Entries tagged ‘Slums’
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Strength in Numbers: Some Final Thoughts on the Informal City Dialogues
As our year-long project comes to a close, the voices of the informal realm only grow louder.
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The Fixers Who Helped Tell the Story of the Informal City, and Live It Every Day
Our writer in Nairobi never could have done his job without the help of his two fixers. In his final blog post, he lets them tell their stories, which are both incredible and thoroughly common.
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Forefront Intro: Waving or Drowning?
Who do Chennai’s waterways belong to — the slum-dwellers who currently live along them, or the richer residents who may soon make their homes there? Kavitha Rajagopalan investigates in the sixth and final Forefront of the Informal City Dialogues.
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Children Fight for a Space to Play in an Overcrowded City
In bursting-at-the-seams Accra, houses and markets are encroaching on the few open spaces big enough for a football game.
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While Their City Planned Their Future, They Struck Back With a “People’s Plan”
Created by informal settlers in Manila, the People’s Plan has forced the hand of a president, helped the urban poor organize — and just might keep a community of thousands from breaking apart.
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Is Slum Tourism Wrong? Kibera’s Residents Voice Their Opinions
From favelas in Rio to townships in Joburg, sight-seeing tours of informal settlements are on the rise. Our blogger asks residents of Nairobi’s largest informal settlement how they feel about the practice.
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Pride in Local Brews Helps Homemade Beers Become a Smash Hit
Brewed cauldron by cauldron in the neighborhoods of Accra, traditional beers are attracting the attention of global distributors, turning a local ritual into big business.
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No Recess for Informal Schools During Kenyan Teachers’ Strike
As schools shut down across the country, slum-based classrooms like Emily Nyongesa’s keep churning out lessons for a fraction of the price of formal education.
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Why Slum Upgrading Requires a Light Touch
In slum upgrading and development, a less-is-more approach can have vastly better outcomes than a heavy-handed one.
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An Informal Currency for Slum-Dwellers, or a Nefarious Separatist Plot?
Officials are arresting spenders of Bangla-Pesa, an alternate currency that helps stabilize poor people’s finances, on charges that they’re trying to subvert the Kenyan shilling.
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