Michael Mattingly

Public Management of Urban Land, Enabling Markets and Low-income Housing Provision: The Overlooked Experience of Iran

This paper examines the first 10 years (1979—89) of the implementation of the Urban Land Act in Iran in order to revisit the debate on the capacity of market-enabling policies to improve low-income housing provision in developing countries. The outcome of the Iranian experience during the study period shows that, at the very least, governments can play an important and effective role in low- and middle-income housing provision through direct provision of urban land in parallel with markets. This suggests that the best way forward may be a combination of market-enabling approaches that develop basic institutional functions plus proactive government intervention for developing public land banks to provide better access to cheap land for a range of housing providers including individual households, co-operatives and private developers.

Goodbye to natural resource-based livelihoods? Crossing the rural/urban divide

Life in proximity to a growing city can be especially difficult for those rural people who are poor. Findings from sustained research around three cities of the South illustrate how peri-urban conditions can create pressure for livelihood change. People were pressed further into a cash-based economy for which they were ill prepared. Surprisingly, agriculture remained important, even though urban expansion changed natural resource-based livelihoods, especially by taking land. The inevitable livelihood transitions were easier if there was support for both familiar and new natural resource-based activities, orienting production towards urban markets. Successful change was associated with greater diversification of income strands, rapid cash returns and bridging opportunities. Participatory planning of livelihood changes and local NGO inputs were advantageous. These findings are important for pro-poor development policy affecting peri-urban populations and may inform rural to urban migration policy.

Ethnicity, corruption and violence in urban land conflict in Kenya

Relatively little has been recorded about the relationships among ethnicity, corruption and conflict over urban land, especially at community level. The stories of land matters in four lower-income settlements in Nairobi, Kenya, drawn from extensive interviews with their occupants and officials and field observations, shed light on the roles of corruption and ethnicity in land conflicts and the character of violence involved. At the same time, they reveal new details of competition for urban land rights. In these cases, land conflict seemed to promote corruption and the use of ethnicity, while corruption and ethnicity were able to alter the relationship of this conflict to violence. There are findings here regarding sources of urban violence in general.

Private development and public management of urban land: A case study of Nepal

Abstract Through an urban management approach to land development, government can relate differently to the private sector so that more effective use is made of its own limited capacities. Circumstances in Nepal illustrate the potential benefits and features of such an enabling strategy. Although a number of actions may be effective, the installation of service infrastructure may be key. However, regulation and negotiation seem necessary compliments of enabling efforts, if the public interest is to be secured. Putting enabling strategies into practice will require new capacities, both within government and the private sector.

Urban land markets in developing countries: Do planners know enough about them?

In developing countries mainstream planning practitioners show little awareness of the urban land markets in which they intervene. The wide-spread ineffectiveness of land use controls may reflect a failure to understand market factors as they affect developers, politicians and the poor. Land acquisition—critical to so many government development programmes —is becoming an impossibility. The market effects of public capital investments are allowed to subvert plan strategies when they could possibly assist them. To be effective in the urban affairs of developing countries, planning must greatly reduce its ignorance and neglect of market forces.Abstract In developing countries mainstream planning practitioners show little awareness of the urban land markets in which they intervene. The wide-spread ineffectiveness of land use controls may reflect a failure to understand market factors as they affect developers, politicians and the poor. Land acquisition—critical to so many government development programmes —is becoming an impossibility. The market effects of public capital investments are allowed to subvert plan strategies when they could possibly assist them. To be effective in the urban affairs of developing countries, planning must greatly reduce its ignorance and neglect of market forces.

ViewpointUrban land markets in developing countries: Do planners know enough about them?

In developing countries mainstream planning practitioners show little awareness of the urban land markets in which they intervene. The wide-spread ineffectiveness of land use controls may reflect a failure to understand market factors as they affect developers, politicians and the poor. Land acquisition—critical to so many government development programmes —is becoming an impossibility. The market effects of public capital investments are allowed to subvert plan strategies when they could possibly assist them. To be effective in the urban affairs of developing countries, planning must greatly reduce its ignorance and neglect of market forces.Abstract In developing countries mainstream planning practitioners show little awareness of the urban land markets in which they intervene. The wide-spread ineffectiveness of land use controls may reflect a failure to understand market factors as they affect developers, politicians and the poor. Land acquisition—critical to so many government development programmes —is becoming an impossibility. The market effects of public capital investments are allowed to subvert plan strategies when they could possibly assist them. To be effective in the urban affairs of developing countries, planning must greatly reduce its ignorance and neglect of market forces.

Impacts of Privatization of Customary Land Rights in Zambia: A Comparative Study of Rural and Peri-urban Locations

In its quest for development, Zambia is pursuing a land policy that facilitates privatization of customary land. This article investigates the effects of privatization in terms of how it shapes peoples behaviour and perception of private tenure and related tenure dynamics. Findings have shown that the appetite to privatize land is growing stronger in peri-urban areas as land becomes more scarce. Furthermore, privatization of land appears to be a threat to traditional political structures as allegiance and loyalty towards chiefs diminish and tension and struggles over land in peri-urban areas increase. Similarly, privatization of land erodes peoples faith in the role that cultural and ancestral beliefs play in traditional land management. Also, people in rural areas tend to favour private tenure more if ‘privatization of customary land’ means allocation of land to outsiders. If, by contrast, the phrase is taken to mean communities registering their own land, peri-urban communities tend to have a stronger desire to register land. Furthermore, rural communities were found to be less informed about land policy and seemed less keen to be involved in land policy processes when compared to peri-urban residents. However, rural people may have no reason to inform themselves about land policy until they realise that the policy is likely to affect them.