Joint Launch: Learning from Informality - Community-led Approaches to Inclusive and Climate-Sensitive Urban Development

Cities Alliance, GIZ, IIED, and Slum Dwellers International co-host an online session on 'Community-led Approaches to Inclusive and Climate-Sensitive Urban Development'
 

In 2025, despite increasing temperatures and the intensification of the climate crisis, many world leaders in governments and businesses are retreating from taking bold action on climate and justice at a time when strong leadership is needed most. Many people working on climate change feel discouraged by funding cuts as emissions rise and investment in critical programmes to reduce vulnerabilities and build resilient communities remains inadequate. 

However, while gloom dominates at the global level, slum dwellers are demonstrating bold leadership that is urgently needed, taking tangible action to strengthen their communities - making them more resilient, healthier, just, cleaner and greener. They are not waiting for global leaders to align. They cannot afford to. But they should not bear the burden alone.

This event will celebrate many of the achievements of those living in informality - communities that have pioneered urban innovations advancing more just and sustainable cities. These efforts are showcased in the 14 case studies featured in the Good Practice Collection Learning from Informality: Urban Innovations for Just and Sustainable Cities. We also share reflections on what these experiences and insights mean for scaling up action, as captured in the report Slum Upgrading is Climate Action: Experiences and Insights from the Global South.

Finally, the event will serve as a platform for open and honest discussions, enabling participants to share their concerns and ideas on how to build on these successes to share a new way forward for bold and widespread movement for leadership and action in informal settlements. 

Event Objectives

• Provide a platform for honest dialogue and discussion on inclusive, community-led climate action in cities and informal settlements, and what’s been accomplished and what is at risk of being lost because of global dynamics
• Celebrate the successful endeavours of local climate action in cities
• Promote the wealth of community-led approaches to urban development and climate action focusing on informal settlements and inspire replication and upscaling globally 
   

Moderator: Julie Greenwalt, Senior Climate Advisor, Cities Alliance 

SDI Affiliates and Topics:  

• Benin: Growing the Urban Poor Movement in Benin
• Tanzania: Community-led urban innovation in informal settlements - the case of the Tanzania Federation of the Urban Poor
• Zambia: Building Resilient Communities Through Local Climate Action - the Zambian case 
• Zimbabwe: Gungano Urban Poor Fund
   

Online event. Register here.

More on the publications

Slum Upgrading is Climate Action: Experiences and Insights from the Global South was published by Cities Alliance in collaboration with Slum Dwellers International (SDI) and the Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). This publication is the outcome of a knowledge-sharing workshop convened in Freetown, Sierra Leone in October 2024 with Cities Alliance, SDI and affiliates from nine countries, and IIED on community-led climate action in informal settlements. 

Learning from Informality: Urban Innovations for Just and Sustainable Cities was published by GIZ in collaboration with Slum Dwellers International (SDI) and the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). This collection was compiled as a contribution to the Global Peer Learning Series: Urban Innovations for Just and Sustainable Cities convened and hosted by GIG and Cities Alliance in 2024. It aims to recognise and learn from existing experiences in which those living in informality have developed urban innovations that advance more Just and sustainable cities. The collection features 14 case studies, drawing on experiences shared during the Peer Learning as well as the wealth of grounded cases in which SDI, IIED and other civil society groups have been involved over the last few years.