ABSTRACT

Cities in Africa are facing uncertain and varied prospects. On the one hand, across the continent, cities are worn down by sputtering economic stagnation, failures in basic service provision, political conflict, and daunting environmental crises. On the other hand, there are cities that are brimming with optimism amid growing economies, new inflows of foreign direct investment, consolidating democratic societies, and vibrant cultural productivity. In most cities, one can find manifestations of elements of both of these scenarios to varying degrees, and urbanism straddling optimism and pessimism, dealing with demographic and political change, increasing inequalities and informal settlements, but also increasing wealth and suburbanisation – one sees these diverse elements clearly in cities such as Nairobi, Kenya, Dakar, Senegal, or Lusaka, Zambia, for instance (Myers, 2015). The challenges that Africa’s urban areas face now and in the future are myriad and varied, as are the tactics and strategies by which Africans are managing uncertainties and complicated states of precarity.