Tema, municipal employees responsible for wastewater management do not have full access to maps of the sewerage infrastructure they are supposed to govern and improve. Maps and knowledge are withheld by other municipal entities and utility providers. To map the decaying infrastructure the workers use GIS coordinates plotted onto open-access maps based on manual visits into the sewers.

African cities have historically incomplete maps and large informal settlements outside the formal maps. In many instances the exclusion of neighborhoods from official maps also means exclusion from important planned infrastructures like water, sewerage, and electricity. However, digital tools and open access to satellite images have transformed urban mapping to a potentially more inclusive and dynamic endeavor, which are equally useful for marginalized communities and ailing municipal organizations and utilities.

This paper traces the negotiations over access to urban maps, in order to understand the complex interconnection between infrastructure, urban change and politics mediated by socio-technical interventions.