Making the invisible visible: generating data on ‘slums’ at local, city and global scales
The largest and most detailed set of data about what are termed ‘slums’ or ‘informal settlements’ has been built from enumerations undertaken by the residents of these settlements and their … Continue reading
Institutional Political Economy for Inclusive, Resilient Cities
The conventional and mainstream approaches for studying and understanding cities are ill-suited for the post-2015 urban context and the alternatives that the international community seeks. Institutional political economy, or institutionalism, … Continue reading
The transformation of Indonesian housing policies
Indonesia, with a population of over 250 million, has been experiencing rapid urbanization in the last few decades. This rapid urbanization has caused many problems in Indonesian cities. The issue … Continue reading
Crossing to safety
Two people die on the roads each minute worldwide, 1.24 million people each year.Without interventions, annual deaths on the roads are predicted to surge to 1.9 million by 2020. Globally, … Continue reading
Flood Governance in Jakarta: The Role of CBOs in Mitigating Annual Floods
Jakarta is a megacity of 28 million residents and is the largest and one of the most dynamic metropolitan areas in Southeast Asia; it is also beset with most of … Continue reading
The challenge and potential of informal settlements
The United Nations estimates that more than 860 million people are currently living in urban slums! On the one hand, the proportion of people in slums today is lower than … Continue reading
The Future of Jakarta: Urbanization Reaches a Breaking Point
Since 2000, the world’s second-largest megacity, Jakarta, has seen its population swell by a staggering 34 percent. Though the city proper is home to just 10 million, the urban zone … Continue reading
Climate Change as a Catalyst for Transformative Sustainability in Cities
This policy brief examines the power of exploring synergies between responding to climate change and other development priorities in cities: in other words, can decision makers devise response strategies that … Continue reading
Nourishing livelihoods: the food vendors sustaining Nairobi’s slums
Food vendors play a key role in nourishing their fellow residents in informal settlements, offering ready access to fruit, vegetables, snacks, and cooked foods. But unlike food vendors in markets … Continue reading
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