African Urban Economies: Viability, Vitality or Vexation?

URBAN GROWTH IN sub-Saharan Africa is often unsupported by economic growth and the development of the manufacturing and service sector. Urban centres in the region have nevertheless continued to grow in the past 50 years, but their fragile economic base is reflected in the limited provision of basic services and infrastructure to their populations and, in many cases, a lack of social and political cohesion that results in the marginalization of poorer groups. The papers in this collection focus on East and Southern Africa and on urban centres that are either national cities or have a population of more than 500,000. The three papers in the introductory section provide an overview of urbanization in the regions, and are broadly divided into an historical review, a discussion of the economic bases of urban centres and an analysis of urban growth trends within their wider economic and political contexts.

The second section includes papers on Maputo, Mombasa and Kampala that trace the historical development of these centres and show how political struggles between different interest groups affect the spatial, social and economic structure of these cities. The papers in Section III describe the livelihoods of the residents of Nairobi, Kampala and Mogadishu, and how urban poverty is affected by changing economic and social dynamics. The papers in the fourth section focus on access to housing and infrastructure. The chapters on Johannesburg and Chitungwiza, in Zimbabwe, describe access to housing and its significance for the livelihoods of poor and migrant households. The chapter on Gaborone describes how the city has been affected by Botswana’s national development strategies, including the privatization of infrastructure development and employment creation. The chapter on Dar es Salaam explores the resurgence of civic society in Tanzania through the experience of the Tabata Development Fund. The concluding chapter highlights the underlying argument of the various chapters, which is that, despite wide variations in the cities considered, they all show population growth and economic durability, but their potential role as national and regional engines of growth is thwarted by a lack of support from national governments and ineffective urban planning.