Search

Developing economies need to supply housing and ensure resource efficiency in the process. Industrialised construction, which increases productivity in construction, can be one means to deliver the needed housing. However, the resource efficiency of industrialised construction in developing economies is under-researched. This paper studies factors influencing resource efficiency in industrialised housing products from the perspective of value chain and environmental impact in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Nairobi, Kenya; and Cape Town, South Africa. Specifically, wall systems with varying degrees of industrialised construction implementation are studied. The study uncovers four main insights – first, the choice of materials influences the resource efficiency of industrialised wall systems; however, the current value chain does not promote the adoption of new materials. Second, products used for industrialised wall systems are imported and incur added transportation-related impacts and more. Third, industrialised construction wall systems often use lightweight materials and have the potential for disassembly; however, end users have reservations about such design strategies. Fourth, controlled production of wall systems reduces construction waste and increases the quality of products. Nevertheless, governments are currently promoting labour-intensive construction methods. Based on these insights, the paper concludes with recommendations, levers and action points for stakeholders to promote resource efficiency in industrialised construction adoption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While existing literature has amply demonstrated how states may "see" their populations, we know less about which residents are legible to the state as populations. Drawing on extended ethnographic fieldwork and interviews conducted between 2011 and 2019 in Cape Town, South Africa, this paper compares the fate of two large land occupations, one of which was evicted, one of which was not. In doing so, this paper demonstrates how rather than taking "populations" as a given, this status should be understood as an outcome. It suggests that participants in each respective occupation began with different views of the state. In other words, the way residents saw the state impacted each respective organizational outcome, which in turn affected how they were seen by the state. In one occupation, participants saw the state as a partner in obtaining housing, and so they organized themselves as atomized recipients. In the other, they viewed the state as an obstacle, and so they organized themselves collectively. Only in the latter case were residents viewed as a population; in the former, they were all evicted. Ultimately, this paper argues that, by bringing tools from political sociology to bear upon urban ethnography, we can gain insight into a process otherwise overlooked in the literature, allowing us to make sense of a question that is central to understanding urban politics in the global South: how do municipal governments decide which occupations to evict and which to tolerate? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]