Luce Beeckmans

Editing the African city: reading colonial planning in Africa from a comparative perspective

In order to understand the complexity of the colonial city in Africa, this article suggests a comparative study on two levels, corresponding with two important phenomena in the planning process of African cities. The first level can be described as the diffusion of planning models to the colonies, and the second as the actual implementation of these planning models on the colonial terrain. Each level requires different scales of research and frames of analysis. They are particularly valuable when examined together.

The Making of the Central Markets of Dakar and Kinshasa: from Colonial Origins to the Post-colonial Period

This article traces the planning history of two central marketplaces in sub-Saharan Africa, in Dakar and Kinshasa, from their French and Belgian colonial origins until the post-colonial period. In the (post-)colonial city, the marketplace has always been at the centre of contemporary debates on urban identity and spatial production. Using a rich variety of sources, this article makes a contribution to a neglected area of scholarship, as comparative studies on planning histories in sub-Saharan African cities are still rare. It also touches upon some key issues such as the multiple and often intricate processes of urban agency between local and foreign actors, sanitation and segregation, the different (post-)colonial planning cultures and their limits and the role of indigenous/intermediary groups in spatial contestation and reappropriation.

A Toponymy of Segregation: The ‘Neutral Zones’ of Dakar, Dar es Salaam and Kinshasa

This chapter explores the politics of the naming of the separation zones or ‘neutral zones’ between Africans and Europeans in three colonial African cities: British Dar es Salaam, French Dakar and Belgian Kinshasa. By showing that in the cities discussed, colonial powers not only used place-naming as a strategy to impose their dominance, but also to legitimise and camouflage the segregationist intentions of their urban policies, we aim to add another layer to the study of the political practice of place-naming within a colonial context. In addition, this chapter uses a toponymic analysis to understand the importance of transnational connections and networks in the introduction of racial segregation in Dakar, Dar es Salaam and Kinshasa, as well as in the accompanied legitimising discourse. Finally, we will illustrate how this legitimising discourse eventually resulted in official place names. Yet, while many of the resulting names are still inscribed in the toponymic landscape of modern Dakar, Dar es Salaam and Kinshasa, others have disappeared as a result of spontaneous or symbolic renaming operations in the eras before and after decolonisation.

The “Development Syndrome”: building and contesting the SICAP housing schemes in French Dakar (1951–1960)

Abstract After the Second World War, European welfare planning was transposed to the African colonies. With regard to housing, this meant a true turning point in urban policy. Under a development slogan, colonial powers for the first time massively invested in the housing of African urban dwellers. This was especially the case in French Dakar, Senegal, where the Société Immobilière du Cap Vert (SICAP) was one of the most productive housing institutions in post-war sub-Saharan Africa. This article, however, argues that the development discourse mobilized by the colonial government not only formed the basis to modernizing the city but also served as an instrument to legitimize a new kind of residential segregation, a phenomenon I call the “Development Syndrome”. Yet Africans were no passive victims of development schemes. This article brings to the fore various forms of agency that were evoked by the ambiguous motivations underscoring the SICAP housing and resettlement schemes.

In between improvisation, compensation and negotiation: a socio-spatial analysis of Kariakoo market (Dar es Salaam) dynamics under British colonial rule (1919–1961)

This article examines the socio-spatial history of the central market of a colonial African city. Colonial policies of racial segregation created obstacles to commerce, which in turn generated a local strategy of improvisational planning to placate various urban actors with a host of often contradictory concessions to ameliorate dislocation. These contradictions of colonial governance played out most visibly in the struggles over Kariakoo market, which became the citys primary market after its construction in 1923. By focusing on contests over the spatial ordering of commerce and residence in a multi-racial city ruled by Europeans, commercially dominated by Indians but overwhelmingly populated by Africans, this article demonstrates how the production of certain types of urban space creates unforeseen leverage for local actors, which simultaneously entrenches wider patterns of obstinate racialization despite the ubiquity of planning concessions. Using deeply researched archival evidence as well as a rich secondary literature, the authors argue that the city market best illustrates the racially contradictory impact of the colonial state on an urban landscape.

Afrika voorbij het export-model

Hoewel nog slechts weinig onderzoek is gebeurd, en zeker vanuit comparatief perspectief, naar andere aspecten en factoren die de ruimtelijkheid van de Afrikaanse stad hebben bepaald dan de verspreiding van het westerse stadsmodel, lijkt de tijd rijp voor een andere geschiedschrijving van de Afrikaanse stad, een voorbij het export-model.