SESSION 1

AFRICAN CITIES AND URBAN MIGRATION: SEEKING SOCIAL COHESION IN AN ERA OF CLIMATE, ECONOMIC, AND POLITICAL CHANGE

Governments and civil society actors in African cities are leading debates on urban migration and displacement in the context of climate change, changes to urban industry, and increasing strain on legacy urban infrastructure. This session will focus on urban migration and displacement, challenging dominant understandings of why migrants and displaced people move to cities. The long-standing development economics argument is that urban migration is primarily based on economic incentives. While economic incentives remain salient, twenty-first century African cities offer migrants and displaced people rich opportunities for building new urban social networks, institutions, and civic spaces that challenge or fully break from colonial and capitalistic legacies of urbanization. African-led city planning will shape the role of migrants in cities, as new understandings of identity, environmental change, physical infrastructure, and human mobility intersect. Proposals to this session can include, but are not limited to: How do claims of belonging, both within urban migrant communities and the wider host communities where migrants live, affect urban social cohesion and access to city services? As climate and environmental change impacts rural and coastal livelihoods more acutely, how will African-led city planning and governance adapt to ensure displaced people and host communities have shared access to the financial and physical resources needed for adaptation? Submissions that address these questions from theoretical and empirical perspectives are welcome, as well as submissions that link research to practice.