Short Abstract

This panel examines the politics and governance of housing in Africa. The panel invites papers that move beyond technocratic and market-driven approaches to examine housing as fundamentally shaped by struggles over land, citizenship, and state power.

Long Abstract

Housing has increasingly become a critical site of political contestation, power struggles, social innovation, and economic exclusion, particularly due to unprecedented urbanisation in Africa and across the globe. The narratives shaping African housing development are highly contested. While emerging discussions prioritise tech-driven smart cities and artificial intelligence, millions of Africans still face basic challenges of housing, urban exclusion, tenure security and affordability. This panel moves beyond technocratic and market-driven approaches to examine housing as a struggle over land, citizenship rights, and state power. Utilising the theme of African Prisms, we seek to foreground questions of participation and justice to rethink what transformative housing governance could look like for the African urban future. We invite papers that deconstruct dominant structural narratives to re-imagine these spaces through political, socio-economic, sustainable, and equitable housing alternatives. This panel welcomes transdisciplinary papers that move away from top-down, commercial housing models in rethinking sustainable and affordable housing. Specifically, we invite contributions that explore state-led formalisation and displacement; the everyday negotiation of housing rights; contested spaces; and case-based or comparative analyses from across the continent. We welcome submissions from scholars, practitioners, and policymakers working across disciplines, including urban studies, political science, geography, history, architecture, and African studies.

Keywords: African cities, housing governance, housing politics, lived realities, urban futures.

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