Cities Alliance Knowledge
Paper: Scaling up Essential Services in African Cities
Infrastructure and Service Delivery
Urban Development
20 Oct 2022
This paper by Dr Mark Napier discusses the balance between state allocation of urban land and market distribution of land as a resource, an asset which inevitably becomes a commodity which can be used by the poor more or less effectively to alleviate poverty.
Observations are made about how the market has been distorted, and why it would make good sense (socially, economically and ideologically) for poorer communities to be better located in South African urban areas.
Download the paper presented at the Fourth Urban Research Symposium, Washington, May 2007 [264KB]