Urban governance and the social construction of the city in Asia

1
Urban governance and the social construction of
the city in Asia
Workshop on Urbanization and Sustainability Bonn,
3-15 June 2002

• Yap Kioe Sheng
• Chief, Human Settlements Section
• Economic and Social Commission
• for Asia and the Pacific

The views expressed in this presentation are
those of the author and not necessarily of ESCAP
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Governance

• Cities are a major source of global
  environmental pollution
• Cities are the key to solving environmental
  problems, because of
• their economies of scale
• the flexibility of their culture
• their sensitivity to economic incentives

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Governance

• We want cities to be
• economically productive
• socially just
• ecologically sustainable
• politically participatory
• culturally vibrant
• We want to influence urban development,
• but can/should we do it and if so, how?

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Governance

• Urban managers dream if they think they control
  urban development
• Their master plans are dreams beautiful and
  unreal
• Cities are pluralistic, open societies with many
  different interest groups
• Decisions by a multitude of local, national and
  global actors affect a citys shape

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Governance

• Two challenges
• Urban poverty alleviation
• Urban environmental management
• Three categories of actors
• Government national and local
• Private sector local, national and transnational
• Civil society the poor, the middle class, the
  rich and powerful

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Governance

• Urban governance can be defined as the ways
  decisions that affect the city are reached and
  implemented
• Norms of good governance include
• Process participation, transparency,
  accountability, subsidiarity, rule of law
• Implementation effectiveness, efficiency
• Outcome equity, sustainability

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Governance

• Five trends affecting urban development and
  governance
• Urbanization
• Globalization
• Informalization
• Privatization
• Decentralization

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Urbanization
Globalization
Informalization
Privatization
Decentralization
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Urbanization

• Urbanization and economic development grow and
  change cities constantly
• Urban space is under permanent pressure for
  redevelopment
• The life span of buildings in Asia is much
  shorter than in Europe
• Rich and poor, public and private sector
  constantly compete for urban space

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Urbanization
Urbanization in Asia (2000-2025)
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Urbanization
Urban population in Asia (2015)
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Urbanization

• For the rural poor, rural-urban migration is a
  form of poverty alleviation
• Cities offer socio-economic opportunities for
  poor migrants (or for their children)
• They can only seize the opportunity, if the city
  creates a supportive environment
• Otherwise, urbanization turns into an
  urbanization of poverty

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Urbanization

• Urbanization is an inevitable part of
  development, but the way government views
  urbanization makes a difference
• There are two views on urbanization
• cities are evil, pools of poverty, crime,
  immorality, environmental degradation
• cities are centres of progress, culture and
  education, cradles of innovation

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Urbanization

• Most urban poor have work, housing, access to
  services and infrastructure
• They make their own arrangements at a higher cost
  and of a lower quality
• This makes cities less efficient and less
  sustainable
• Governments should support rather than obstruct
  urbanization

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Urbanization
Cost of water (US/m3)
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Urbanization
Globalization
Informalization
Privatization
Decentralization
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Globalization

• Cities need economic growth to reduce poverty and
  pay for urban development
• Cities compete for foreign investments (FDI) that
  generate economic growth
• This gives trans-national companies enormous
  bargaining power
• The needs of those companies may differ from
  those of the population

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Globalization

• Multi-national retail companies create worldwide
  demand for their products
• They select the best locations in the city for
  their outlets
• Outlets like McDonalds and Carrefour can make or
  break a shopping area
• They have a significant impact on urban
  development

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Globalization

• Capital moves around the world in search of
  investment opportunities in stock markets and
  bank deposits, financing real estate and urban
  infrastructure
• Capital can leave as easily as it enters the
  1997 financial crisis abruptly ended real estate
  and infrastructure development in many cities of
  Asia

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An abandoned shopping centre at one of the busy
intersections of Bangkok
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Urbanization
Globalization
Informalization
Privatization
Decentralization
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Informalization

