Who owns the African city?
Convenors: Benjamin Davy (University of Johannesburg), Nyembezi Makoni (University of Johannesburg)
Track: Transformative Practices
Keywords: Private Property Relations, Common Property Relations, Ownership in Land, Rights of Nature, Justice and the City
Thursday October 24, 15:30–17:00, First Floor Seminar Room, John Moffat Building
SESSION 14
WHO OWNS THE AFRICAN CITY?
Ownership in land is one of the key determinants of the potential of urban transformation (Watson 2012). A city that is owned by its users develops differently from a city owned by international corporations. A city that is owned by a tiny group of proprietors develops differently from a city that is owned by many small-holding owners. Ownership is not confined to private property (Davy 2023). African cities comprise vast urban commons: Streets, marketplaces, or urban forests are used by members of the public, who appropriate urban spaces opportunistically. In African cities, ownership in land often mixes formal and informal components (Roy 2005). Many African cities have a rich fauna and flora. Urban monkeys (but also snakes, spiders, or feral cats and dogs) are a typical example of the joint ownership in land by human and non-human animals. Animals and the rest of Nature often are neglected as members of the moral community who owe each other justice. Considering urban transformation, the survival of human and non-human animals in cities threatened by fire, drought, or flooding needs to pay attention to all species.
Main questions:
- What is the impact of private and common property relations on urban transformation in Africa?
- What are particularly remarkable just and unjust ownership practices in African cities?
- How can urban land reforms contribute to urban transformation?
Presentations
The ing’ombe (cattle) in the town: Reimagining their roles and significance beyond animal spaces in Karonga Town, Malawi
There is a comprehensive literature that shows that the practice of cattle rearing has been embedded into urban societies of the African continent for many centuries. While the socio-economic and environmental impact of livestock rearing in urban Africa are storied, literature...
Of containerization and urban development: Appropriating the public urban space for informal business operations in the Sunyani Municipality
This study seeks to understand the effects of containerization on urban aesthetics, legibility, resilience and urban governance. The study employs mixed methods to collect data from diverse actors in the informal business and urban governance space for a nuanced understanding of the phenomenon.
Who owns the road?
Due to the continuation of historical unequal power relations, there are contesting ownerships in South African cities. The R702, a provincial road in Mangaung, illustrates and contests these hierarchical relations of ownership and the role of law in producing and transforming them.
The Arboreal City: Trees in the making of Johannesburg
Using archival research, this paper will focus on the history of trees in Johannesburg to show that environmental actors have been a key, if understudied, element of racial capitalist project that divided the city.
