Michal Lyons

Participation, Empowerment and Sustainability: (How) Do the Links Work?

This paper investigates the relationship between participation, empowerment and sustainability. Using the multisectoral and multicontextual experience of participation amassed in South Africa, both pre- and post-apartheid , we address two questions: does participation lead to empowerment; and does empowerment, in turn, lead to sustainability? Further, what external factors mediate and influence that relationship? Analysis shows that a relationship does exist and is contingent on a number of contextual factors, crucial to its success. Findings are discussed in terms of the international literature on community participation and local democracy, and policy implications are identified.

Creating Urban Social Capital: Some Evidence from Informal Traders in Nairobi

The poverty and dramatic alteration in geographical composition of African cities have been associated with rapid urbanisation, the growth of the informal economy and migration. The latter has separated individuals from long-established social and kinship networks, and from familiar livelihood strategies. The sustainable livelihoods approach views social capital as one of the poors most important assets in managing their lives. This paper asks four central questions. (1) Does the creation of new, urban forms of social capital, depend upon and deplete inherited forms? (2) Is social capital deliberately created or is it a by-product of sociability? (3) What are its functions in supporting the livelihoods of informal traders? (4) Is there a gender dimension to the strategies adopted? The paper draws on interviews with 124 traders in 2 Nairobi markets, and on key-informant interviews. Principal findings are that, whilst traders initially draw heavily on existing inherited social capital, they deliberately create and adapt their networks, opportunistically building relationships of trust in the marketplace which enable them to survive. The pace of change is different in different economic milieux. Women and men adopt different strategies to achieve similar ends. Conclusions are drawn for social capital theory and policy.

Street Traders and the Emerging Spaces for Urban Voice and Citizenship in African Cities

As informal commerce has grown to become the lifeblood of African cities, street trade—among the largest sub-groups in the informal economy—has become a visible but contested domain. Yet the increase in street traders has not been accompanied by a corresponding improvement in their status as citizens or in their political influence. The paper first discusses the implications of theoretical debates on ‘citizenship’ and ‘voice’ for street traders and then explores characteristics of traders’ associations and influence in four case study countries: Senegal, Ghana, Tanzania and Lesotho. Drawing together the authors’ findings from research between 2001 and 2008, the paper identifies a fluidity of both formal and informal traders’ organisations which fail to achieve lasting impact. Finally, the paper discusses urban policy implications, arguing for a more flexible definition of urban citizenship based on rights and responsibilities, and an understanding of the complexity of grassroots associations of the marginalised poor.

China's 'Chocolate City': An Ethnic Enclave in a Changing Landscape*

Abstract The recent rise of African communities in Guangzhou has been widely noted. To understand this ‘Chocolate City,’ with a series of field surveys in 2006-2010, we examine its different development stages and shed particular light upon its internal and external linkages. Three modalities: the emerging enclave, the prosperous enclave and the collapsing enclave, have been identified. The rise of the ‘Chocolate City’ has been mainly attributed to the rise of Sino-Africa trading and the efforts of local entrepreneurs. The prosperity of the City was backed by the local states. However, the involvement of local polices, the reform of the local immigration regime and the deterioration of economic relations resulted in its recent collapse. We argue that this ‘Chocolate City’ is a restructuring ethnic enclave underlying the impacts of ‘transient glocalization.’ The rise and fall of the ‘Chocolate City’ indicates the dynamic relations between the transient global-local nexus, immigration regime, and local geography.

Resilient dwellings or resilient people? Towards people-centred reconstruction

Our review of post-disaster reconstruction in 10 countries has demonstrated some of the weaknesses in currently dominant approaches, e.g. donor-driven reconstruction and owner-driven reconstruction. They have often been top-down and exclusionary, focusing on people with existing title to land and housing, and failing to reach the marginalized, especially in urban areas. Since they aim for safer dwellings, they rarely tackle people s underlying vulnerabilities. This paper argues that an inclusive and participatory approach, people-centred reconstruction, should be central to housing and livelihoods after disasters. Reconstruction programmes need to make people more resilient to future risks. That requires not just making their buildings safer, but also making people more capable to adapt to risk. As to housing, many agencies interpret building back is better, as reconstructed houses are safer than pre-disaster types. That concern for quality leads them to set high standards, engage architects and engineers to produce designs, and use contractors to construct. The end product is often inappropriate, difficult to maintain and too expensive to replicate. Damage assessments after disasters often point at vernacular technologies such as timber frames that have performed much better than others. Provided if any weaknesses are addressed, they can be incorporated in reconstruction strategeies because they are well known to local residents and builders and use mainly local resources, they require less support, thus they are cheaper and quicker. The reduction of peoples vulnerabilities, however, requires more than better housing; programmes also need to rebuild peoples livelihoods, restore local markets and social networks. To strengthen their capabilities to cope, survivors should play key roles in decision-making and resource management. Forty years ago, John Turner concluded that the process of housing matters as much as its end product, as it empowers people. Reconstruction is not different: putting people at its centre empowers them and strengthens their capabilities and resilience.

Inhabiting Spaces of Liminality: Migrants in Omonia, Athens

When a dominant group yields space to the ‘other’, boundaries are redrawn in urban space or time. However, as migration increases, the ‘other’ becomes increasingly diverse. Through a study of the Omonia area of Athens, this article addresses two gaps at the intersection of urban and migration studies: (How) is spatial differentiation constructed and negotiated among migrant groups? (How) is it maintained over time? Findings enrich our understanding of liminal moments and zones. Different migrant groups maintain distinct spatial boundaries within overlapping areas without overt conflict; and access to distinct spaces is negotiated over time within migrant groups. This is discussed in terms of the role of norms of public behaviour and modes of socialisation in defining divisions in public space.

In the Dragon's Den: African Traders in Guangzhou

A growing literature studies the Chinese diasporas in Africa, involved in the import and distribution of manufactured goods across the continent, identifying their economic and social strategies and their interactions with African urban and political life. In contrast, the counter-flow of African private traders to China has been relatively little studied, yet is part of significant changes in African economies and societies, and creates new interactions in Chinese cities. The commerce in which they have engaged since the introduction of the ‘Open Door’ policy and the subsequent rapid rise in bilateral trade has been undertaken through not only a period of booming international trade, but also a fuel crisis and a world financial crisis in 2008. This article explores the African diaspora in Guangzhou, Chinas major export hub. Drawing on ongoing work by the authors begun in 2005, it examines how the Guangzhou–Africa trade has changed over the period, what strategies have been adopted by migrants at the Guangzhou end of the value chain, and how their perceptions of their migration, their migrant community and their host city (and its perceptions of them) have changed over time. Findings are theorised in relation to grass-roots transnationalism.

The ‘third tier’ of globalization

In recent years, China’s major trading cities have witnessed rapid social, cultural and physical change which has accompanied the country’s boom in manufacturing and exports. A small but increasingly significant element of this growth has been the China–Africa trade in small‐scale manufactured goods. The opening of China’s economy has created new spaces for migrant entrepreneurs capturing a share of international value chains, transforming social and business relations, and reconfiguring urban space. This paper draws on a pilot study by the authors of African migrants in Guangzhou in 2007, active in the exports to the African sub‐continent. Findings challenge established models of global city growth, identifying the collective importance of individual entrepreneurs in promoting a trade which has significant impacts on African cities, while creating new interactions with identifiable, distinctive and unanticipated impacts on this dynamic host city.

The World Bank and the Street: (How) Do ‘Doing Business’ Reforms Affect Tanzania’s Micro-traders?

The well-documented weaknesses of structural adjustment policies have led to a reconceptualisation of the World Bank’s approach to neo-liberal reforms. The ‘Doing Business’ reforms aim to foster a better climate for business in a number of ways. The main policy documents reject interventions targeted at specific groups but, although they identify informal small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as likely to benefit disproportionately, they specifically exclude micro-enterprises as a target group. The general argument of this paper is that reforms may well impact non-target groups through interactions with several areas of policy and law, with public attitudes and with multiple economic sectors. In particular, it is argued that the exclusion of micro-traders from the reforms contributes to their marginalisation in political and policy arenas, increasing their vulnerability to state intervention. The paper draws on a four-month study conducted by the authors in Tanzania in 2007.

Elevated mercury exposure in communities living alongside the Inanda Dam, South Africa

Mercury is a persistent heavy metal that has been associated with damage to the central nervous system, including hearing and speech impairment, visual constriction and loss of muscle control. In aquatic environments mercury may be methylated to its most toxic form, methyl-mercury. In 1990 concerns were raised over mercury contamination in the vicinity of a mercury processing plant in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Mercury waste was reported to have been discharged into the Mngceweni River, situated in close proximity to the plant. The Mngceweni River joins the uMgeni River, which in turn flows into the Inanda Dam, along the banks of which several villages are located. This study evaluated the mercury levels in river and dam sediments, fish from the Inanda Dam and hair samples collected from residents of three villages along the banks of the Inanda Dam. The study results showed that 50% of the fish samples and 17% of hair samples collected from villagers had mercury concentrations that exceeded guideline levels of the World Health Organization. Mercury concentrations in 62% of the river sediment samples collected in close proximity to the former mercury processing plant exceeded the level at which remedial action is required according to legislation in the Netherlands. These preliminary findings give reasons for concern and should be used as a baseline for further investigations.