Cape Town’s Informal Settlements and Their Right to the City: Historical Crimes and the Need for Reparation via Regenerative Slum Upgrade Strategies

Abstract

In Cape Town, South Africa, municipal exploitation and mistreatment of informal settlements masquerades under the guise of urban upgrade. In a bid to curate a “slum free city” by 2014, the municipality twisted several national and local initiatives into a perverse version of slum upgrading; using these distortions, Cape Town selfishly advanced its international interests and funded several urban vanity projects. The city’s actions echoed apartheid era practices and entrenched apartheid legacies, subsequently violating multiple social contracts and infringing upon basic human rights. This calls for a significant theoretical evaluation and scholarly criticism. This paper combines theory, historical analysis, and social examination in an effort to expose the city’s corrupt actions and suggest a significant restructuring of current realities. An initial examination of apartheid practices and their entrenched legacies establishes the dramatic stage upon which the city of Cape Town and the “informal” wrestle over the “right to the city.” A subsequent in-depth examination of Cape Town’s post-apartheid practices reveals that despite the dissolution of the regime, the city continues to oppress and neglect its black citizens. A combined philosophical approach of Henri Lefebvre’s ideas on the “right to a city” and AbdouMaliq Simone’s perceptions of “informal realities,” the paper suggests that city government has betrayed its black citizens and has failed to address the desperate need for apartheid reparations. In fact, case studies of high-profile projects, such as the N2 Gateway, reveal that the city ignores its citizen’s needs and instead victimizes, exploits, and demonizes them for its own failures. On the other hand, a series of alternative upgrade initiatives in Cape Town reveal positive approaches to the mitigation of apartheid’s modern consequences. The VPUU in Harare, Flamingo Crescent, and the Empower Shack employ strategies like reblocking, community participation, and the reinforcement of informal networks. These strategies are able to successfully mitigate crime, violence, systemic impoverishment, lack of access, and a plethora of issues that plague informal settlements. Analyzed side by side, these case studies show that, contrary to the common arguments in the field of global development, physical infrastructure, upgrade, and resources are not enough to uplift impoverished communities. The physical arrangement of the city becomes necessary to the facilitation and co-curation of the social and cultural livelihood for its urban populations, particularly those without accessible resources. As a result, this thesis prompts a redefinition of formal/informal relationships and a strong evaluation of the city’s moral obligation to its informal dwellers. In the modern context of the post-apartheid state, the city’s investment in regenerative urban initiatives becomes crucial.