• Cities are complex entities with a high density
  of all sorts of activity
• They need regulations to limit negative
  externalities
• Regulations make urban life more costly and
  cumbersome for rich and poor
• Unless there is a basic consensus on their
  usefulness, they will be ignored

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Informalization

• Regulations create problems for the urban rich
  and powerful
• Regulations prevent them from serving their own
  interests
• They resort to informal arrangements to get
  things done
• Corruption solves problems left unsolved in the
  formal decision-making process

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Informalization

• The poor have to rely on the informal sector
  where regulations do not apply
• The informal sector is not spontaneous, but
  planned and controlled
• It is not marginal it has links to the formal
  sector and the authorities
• The informal sector is a major developer and
  urban stakeholder

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Without payments to middlemen and the consent of
law enforcers, squatters would not remain
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Informalization

• The informal sector produces more houses than the
  formal sector
• It employs more people than the public and
  private sector
• It supplies many inputs to the formal sector and
  even the global market
• Its food supply keeps the urban cost of living low

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Informalization

• Informal arrangements of rich and poor make
  decision-making intransparent
• It creates inefficient cities that benefit only
  specific interest groups
• Urban governance needs to be inclusive,
  participatory and transparent
• It should create cities for all, current and
  future generations

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Urbanization
Globalization
Informalization
Privatization
Decentralization
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Privatization

• Free-market policies promote privatization and
  de-regulation
• The goal is to make urban service delivery more
  efficient, and it may work
• Many local governments lack the capacity to
  negotiate the best deal for the city
• Privatization goes further.

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Privatization

• The urban middle-class is now convinced of the
  governments incompetence
• It knows that government is unable to meet the
  demand for urban services
• Middle-class families are turning to the private
  sector for housing and services

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Privatization

• The middle class lives in a private towns guarded
  by private security firms
• It drinks bottled, not tap water it uses mobile
  phones of private companies
• It drives on a privately-operated toll-way to
  enjoy a day on a private golf course
• It shops at private malls, cleaned and protected
  by private companies

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Privatization

• The middle class can do so, because it has money,
  but what about others?
• Local government is left with limited resources
  and is expected to look after
• the public space
• the problems of crime and pollution
• the needs of the urban poor

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Urbanization
Globalization
Informalization
Privatization
Decentralization
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Decentralization

• Education and information enable people to
  compare themselves with others
• They become more vocal and demand that their
  needs are met
• They consider governments bureaucratic, corrupt,
  ineffective and inefficient
• Governments lose respect, authority and
  credibility

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Decentralization

• Governments begin to understand the need to be
  close to their clients
• They devolve power to lower levels of government,
  closer to the people
• This places more responsibilities in the hands of
  local governments
• It gives communities more opportunity to select
  the development they want

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Decentralization

• Local governments lack the resources to assume
  new responsibilities
• They rarely get all the power necessary to assume
  the responsibilities
• More power for local government makes
  coordination more cumbersome
• It makes solving trans-boundary problems more
  difficult

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Government agencies responsible for different
types of transport rarely cooperate this adds to
traffic congestion
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Conclusions

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Conclusions

• Cities are made by a multitude of public and
  private, local, national and global stakeholders
• Some see this as a positive development
• as society becomes pluralistic, no one can
  represent the public interest
• the more decision-makers the better no one is
  really in control

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Conclusions

• Cities face numerous social, economic and
  environmental challenges
• Who will represent the powerless, the poor and
  the future generations?
• It cannot be left to the market there is a need
  to reconcile conflicting interests
• There is a need for a broad consensus on some
  basic principles

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Conclusions

• Local government should accept its loss of
  primacy and work with other actors
• Local government should
• become leaner, but meaner
• be facilitator rather than provider
• do more steering and less rowing
• learn how to make use of others
• make strategic interventions

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Conclusions

• This requires a different attitude among
  government officials, and capacity building of
  local governments
• It requires more civic engagement and
  partnerships among stakeholders
• The roles of government, market and civil society
  in urban decision-making need to be defined

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Thank you