Paper short abstract:

In this presentation, I investigate the riots and unionization of the street traders’ association “SHIUMA” in Mwanza city, Tanzania to reconsidering informality that creates new relationship between the government, the informal sector and civil society in Africa.

Paper long abstract:

The street traders who occupy African urban space in a chaotic fashion are conspicuous. The "round-ups of street traders" designed to move street traders to public markets and the riots incited by the street traders in response have been identified as visible manifestations of the latent friction between the state and the informal sector.

There has been recently a movement to unionize among street traders who have frequently rioted. Previous research has considered the issues of street business as consultation for the various rights to the resources on the streets among the state, street vendors, and civil society, and it has discussed the formal unionization of street traders within the framework of civil society theory. However, such previous studies have neglected to sufficiently discuss the logic behind their everyday practices as an informal sector that fluidly and flexibly creates a livelihood for themselves in this uncertain urban environment, and in what manner formal unionization is continuing within the nationally planned economy. In this presentation, I investigate the details of unionization of the street traders' association in Mwanza city is called as SHIUMA to reconsidering informality of the street traders. I will point out that the unionization of street traders is not a movement to form a formal organization, rather the association themselves exist in parallel with the actual street-space, and the ability exists to test the formalized framework and logic requested by the government that is included in one of the constant learning materials on street-space.