The UN’s Cities without Slums Campaign, which aimed to improve the lives of 100 million “slum” dwellers, has been inappropriately communicated across Africa as a project to eradicate slums and this book explains how current urban policy encourages this interpretation which has led to conflicts between urban residents and local and national authorities. It argues that the right to the city, in its original conception, has direct relevance for urban contestations in Africa today.

Marie Huchzermeyer's profile page

Marie Huchzermeyer is an associate professor in the School of Architecture and Planning at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. She is the author of Tenement Cities: From 19th Century Berlin to 21st Century Nairobi and Unlawful Occupation: Informal Settlements and Urban Policy in South Africa and Brazil, and a coeditor of Informal Settlements: A Perpetual Challenge?

"The author grapples with urbanization, affordable housing, and the question of 'slums.' Huchzermeyer chronicles the implications that a global development discourse promoting 'cities without slums' has had for Africa's urban poor and for their neighborhoods." —Journal of Urban Affairs (February 2013)

"This is a stimulating, carefully-crafted and very worthwhile contribution that deserves to be widely read."  —New Agenda (October 2012)

"The question of worldwide slums and slum eradication is central to understanding city-building processes and urbanization in the future."  —Martin Murray, professor of urban planning, Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning