Governance of infrastructure provision in informal settlements: the electrification of unproclaimed areas in the City of Johannesburg A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Savory Chikomwe Johannesburg, 2022 i Declaration I declare that this thesis is my own unaided work. It is being submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy to the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. The thesis has not been submitted before for any degree or examination to any other University. Signature of Candidate 30 September 2022 ii Abstract An increasing number of informal settlements in South Africa are receiving interim services for extended periods while awaiting permanent upgrading or housing solutions. This thesis explores the complex governance arrangements and challenges that arise around the provision of basic services using City of Johannesburg as a case study, with a focus on three ‘unproclaimed’ informal settlements that have undergone electrification. These are Stjwetla, Protea South and Slovo Park. The three cases shed light on the modes of infrastructure governance that characterize informal settlement upgrading as practiced in the City of Johannesburg and to some extent in South Africa more generally. Formal grid electrification in the case study settlements is juxtaposed by other temporary basic infrastructure provisioning in a complicated socio-political, institutional and governance context. The inquiry adopted a qualitative methodology. The case studies of the three settlements and the City of Johannesburg were compiled through an extensive literature and document review and in- depth interviews with key informants. These spanned community leadership, political representatives, experts and officials in municipal, provincial and national departments and state- owned entities. The thesis finds ambivalence, disconnections, misalignments and contradictions in the basic infrastructure provision and upgrading processes within the City of Johannesburg and between the City and central government departments. This was accentuated by the role of the national state-owned electricity company Eskom in one of the three settlements. The thesis finds that the prolonged temporary status of the informal settlements promotes contestations at various levels, including ligation. In the absence of progress towards permanent upgrading, investment in grid electrification ambiguously signals permanence even where there is no state intention to upgrade in situ. Within communities, this confusion contributes to tension while also triggering consolidation and in-migration. Differing interpretations across entities of the state about the role of grid electrification in informal settlement trajectories open up space for temporary electrification ultimately to lead towards the pragmatic adoption of permanent in situ upgrading. This notwithstanding, literature reviewed for this thesis points instead toward the necessity for a turn to off-grid electrification technologies for informal settlements. iii Dedication To my wife and partner, Vimbai, our children Tatenda (Tatee), Tapiwanashe (Tapie), Nyasha (Ngenege/Galileo), Ropafadzai (‘ster), Takudzwa (Rodgie) and not least Tafar Savory (Tafrie). You have been my source of inspiration, always sharing with me the upwards and steepness of the PhD journey. God bless you. To my Overseer and President of the Apostolic Faith Mission of Africa, Rev R. Zulu: Your prayers, manifold love and great things you have and continue to teach me. To Pastors P. K. Nyabadza (Masvingo) and S.S Mthombeni (Johannesburg): You are exemplary men of God. Thank you for prayers. To Rev Darlington Mushongera, thank you so much! Last but not least, Evergood Group at Masvingo Church. You are an obedient, God-fearing Group among Groups, that inspiring me. Keep up the good work of God iv Acknowledgments I am enormously indebted to my family, in particular, my wifie Vimbai Chikomwe and children for their love, encouragement and support throughout the PhD journey. My greatest thanks and gratitude to Prof. Marie Huchzermeyer my supervisor, teacher and guider Your support, both academic and financial is most appreciated. I now cherish the hard corrections and insightful feedback on my writing and analysis which has led to huge improvement for me as a researcher. THANK YOU! To staff members from the Witwatersrand University and School of Architecture and Planning, many thanks for being supportive and providing a friendly and conducive environment. To fellow PhD students, Grace Khumalo, Vincent Siwawa and Morgen Zivhave, thanks for those insightful discussions and encouragements! Siphokazi Makhaye, you were a good administrator. The PhD project would not have been successful without the financial support of the National Research foundation. Other funding for fees, accommodation and stipends from Prof Marie Huchzermeyer are acknowledged and appreciated. Last but least, I thank all my interview respondents both from the communities of Stjwetla, Protea South and Slovo Park as well as institutional respondents from across the City of Johannesburg, government departments and experts/professionals for the generous sharing of information, experiences and suggestions. v List of Figures Figure 2.1: Conceptualizing infrastructure provision in informal settlements: a theoretical and conceptual framework. Author’s own construction……………………………………………………………….. 60 Figure 3. 1: A schematic diagram illustrating departmental interrelationships and issues in South Africa Author’s construction……………………….………………………………………………………….109 Figure 4. 1: Location of Setjwela, Protea South and Slovo Park informal settlements in Region E, D & G respectively, Johannesburg Source: Adapted from CoJ Regional Map…………………………………………….128 Figure 4. 2: Storey brick-and-concrete residential and business structure (left photo) and another storey residential (right photo). Source: Author’s, 2020 ............................................................................. 131 Figure 4. 3: Left photo showing electricity pole being incorporated in upcoming brick structure and on the right a storey building under construction is very close to electricity lines. Source: Huchzermeyer 2017 .............................................................................................................................................. 132 Figure 4. 4: Shack dwellings have encroached below the flood line of the Juskei River in Stjwetla Informal Settlement. Source: Author’s, 2020 .................................................................................. 132 Figure 4. 5: Stjwetla informal settlement 2001-2010 depicting the Silvertown TRA constructed in 2006, road bridge construction in 2008 and clearance for re-blocking in 2010. Source: adapted from Source: Google earth historical imagery .................................................................................................... 133 Figure 4. 6: Stjwetla informal settlement 2013-2021 depicting the Gift of the Givers TRA, the state construction of tin shacks with electrification in 2015 and the gradual extension of the settlement thereafter. Source: adapted from Google earth historical imagery ................................................ 134 Figure 4. 7: Marlboro Container Housing Units as of 16 December 2020, all work on heavily reinforced slab. Source: Author’s, 2020 .......................................................................................................... 136 Figure 4. 8: Protea South informal settlement in July 2021 depicting areas that were formally planned and developed with bonded and subsidised housing. Source: adapted from Google earth historical imagery ......................................................................................................................................... 137 Figure 4. 9: Chronology of Protea South informal settlement 2021-2018 depicting densification, temporary un-used TRA (2007-2011), re-blocking and road construction. Source: adapted from Google earth historical imagery ................................................................................................................ 138 Figure 4. 10: Slovo Park in its surrounding. Source: Author-adapted Google Earth Imagery, 2021... ...................................................................................................................................................... 143 Figure 4. 11: The north-east corner of Slovo Park showing gradual densification and the internal relocation from the flood-prone area to the erstwhile soccer field. Source: Author-adapted Google Earth Imagery, 2001-2021 ............................................................................................................ 143 Figure 4. 12: A contracted ‘honey sucker’ desludging a VIP toilet system. Source: Author’s 2020 .... 144 Figure 4. 13: A newly constructed house in Slovo Park (left photo) and a double-storey residential building under construction (right photo). Source: Author’s 2020 .................................................... 148 vi Figure 5.1: Summary of the basic infrastructure trajectory in Stjwetla: Author’s own construction 2021 ...................................................................................................................................................... 151 Figure 5.2: The original tin structures provided in the ‘re-blocked’ Stjwetla by the municipality and connected to the grid electrification and basic storm water drainage as part of the infrastructure provision: Adopted from Huchzermeyer, 2017 .............................................................................................. 152 Figure 5.3: Individual shack electricity connections in Stjwetla: Adopted from Huchzermeyer, 2017... ...................................................................................................................................................... 152 Figure 5.4: Communal water standpipe (left photo), lockable chemical toilets located on the far western end outside the built area along the main access road into Stjwetla (right photo). Source: Author, 2021. ...................................................................................................................................................... 154 Figure 5.5: An ‘off-site’ sewerage effluent disposal into Jukskei through a white PVC pipe. Source: Author, 2021 ................................................................................................................................. 144 Figure 5.6: A typical illegal connection showing a live electric cable across the footbridge from the Alexandra East Bank developments to Stjwetla on the west bank: Source: Author, 2019 ..................... 166 Figure 6. 1: Water tanks that the CoJ put in Protea South in 2019. Source Huchzermeyer, 2019 ....... 188 Figure 6. 2: Low tension electricity distribution lines in Protea South since 2019, photos taken within a space of over 8 months apart in 2020. Left photo, a resident showing how low the lines drop and right photo showing equally lying lines. Source: Author’s, 2020 .............................................................. 196 Figure 7. 1: A typical electricity pole with meter box and multiple wires going out of meter box in Slovo Park. Source: Author’s 2020 .......................................................................................................... 215 Figure 7. 2: House consolidation in Slovo Park. Source: Author’s 2020........................................... 219 vii List of Tables Table 4. 1 Groups of interview respondents ............................................................................................. 115 Table 4. 2: Case study selection: Setjwetla, Protea South and Slovo Park: Source: Author based on data obtained from City Power ..................................................................................................... 130 Table 4. 3: Summarised table of key events and timelines in Slovo Park settlement upgrading from 1994- 2018: Source: author’s own construction with insights from SERI (2020) and Huchzermeyer (2021) ................................................................................................................................................................ ..146 Table 9.1: Summary of Thesis recommendations: Source: Author’s own ......................................... 260 viii List of Abbreviations AC Alternating current AES Eletropaulo Metropolitana Eletricidade de São Paulo S.A AMC Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation ANC African National Congress ARP Alexandra Renewal Project BBBEE Broad-based black economic empowerment BNG Breaking New Ground Policy CBOs Community Based Organisations CES Centre for Effective Services CoCT City of Cape Town COGTA Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs CoJ City of Johannesburg CRUM Citizen Relationship and Urban Management CT & SP City Transformation and Spatial Planning CUBES Centre for Urbanism and Built Environment Studies DA Democratic Alliance DC Direct current DoE Department of Energy DoH Department of Housing DoRA Division of Revenue Act or Bill DPE Department of Public Enterprises DPME Department of Planning Monitoring and Evaluation DPSA Department of Public Service and Administration, DME Department of Minerals and Energy EIA Energy Information Administration EIA Environmental Impact Assessment EISD Environment and Infrastructure Services ESMAP Energy Sector Management Assistance Program FBE Free Basic Electricity FIDPM Framework for Infrastructure Delivery and Procurement Management GGLN Good Governance Learning Networks GWME Government-Wide Monitoring and Evaluation HDA Housing Development Agency HSDG Human Settlement Development Grant IDPs Integrated Development Plans IEA International Energy Agency INEP Integrated National Electrification Programme IPPs Interdependent Power Producers IRA Intergovernmental Relations Act JW Johannesburg Water LPM Landless People’s Movement MIG Municipality Infrastructure Grant MTSF Medium-Term Strategic Framework NDoHS National Department of Human Settlements ix NDP National Development Plan NERSA National Electricity Regulator of South Africa NGOs Non-governmental organizations NPC National Planning Commission NPM New Public Management NT National Treasury NUSP National Upgrading Support Programme OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development OPECP Office of the Premier, Eastern Cape Province OUTA Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse PARI Public Affairs Research Institute PMG Parliamentary Monitoring Group RAC Rapid Assessment and Categorisation RSA Republic of South Africa REDs Regional Electricity Distributors SABS South African Bureau of Standards SACN South African Cities Network. SALGA South African Local Government Association SANS South African National Standards SDF Spatial Development Framework SDG Sustainable Development Goal SEA Sustainable Energy Africa SERI Socio-Economic Rights Institute of South Africa SIPDM Standard for Infrastructure Procurement and Delivery Management SPCDF Slovo Park Community Development Forum SPLUMA Spatial Planning and Land Use Management Act TRAs Temporary relocation areas UISP Upgrading of Informal Settlement Programme UISPG Upgrading of Informal Settlement Partnership Grant UNDP United Nations Development Programme USA United States of America USAID United States Agency for International Development. USDG Urban Settlement Development Grant VIP Ventilated Improved Pit latrine WHO World Health Organisation WPLG White Paper on Local Government x Table of Contents Declaration ..................................................................................................................................................... i Abstract ......................................................................................................................................................... ii Dedication .................................................................................................................................................... iii Acknowledgments ........................................................................................................................................ iv List of Figures ............................................................................................................................................... v List of Tables .............................................................................................................................................. vii List of Abbreviations ................................................................................................................................. viii CHAPTER ONE ......................................................................................................................................... 1 1.0 Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 Background ................................................................................................................................... 2 1.3 Problem statement and rationale ................................................................................................... 4 1.4 Aims and objectives of the study .................................................................................................. 5 1.4.1 Sub aims ................................................................................................................................ 6 1.5 Research questions ....................................................................................................................... 6 1.6 Working hypothesis ...................................................................................................................... 6 CHAPTER TWO ...................................................................................................................................... 11 2.0 Key debates in infrastructure governance and institutional frameworks as they relate to informal settlement upgrading and electrification ................................................................................. 11 2.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 11 2.2 Informal settlement upgrading ................................................................................................ 11 2.2.1 Understandings and conceptualisations of informal settlements ........................................ 12 2.2.2 Debates about informal settlement upgrading ..................................................................... 14 2.2.3 Informal settlement upgrading entangled in policy-practice challenges ............................. 18 2.3 Infrastructure governance ....................................................................................................... 20 2.3.1 Infrastructure and its criticality to urbanisation .................................................................. 20 2.3.2 Debates on conventional networked and non-network types of infrastructure ................... 22 2.3.3 Governance, conceptualizations and contextualisation ....................................................... 25 2.3.4 Governance systems in theories .......................................................................................... 29 2.3.5 The governance of infrastructure ........................................................................................ 30 2.3.6 Macro-meso-micro governance: disentangling for effective implementation .................... 33 2.3.7 Infrastructure governance and the Principle of the Hiding Hand and other Hands ............ 34 2.4 Electrification and development .............................................................................................. 37 xi 2.4.1 Types of electricity supply .................................................................................................. 37 2.4.2 The importance using electricity when compared to other energy forms in unelectrified settlements ........................................................................................................................................... 39 2.4.3 A contemporary view of electricity..................................................................................... 40 2.4.4 Grid electrification of informal settlements: formal recognition not without governance challenges. ........................................................................................................................................... 41 2.4.5 The practice of linking up informal settlements to grid electrification: successful and unsuccessful examples ........................................................................................................................ 43 2.4.6 Debates about polycentric energy governance and practices .............................................. 47 2.5 Institutional arrangements in infrastructure governance ..................................................... 50 2.5.1 Institutional coordination as enabler to institutional administrative capacity ..................... 52 2.5.2 Institutional theorisations informing infrastructure provision and governance .................. 53 2.5.3 Institutional-legal perspective: The connection between judicialization of infrastructure and governance ................................................................................................................................... 54 2.6 The implications of infrastructure governance and institutional frameworks for informal settlement upgrading and electrification in informal settlements: Towards theoretical and conceptual framing ................................................................................................................................... 56 Situating electrification in the infrastructure provision narrative of informal settlements ................. 57 The relationship between infrastructure governance and upgrading of informal settlement .............. 57 Institutional arrangements as key mediator to infrastructure governance and informal settlement upgrading ............................................................................................................................................ 58 2.7 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................. 61 CHAPTER THREE .................................................................................................................................. 62 3.0 Infrastructure governance and institutional frameworks, informal settlement upgrading and electrification in the South African context ............................................................................................ 62 3.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 62 3.2 Informal settlement upgrading ................................................................................................ 62 3.2.1 Introduction to legislative, policy frameworks and main actors in the informal settlement upgrading and interim electrification .................................................................................................. 62 3.2.2 Emerging governance conundrums in the operationalisation of interim infrastructure provision within informal settlement upgrading in South Africa ....................................................... 63 3.2.3 Policy-practice contradictions in the informal settlement upgrading and the INEP trajectory ............................................................................................................................................. 66 3.2.4 Informal settlement categorisation and geo-technical assessments .................................... 70 3.2.5 Housing and Energy funding - implications for resourcing and management of informal settlement upgrading ........................................................................................................................... 76 3.3 Infrastructure governance in South Africa: key components in place but not operationalised .......................................................................................................................................... 78 xii 3.3.1 Infrastructure governance in practice .................................................................................. 81 3.3.2 Developmental local government: infrastructure governance implicitly subsumed ........... 84 3.3.3 Participatory governance: official rhetoric, political gimmick or too difficult in practice. 86 3.4 Electrification of informal settlements in South Africa ......................................................... 89 3.4.1 Legislative and policy frameworks for electrification: A need for rationalisation towards informal settlement infrastructure provision and governance ............................................................. 90 3.4.2 Grid electrification for informal settlements as a governance issue: Policy fixated in contradiction to imperatives for alternative energy provisions ........................................................... 93 3.4.3 Multi-level energy governance in South Africa .................................................................. 95 3.4.4 Techno- political electrification governance at metropolitan municipalities ...................... 97 3.4.5 Pressure around unbundling the Eskom monopoly, as a backdrop to informal settlement electrification ...................................................................................................................................... 98 3.5 Institutional framing for infrastructure governance in South Africa ................................ 100 3.5.1 Legislative frameworks........................................................................................................... 100 3.5.2 Public service institutional reforms: implications of state and municipal corporatisation and ‘contractualisation’ for infrastructure governance ..................................................................... 103 3.5.3 Judicialisation as last hope intervention for infrastructure governance in South Africa ... 105 3.6 Towards a conceptual diagram of infrastructure governance and institutional arrangements in the South African informal settlement electrification ............................................ 108 3.7 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................ 109 CHAPTER FOUR ................................................................................................................................... 111 4.0 Research methods and case study background ........................................................................ 111 4.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 111 4.2 Interpretive research paradigm, qualitative case study approach and research instruments .............................................................................................................................................. 111 4.2.1 Case study as the research design ..................................................................................... 112 4.2.2 Literature review ............................................................................................................... 112 4.2.3 The choice of qualitative interviews as a research instrument .......................................... 113 4.2.4 Scope of the qualitative interviewing ................................................................................ 113 4.2.5 Gaining access to interviewees and scheduling of interview meetings ............................ 115 4.2.6 Interview approach ............................................................................................................ 116 4.2.7 Transect walks as a research instrument ........................................................................... 117 4.3 Data analysis ............................................................................................................................. 118 4.4 Ethical considerations ............................................................................................................... 119 4.5 Limitations ................................................................................................................................ 121 4.6 The CoJ Municipal Governance Framework for basic service provision ................................. 123 xiii 4.7 Comparative methodology in case study selection and background ......................................... 126 4.8 The City of Johannesburg as a case study ................................................................................. 127 4.9 Selection of the three informal settlements cases ..................................................................... 128 4.10 Rationale for and background on Stjwetla ................................................................................ 131 4.11 Rationale for and background on Protea South ......................................................................... 137 4.12 Rationale for and background on Slovo Park ........................................................................... 142 4.13 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 148 CHAPTER FIVE .................................................................................................................................... 150 5.0 Stjwetla: interim electrification caught up in governance dilemmas and political promises for housing ............................................................................................................................................... 150 5.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 150 5.2 The manifestation of infrastructure provision: electricity, water and sanitation ............. 150 5.2.1 The CoJ’s de facto urban management policy and how this is manifesting ..................... 151 5.2.3 Experiences and understandings of the Marlboro TRA as a lens into the governance conundrum underlying and influencing Stjwetla .............................................................................. 159 5.3 Participatory governance and governance of infrastructure planning and implementation . .................................................................................................................................................. 163 5.4 Implementation dynamics in the electrification and how these are governed ................... 165 5.4.1 Stjwetla’s electrification triggering in-migration, informal connections and permanent construction ....................................................................................................................................... 165 5.4.2 Temporary or permanent electrification in Stjwetla? State and community institutions in intense debates .................................................................................................................................. 168 5.5 Discussion of findings for understanding the governance of informal settlement electrification in Stjwetla ........................................................................................................................ 170 5.6 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 172 CHAPTER SIX ....................................................................................................................................... 174 6.0 Protea South: Interim electrification fanning community fragmentation ............................. 174 6.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 174 6.2 Informal settlement upgrading: Implicit and inconsistent application.............................. 175 6.2.1 Ambivalence to UISP: Disjuncture between the statutory UISP and the conventionalist RDP top structure approach .............................................................................................................. 175 6.2.2 Dolomite entangled relocations and cause for perpetual temporariness ........................... 179 6.3 Governance arrangements and how they are mediating in the infrastructure provision challenges in Protea South ..................................................................................................................... 181 6.3.1 Community leadership and the influence of party politics ............................................... 181 6.3.2 Participatory governance in infrastructure provision processes ........................................ 185 xiv 6.3.3 Litigation as democratic participation in infrastructure governance ................................. 187 6.4 Eskom and partial electrification in Protea South: corporatised services without interdependence with the CoJ ................................................................................................................ 191 6.5 Dynamics in the electrification of Protea South and how these are governed ................... 193 6.5.1 Community contestations as outcomes from differential electricity access...................... 193 6.5.2 Ineffective electricity infrastructure maintenance ............................................................. 195 Discussion ................................................................................................................................................ 199 6.6 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 202 CHAPTER SEVEN ................................................................................................................................. 203 7.0 Slovo Park: interim electrification as a community strategy to bridge delays in implementing a court order for permanent upgrading ............................................................................................... 203 7.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 203 7.2 The local civic instructing a locally relevant infrastructure governance pedagogy .................. 203 7.3 The UISP in practice: The benevolent ‘Hiding Hand’ governance turns to ‘Protective Hand’, ‘Passive Hand’ and ‘Malevolent Hiding Hand’ configurations ................................................................ 206 SPCDF holding the CoJ to account for informal settlement upgrading: Putting macro-meso-micro- governance procedures in reversal .................................................................................................... 210 7.4 SPDCF-driven electrification and other infrastructure: Exemplary active and infrastructural citizenship governance configurations ...................................................................................................... 213 7.5 Judicial intervention for UISP implementation ......................................................................... 217 7.6 Dynamics and anxieties: interim-permanent electrification infrastructure misconceptions ..... 219 7.7 Discussion................................................................................................................................. 222 CHAPTER 8 ............................................................................................................................................ 225 8.0 The City of Johannesburg’s governance of infrastructure provision in informal settlements .. ...................................................................................................................................................... 225 8.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 225 8.2 Internal dissonances within the CoJ in the administration of infrastructure provision in informal settlements................................................................................................................................................. 225 8.3 Contractualisation and corporatization of infrastructure provision for informal settlements ... 231 8.4 Disconnections across infrastructure sectors operating in informal settlements ....................... 235 8.4.1 Lack of coordination between government departments, NUSP and municipalities ........ 235 8.4.2 Tensions between CoJ and Eskom .................................................................................... 239 8.5 Complex contradictions: inconsistent interim electrification sitting awkwardly with other basic infrastructure services ............................................................................................................................... 241 8.6 Discussion................................................................................................................................. 245 8.7 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 248 xv CHAPTER NINE .................................................................................................................................... 249 9.0 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 249 9.1 Brief summary of the empirical component of the thesis ......................................................... 250 9.2 Revisiting and answering the research questions ...................................................................... 252 9.3 Contribution to knowledge........................................................................................................ 254 9.4 Reflection on the research methods .......................................................................................... 257 9.5 Recommendations arising from the study ................................................................................. 258 9.6 Suggestions for further research ............................................................................................... 261 REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................................ 262 Appendix A: Ethics Clearance .................................................................................................................. 282 Appendix B ............................................................................................................................................... 283 Appendix C ............................................................................................................................................... 284 Appendix D Participant Information Sheet ............................................................................................... 286 Appendix E Sample of Consent Form ...................................................................................................... 287 Appendix F List of Interviewees ............................................................................................................... 288 1 CHAPTER ONE 1.0 Introduction 1.1 Introduction Infrastructure provision and governance represent a growing challenge in many regions of the global South, where severe shortages of basic services such as water, sanitation, and electricity characterise impoverished settlements. This thesis sets out to better understand infrastructure governance, conceptualised as encompassing, inter alia, decision-making, funding, implementation, and networking (OECD, 2015; Wegrich, et al. 2017), as intervening in infrastructure provision frameworks. Governance is a term that has multiple meanings (Hye, 2000; Pierre & Peters, 2000) and is differently applicable in settings with dissimilar socio-economic, political and institutional contexts. Wegrich et al.’s (2017) review of recent research shows many city administrations are not embracing infrastructure governance. As such, the modus operandum of institutions is inherently shaped by political logics, centre-local influences and tensions, and multiple rationalities and irrationalities, including inefficient use of limited resources and corrupt behaviours; these should fundamentally change towards infrastructure governance being a trajectory that is able to secure manifold benefits and opportunities to those most in need (ibid). Other benefits relate to the active interactions between the state, citizen, and other stakeholders (Graham, et al. 2003). Conceptualized as a virtuous notion, governance as a concept represents a situation in which the state is weakening and various forces in society steering; private and civil society organisations are acknowledged as co-producers and not passive subjects (Rhodes, 1997; Ansell & Torfing, 2016). Assduzzaman, et al. (2016) also theorise the shift towards governance as involving a system of democracy that positively reforms state-civil society relationships. In such an environment, infrastructure governance becomes an enabler of the provision of functional public infrastructure, hinging on mutual and active interaction, and technical complementarities in which the public, community and or private sector work together (Graham, et al. 2003). Based on the foregoing, this thesis analyses the governance of infrastructure in the particular geographical or physical setting of informal settlements referred to as unproclaimed areas in the South African electrification guidelines. The commendable electrification approach, instituted under a universal electrification programme, is juxtaposed with temporary housing sector 2 infrastructure, namely water and sanitation. The electrification guidelines for unproclaimed areas were introduced due to the significant improvement to impoverished households that access to electricity can make, although this requires high levels of investment and forms a challenge in terms of governance (Hughes, 1983; Migdal, 1988; Star, 1999; Gaunt, 2003; IEA, 2011). Despite the commendable goal of universal electrification, South Africa is faced with an electricity supply conundrum related to its coal-based grid electrification (Jaglin & Dubresson, 2016). This is also deemed unsustainable and inappropriate as primary means for energy provision to informal settlements (Keller, 2012; Tait, 2017; Runsten, et al, 2018). Indeed, for many countries, the unsustainability of grid-supplied electrification is due to high costs, governance, and other reasons (IEA, 2011). In South Africa, grid electrification has been implemented in informal settlements since 2011 under policy guidelines for the electrification of unproclaimed areas, although earlier electrification of informal settlements has taken place. The electrification is provided under the Integrated National Electrification Programme (INEP) through which Eskom, the state-owned electricity utility, distributes in licensed supply areas (DoE, 2018). Metropolitan municipalities can supply electricity in parts of their jurisdiction where the National Electricity Regulator of South Africa (NERSA) issues them a license (ibid). It is in this context that the inquiry sets out to understand the governance of electrification of informal settlements through the energy sector alongside temporary water and sanitation provision through the housing sector. The housing sector infrastructure provision to informal settlements ought to be aligned with the Upgrading of Informal Settlement Programme (UISP) adopted in 2004 into the then Housing Code by the then Department of Housing, renamed Department of Human Settlements in 2009, and also incorporated into the 2009 Housing Code. However, the UISP has seldom formed the guiding approach, with the result that informal settlements have remained and been managed as temporary indefinitely. 1.2 Background McLennan and Munslow (2009) identify infrastructure provision for marginalised informal settlement communities as a challenge in the third decade of South Africa’s democracy. Service delivery protests arising from informal settlements are not uncommon as the state fails to supply much-needed infrastructure (Lemanski, 2019). South Africa, through its Housing Code, has undertaken to provide infrastructure in informal settlements under the UISP to alleviate 3 vulnerabilities. This builds on the 1996 Constitution, which incorporates basic services as a right. Accordingly, the National Housing Code emphasises that ‘the UISP is one of the most important programmes of government which seeks to upgrade the living conditions of millions of poor people by providing secure tenure and access to basic services’ (DoHS 2009:16). Despite the state’s commitments to upgrade informal settlements, there has not been significant traction on UISP implementation, despite brokering by courts of law (Chenwi, 2015; Clark & Tissington, 2015). Other state undertakings which also did not materialise in meaningful ways include President Jacob Zuma’s 2010 pledge to significantly advance in situ upgrading (Cirolia et al., 2016). In this undertaking, the performance agreement was signed with the then Minister of Human Settlements in what was termed the ‘first large-scale programmatic response to incremental upgrading of informal settlements in the country’ (Tissington, 2012:4). This aimed ‘to upgrade 400 000 households in well-located informal settlements with access to basic services and secure tenure’ (Fieuw, 2015). Yet to date, very little in situ upgrading has taken place in the country. The electricity provision in the Metropolitan City of Johannesburg (CoJ) embeds a governance challenge as two state-owned enterprises, one national and another municipal, are both distributing electricity under the same jurisdiction of the CoJ, albeit without coordination (see Chapter 8). This siloed approach to electricity and other infrastructure governance, in general, is also mirrored at the national level, where the Department of Energy (DoE) works in isolation of the National Department of Human Settlements (NDoHS), supposedly a key infrastructure department in the informal settlements (see Chapter 8). It is important to state that these challenges are taking place against the background of constitutional and intergovernmental frameworks that advocate for cooperative, coordinated and interactive governance (RSA, 1996; RSA, 2005). Besides the 1996 Constitution and National Development Plan (NDP) 2030 (The Presidency, 2012), the 2005 Intergovernmental Relations Act (IRA) provides mechanisms ‘for the national government, provincial governments and local governments to promote and facilitate intergovernmental relations’ and reinforces ‘concerted effort by government in all spheres to work together and to integrate as far as possible their actions in the provision of services’ (RSA, 2005:2). Yet the housing and energy infrastructure sectors are seized with inherent complex intergovernmental disconnections and contradictions. 4 Apart from earlier critique of electrification, there is a paradox in terms of the unwitting connotation of permanence, which on-grid electrification brings about (Gaunt et al., 2012; Runstein et al., 2018). Unlike basic and communally provided water and sanitation, the “big” networks and their high investments in the form of poles, overhead distribution, transformers and metered connections to the temporary shack dwellings create an assurance of permanence (see Runstein et al., 2018). The implication of this sense of permanence is further concretised by the so-called ‘re-blocking’ that entails realignment and re-organising of spontaneous informal settlement layouts to enable the installation of basic services including the grid electricity infrastructure (Basson, 2019). However, Kiefer and Ranganathan (2018:1) argue the re-blocking paradigm is ‘[t]hough not without structural and long-term challenges… [and] provides an alternative to eviction and resettlement’ implying that it is proving to be a permanent solution. Furthermore, re-blocking ‘is the latest iteration of in situ slum upgrading. Re-blocking differs from previous in situ approaches influenced by John Turner and others in the degree to which space is physically reorganized’ (ibid:1). Taken together with high capital investment argument, electrification is perceived as a permanent measure allowing the de facto in situ upgrading process. In this way, the UISP and INEP are perceived as contradictory in common purposes, as the former is maintaining temporary infrastructure provisions. In the context of the above background of contradictory infrastructure provision and unclear upgrading policies, I discuss how the electrification programme for the unproclaimed areas is manifesting in the CoJ. The inquiry also pays close focus to tensions, contestations and disconnections among central government organisations, the CoJ and state residents, where some informal settlement communities have resorted to litigation for intervention in the infrastructure provision. As Anheier (2013:11) conclude about infrastructure governance, not all arrangements are ‘well grounded, let alone well guided. Some innovations would likely do more harm than good; others … fraught with unknown consequences.’ 1.3 Problem statement and rationale This inquiry is instigated by unclear infrastructure governance configurations that manifest in the implementation of a well-intentioned informal settlement infrastructure provision through a state- approved UISP. The informal settlement residents have been waiting for the infrastructure delivery and permanent settlement upgrading, which, however, is not forthcoming except for empty 5 promises since the onset of the UISP in 2004. In particular, the CoJ is disfavouring UISP for relocation of residents to greenfield developments leading to contestations and intervention of the judiciary. Yet the CoJ is not complying fully with court judgements and orders that are compelling the City to upgrade in situ and engage the inhabitants in more meaningful ways. In adopting the relocation strategy, the city seems to have the support or blessing of the DoHS, which is not intervening in that process. This makes the informal settlement upgrading in the CoJ complex, difficult to understand and worth investigating. Relatedly, the stuck upgrading processes are leading to rather permanent brick-and-mortar self-consolidations ostensibly activated by the seemingly permanent electrification albeit without the approval of the CoJ, altogether leading to a complicated informal settlement upgrading trajectory. In terms of rationale, the study is motivated to contribute knowledge in infrastructure governance for informal settlements by making a systematic engagement with and analysis of underlying driving policy and institutional arrangements as well as community-level factors that hinder or promote infrastructure provision in South Africa. Thus, the study hopes to make a specific contribution to knowledge based on a comprehensive study of infrastructure provision challenges in informal settlements in the CoJ. There is also little specific literature on formal electrification of informal settlements, with much of the existing literature focusing on energy services to urban poor (Gaunt, 2003; 2008; ESMAP, 2011; GNESD, 2013; Singh, et al., 2015), optimal arrangements, ownership, and operations (Jaglin & Dubresson, 2016) and informal electrification in informal settlements (Gaunt et al, 2012). 1.4 Aims and objectives of the study The research provides deeper insights into infrastructure governance configurations that perpetuate inadequate infrastructure provision in the complicated interface between interim electrification and other interim services in informal settlements. To achieve this aim, the inquiry analyses how the energy and housing sectors’ policies and programmes are manifesting at implementation level. The thesis also seeks to assess how community governance, organisation and forming alliances promote or hinder infrastructure provision in that settlement. 6 1.4.1 Sub aims The research has the following objectives: i. To contribute to the understanding of infrastructure provision in relation to the improvement of conditions in informal settlements in post-apartheid South Africa. ii. To determine the contributions of the institutional framing for electricity in infrastructure provision and informal settlement upgrading processes and assess the interactions between institutional stakeholders and informal settlement residents in the informal settlement upgrading processes in Johannesburg. iii. To examine the methodologies for infrastructure governance in South Africa and how the the arrangements are intervening in the infrastructure challenges with regards to informal settlements. iv. To understand the unintended complexities brought about by electrification of unproclaimed areas and how the dynamics are governed. 1.5 Research questions This study is based on the following research question: How is infrastructure provision in informal settlements, in particular electrification, governed in South Africa? The above question is broken down into the following sub-questions, which guided this research: i. How is infrastructure provided in informal settlements in post-apartheid South Africa? ii. How is electricity institutionally framed, and in what ways does the structure manifest in informal settlement upgrading in Johannesburg? iii. What arrangements exist for the governance of infrastructure provision in the informal settlements in South African cities? How are these interventions mediating in the infrastructure challenges? iv. What dynamics are triggered in the implementation of the electrification of unproclaimed areas, and how are these governed? 1.6 Working hypothesis The working hypothesis for the governance of provision of electrification and related infrastructure in informal settlements was formulated around an awareness of limited interactions between government entities and between the entities and residents or their representative organisations. 7 This, I assumed, was culminating in disconnected implementation and infrastructure governance processes, in which critical stakeholders, especially community-based organisations, are then required to take proactive and direct roles. Indeed, the study found that there are limited interdepartmental collaborations in the CoJ, inter-sectoral tensions and the state institutions in stalemate with the residents in the settlements. The impasses are partly responsible for the residents ultimately resorting to struggles including judicialising infrastructure governance against the state. With regard to sub-question (i), I expected that it would not be easy to establish exactly how infrastructure is provided to informal settlements, and that this would vary from one settlement to the next. However, the unconditional cooperation I got across all key informants made it relatively simple to determine how water-sanitation-electricity infrastructures are provided in all the three settlements under study. The ideal of the UISP is not, in all cases, the basis of infrastructure provision, but this is implicitly guided under the pragmatist policy of the DoE and the ambivalent and unrealistic DoHS housing policy. Regarding research question (ii), I expected to find an ambiguous institutional framing that was not aiding informal settlement upgrading in the City of Johannesburg. This hypothesis was confirmed with three key departments responsible for housing, planning and infrastructure are working in siloes or misalignment. So are the two national infrastructure sectors. For sub-question (iii), my working hypothesis was that different infrastructure governance arrangements may be present for the infrastructure provision in each settlement, and that those with stronger community involvement and most direct relationship with the City (i.e., not being electrified by the national electricity enterprise Eskom) might be better mediating infrastructure challenges. This supposition was partly correct as the two groups of settlements administered by the CoJ (Stjwetla and Slovo Park) and Eskom (Protea South) have different infrastructure governance principles. Overall, however, material infrastructure management concerns of all the three communities were similar and unabated. Regarding sub- question (iv), I expected to find dynamics at various levels, including possibly a level of disregard or lack of adherence to the policy frameworks at implementation level, resulting in (and in part due to) institutional fragmentation, confusion and contestations among the various institutional entities and between these entities and stakeholders involved in the process. For this, important dynamics were found. They pertain not only to scarce or no implementation of UISP but also to tension interpretation and implementation of the infrastructure sectoral policies, inherent 8 horizontal sectoral fragmentation and the connotations of permanence that the interim electrification is triggering. 1.6 Spatial context, scope, and overview of the research methods The thesis is spatially framed by a context of apparent zeal and commitment to upgrade informal settlements in South Africa. The key focus, therefore, is to determine how that vision is accomplished using the CoJ as a case study. This makes the research an evaluative assessment of the implementation of infrastructure provision, with the intention to identify bottlenecks to the informal settlement upgrading processes. This research interest arises against the backdrop of perpetually inadequate, impermanent infrastructure provisioning that results in precarious living conditions in informal settlements in the CoJ and South Africa at large, despite professed commitments to upgrading (Cirolia, 2017). The inquiry is located within a qualitative paradigm, and an interpretive research design has been adopted. In this design, a qualitative case study methodology was used with in-depth interviews and transect walks as the research instruments suitable to understand infrastructure governance in informal settlements. The main case study is the CoJ with context cases of the informal settlements Stjwetla, Protea South and Slovo Park. I made preliminary visits in addition to undertaking literature reviews to get to know these settlements before making my final case study choice. I considered a total of 12 electrified informal settlements in the City. All of these were electrified by City Power except for Protea South, which was Eskom-supplied. I purposively included Protea South in order to compare Eskom- with City Power-supplied areas, given the different governance arrangements. My preliminary visits to the case study sites helped me gain an initial understanding of the institutional setup as it applied in each case. I gained an understanding of the infrastructure situation pertaining to each of the informal settlements as well as the governance context at the level of the community. The in-depth interviews, which spanned national and local government officials, utility companies, political representatives and community leadership complemented the grey literature review. In terms of delineation, the research does not seek to investigate the entire infrastructure governance arena but concentrates on electrification in unproclaimed areas and connected to this, comparison with basic water and sanitation infrastructure in the same areas. As already mentioned, 9 the three empirical case studies of the Stjwetla, Protea South and Slovo Park informal settlements, all in the CoJ, were purposively chosen. Beyond the inclusion of Protea South as electrified by Eskom, other criteria were the contrasts and unique aspects across the three settlements in terms of community governance, histories or attempts at relocations and the particular infrastructure provision trajectory in each settlement. In this sense, Stjwetla has experienced partial removals, reversals and removals again in a manner that shows indecisiveness by the state. Protea South has a disjointed community leadership that is self-conflicting, and Slovo Park, a perfect opposite of Protea South, has an organised community leadership that is seemingly quite unique, yet it is struggling in the quagmire of settlement upgrading and related infrastructure provision challenges. 1.7 Organisation of the thesis The remainder of the thesis is presented in eight chapters, with the next two chapters constituting the literature reviews that provide a conceptual and theoretical understanding of the deeply complex, multi-faceted and elusive informal settlements-related themes of electrification, infrastructure governance and informal settlement upgrading as applicable across the globe, developing countries and in the South African context. Chapter 2 presents key debates in governance and institutional frameworks as they relate to informal settlement upgrading, infrastructure governance and electrification globally, regionally and in South Africa. Giving definitional foundation, the chapter also discusses key conceptual, theoretical and empirical knowledge pertaining to infrastructure governance and state-informal settlement interfaces as they relate to infrastructure provision in informal settlements. It also discusses electrification as an important indicator and driver in informal settlement upgrading endeavours. Chapter 2 ends in a conceptual framework for the thesis. Chapter 3 builds on the preceding chapter by presenting informal settlement upgrading, governance frameworks, electrification and institutional frameworks in the South African context. The chapter outlines the historical background of informal settlements, upgrading and their governance. It reflects on key aspects of informal settlements, the contestations and litigation against the state’s refusal to upgrade. The chapter also details electrification policies and programmes and how state agencies, including Eskom (national player) and City Power (local government), are implementing or are supposed to be implementing in line with legislative and programmatic arrangements. The chapter argues that gaps exist in the governance of electrification 10 and the other interim infrastructures in the unproclaimed areas, negatively impacting envisioned progress in implementing the upgrading programme. Chapter 4 introduces the research methods and research approach and the case study contexts of Stjwetla, Protea South and Slovo Park settlements. It outlines the research process of the interpretive qualitative case study approach and data analysis techniques. Chapters 5, 6 and 7 each cover one case study. These findings chapters provide evidence of how infrastructure provision is being governed. Chapter 5 focuses on Stjwetla, which faces multiple governance challenges, including the prospect of a complete relocation through which the costly electrification infrastructure would be rendered obsolete. Chapter 6 presents evidence that Protea South has deeply fragmented community leadership that militates against community cohesion and reluctant state agencies. The judicialisation of infrastructure governance in this case intervened in the infrastructure provision, but community division is masking the efficacies of the litigation strategy. Chapter 7 sets out a community that is exemplary in terms of paving the way for the inclusionary the UISP implementation approach in Slovo Park. The Slovo Park community leadership arrangements have catalysed important breakthroughs and infrastructure negotiations with the CoJ.. Like Protea South, Slovo Park’s trajectory also included community-initiated litigation, but this yet to show meaningful results for the community. Chapter 8 turns to institutions of City of Johannesburg that have relevance for infrastructure governance and provision in the City’s informal settlements. It also analyses the roles of state institutions beyond the City including national departments, and their relationship with the City. Here disconnections and misalignments surface at interdepartmental and intra-municipality levels. The thesis concludes with Chapter 9, with the findings showing a complex governance approach, a contradicting and significantly varying trajectory across the three settlements but also in relation to the visions and thrusts of national policies, programmes and legislation. Based on the findings, I argue that there is a need to revisit the frameworks of the UISP and INEP, which are performing poorly in the informal settlements. At its close, the chapter formulates recommendations for policy frameworks and further research. 11 CHAPTER TWO 2.0 Key debates in infrastructure governance and institutional frameworks as they relate to informal settlement upgrading and electrification 2.1 Introduction Infrastructure governance, institutional frameworks, informal settlement upgrading and electrification are key empirical and conceptual themes undergirding the different literature discussions in this thesis. The purpose of this chapter is to review these in a way that allows me to construct a conceptual framing for this thesis. The chapter opens with a discussion of the informal settlement upgrading theme to determine how infrastructure upgrading is done. This theme sheds details about how in informal settlements are differently understood, conceptualised and happening globally and regionally for ultimate comparison with South African approaches. It does so by examining international studies on the implementation and governance of informal settlement upgrading. The second theme reviewed in this chapter is electrification focusing on distribution, electrification typologies and how the infrastructure is governed in informal settlements. This pertinent theme directly anchors and informs the study on South African electrification of unproclaimed areas. The electrification theme is followed by a review of extensive debates on infrastructure governance, key concepts relating to infrastructure, governance, and related theories and principles. The thematic is important to inform South African of best infrastructure governance international practices around the globe and region. Lastly, the chapter reviews literature on institutional arrangements in infrastructure governance, paying attention to institutional interactions, coordination, capacities and challenges. Here the review encompasses the institutional-legal perspective and the role of judicial institutions in infrastructure governance in informal settlements. The institutional-legal thematic is central to determine how state institutions and the legal fraternity are intervening in infrastructure governance, with international insights key to inform local South African trajectories. 2.2 Informal settlement upgrading The section first looks at how informal settlements are understood and conceptualised in global South contexts which helps this thesis to frame challenges and tensions in the settlements upgrading initiatives. Key debates about informal settlement upgrading and how it is manifesting in the global South and globally more generally are discussed. There also discussions about 12 informal settlement upgrading policy-practice disjuncture not notwithstanding compelling socio- economic reasons to incremental informal settlement upgrading. 2.2.1 Understandings and conceptualisations of informal settlements Informal settlements, which is the term this thesis adopts, is not entirely synonymous with the term slum, the latter being a complex, ambiguous international condition encompassing varying forms of vulnerabilities that ‘represent the worst of urban poverty and inequality’ and informalities across time and geographies (UN-Habitat, 2003:v). Because of these many facets, UN-Habitat (2003) assumes “slum” as an operational definition to unpack the complex global underlying spatial, social, and economic dynamics related to slum phenomena. Informal settlements are seen as a particular type of slum just like squatter settlements, which connote unauthorised occupation of land (Gilbert, 2009). As both ‘slum’ and ‘squatter’ convey negative histories and meanings in South Africa (Huchzermeyer, 2014), this thesis henceforth adopts the use of the term informal settlements as much as possible. This is also the term most frequently used in the South African housing policies. Although informal settlements, just like slums, are important human settlement areas, they are often negatively stereotyped. Slums are identified by their deficits: ‘the most intolerable of urban housing conditions, which frequently include insecurity of tenure; lack of basic services, especially water and sanitation; inadequate and sometimes unsafe building structures; overcrowding; and location on hazardous land…[with] high concentrations of poverty and of social and economic deprivation’ (UN-Habitat, 2003:vi). UN-Habitat (1999; 2010) characterises the poor human living conditions in informal settlements as not only a manifestation of poverty, squalor and vulnerability but also exclusion, precarious legality and stigmatisation. From a health perspective, informal settlements were responsible for a quarter of respiratory and diarrhoeal diseases among children towards the end of the previous century (WHO, 1998). In Sub-Saharan Africa, a contributing factor to poor living conditions in the settlements is the severest lack of access to piped water on-premises and on-site sewerage (Satterthwaite et al., 2019). The positive side of the informal settlements’ ledger is their being receiving points for immigrants by virtue of providing affordable housing, often built by own means within or on the edge of an existing informal settlement. UN-Habitat (2003) argues that this should be an indication to state authorities of shelter innovation possibilities for the poor urbanites. Furthermore, residents of the 13 settlements can be seen as ‘wellsprings of entrepreneurial energy’ and thus important cogwheels of city economies, providing employees, employers and markets to the city (City Alliance, 1999:2). The New Urban Agenda (UN-Habitat, 2016:14) exemplifies this point using a supposition that if the nearly one million residents of Dharavi informal settlement were evicted, that would socially and economically dislocate Mumbai. In that way ‘[T]he city would simply stop working. If the mega slum were to disappear, then Mumbai would lose so many of its drivers, domestic workers, garment manufacturers, garbage collectors and office workers that India’s commercial capital would simply cease to function.’ There are several understandings and conceptualisations of informal settlements that frame their tensions between temporariness, upgrading initiatives and permanence. According to Waliuzzaman (2020:1), urban informal settlements are conceptualized as housing of the poor where hegemonic imaginings of “dysfunction”, “disorder” and “discursive marginalisations” often influenced by the legacy of coloniality view ‘informality as the “problem” of global South cities.’ Another analyst attributes the existence and growth of the settlements to failure of past as well as current policies for informal settlements often criticized as rigid, outdated and inappropriate planning instruments (Sietchiping, 2005). Okyere and Kita (2015) and Niva, et al (2019) cite persistent and or uncontrolled processes of urbanization and strong urban growth in African cities, rarely addressed by policymaking, as significantly contributory to the informal settlement phenomenon. For this, urban planners are often blamed for losing control and or overlooking the spatial expansion and growth of the settlements (Sietchiping, 2005). Given informal settlements are a culmination of multidimensional spatial-temporal urbanization dynamics (Niva, et al, 2019), Sietchiping (2005) suggests that urban planning needs to understand the various motivations behind the proliferation of informal settlements. This conceptualization and the simulation require appraisals to give insights about the settlements locational, development and growth trends, and to predict their ‘past, present and probable future location’ (Sietchiping, 2005:1). To address the dynamics of informal settlements in developing countries, Sietchiping (2005:1) proposes a Geographic Information Systems-Cellular Automata Informal Settlement Growth Model ‘to model, simulate, predict and dynamically visualize the growth’ practices. This GIS-linked model providing visual trends is regarded with high potential, sensitivity, usability and reliability and high prediction of slum development, growth and facilitates future planning (ibid). 14 Unlike the foregoing technocratic solution, Okyere and Kita (2015:101) campaigns for a reconsideration of ‘dominant and conventional thoughts on informal settlements to embrace its inherent patterns and processes in Africa…for responsive, inclusive and effective sustainable urban planning strategies in African cities.’ The next section pertains to debates surrounding informal settlement upgrading, experiences and the various ways in which literature suggests the upgrading strategy has been done, treated or could be treated. The discussion forms the basis for establishing a connection to infrastructure and its governance, where informal settlement upgrading is all about infrastructure provision and improvement. 2.2.2 Debates about informal settlement upgrading Informal settlement upgrading is classified into four (4) broad categories of which one is the do- nothing approach by government motivated by of lack of capabilities, resources or political will to engage with informality (Visagie & Turok, 2020). This is synonymous with adopting a “quiet diplomacy” that ignores the settlements as governments make no claims or responsibilities on infrastructure investments in the settlements (Satterthwaite, 2012). Secondly, the state can choose to evict, relocate or den-densify informal settlements on the grounds of illegality where debates like area inhabited is reserved for a specific development or as a protective measure from environmental hazards can be raised (see Jordan and O’Riordan, 2004; Visagie & Turok, 2020; Tournée and Omwanza, undated). Under this typology, some settlements may be openly bulldozed, often worsening the lives of residents (Tibaijuka, 2005; Huchzermeyer, 2011; Satterthwaite, 2012). The third option is where local authorities provide little basic utilities to alleviate hardship which, at least, signifies state acceptance of the informalities albeit without a clear vision for a better future (Visagie & Turok, 2020). It is in this third category that this study largely falls. The fourth and last possibility is where the state makes bolder commitment to redesign, develop, upgrade as well as manage the settlement developmental approach in partnership with the community (ibid). The last one resonates with what the UISP in South Africa purposes to do. In the context of the upgrading typologies outlined above, Satterthwaite (2012: 205) defines informal settlement upgrading as measures taken to ‘improve the quality of housing and the 15 provision of housing-related infrastructure and services to settlements that are considered to be (or officially designated as) ‘slums’ or that developed illegally.’ Relocation and or de-densification which both encompass physical removals of residents is one framework of informal settlement upgrading. To undertake relocation/densification, environmental, health hazards, overcrowding among other factors that impact basic or emergency services provision in informal settlements are considered (see Jordan and O’Riordan, 2004; Visagie & Turok, 2020). Excessive population density is, for instance, criticized for speeding up the spread of water and vector-borne sicknesses and raising the risk of the contagious Covid-19 pandemic especially where there is inadequate infrastructure (Satterthwaite, 2011; UN-Habitat, 2015; PlanAct, 2020). In overly populated settlements, complete relocation or de-densification is often contemplated, with most governments tempted to relocate informal communities to affordable state-subsidized housing solutions (Visagie & Turok, 2020). But given formidable numbers of the poor living in informal settlements and limited state resources, for instance in sub-Saharan Africa, some governments end up making exceptional commitments which they may not fulfil (ibid). More often, governments redirect limited financial and human resources to implement temporary residential areas (TRAs) at host sites these often-becoming new sites of marginalization and high social vulnerability (PlanAct, 2020). TRAs are comparable to gray spaces where populations are thrust ‘in “permanent temporariness” – concurrently tolerated and condemned, perpetually waiting ‘to be corrected’ (Yiftachel, 2009:90). Top-down or centrally imposed de-densification solutions lack contextual flexibility, compromise and unanimity hence the process is bound to face resistance and contestation by communities who may not accept disturbance or relocation (Visagie & Turok, 2020). The resistance has been conceptualized under active citizenship (GGLN, 2013) and infrastructural citizenship (Amin, 2014; Lemanski, 2019), being frameworks through which citizens seek improvement in the way infrastructure planning, provision and governance is done. As a matter of procedure, relocations require extraordinary processes including social facilitation, securing the residents’ informed consent, acquiring and servicing of well-located land and ensuring minimal disruption on livelihoods (PlanAct, 2020). This implies that if not managed well, de- densification can inflict deep socio-economic and political impacts tantamount to evictions or forced removals, except if the informed consent principle and processes of participation are adhered to in strict sense. 16 The third option, temporary settlement upgrading, is common where land tenure is not secure and inhabitants susceptible to possible eviction such that government may only provide temporary or provisional infrastructural improvements in form of communal water taps, street lighting or road opening (Satterthwaite (2012); Visagie & Turok, 2020). The sites can include residents carefully chosen problematic land pieces like dumpsites, riparian, rugged and other poorly located land in anticipation of standing a good chance of evading eviction by government (Satterthwaite, 2012; Tournée and Omwanza, undated). Upgrading initiatives are possible after the acceptance and integration ‘in local governments’ ongoing investment and management programmes’ (Satterthwaite, 2012:208). Settlement like Kibera, Mathare and Korogocho, all in Nairobi, Kenya, can be classified under this upgrading trajectory given the temporary and poor drainage infrastructure for example, which poses a health hazard and high proneness to flooding (Tournée and Omwanza, undated). In such circumstances, governments may roll out temporary basic services like communal water, communal disludgeable or bucket sewerage systems, municipal solid waste collection/disposal yet in some instances these may be non-existent (PlanAct, 2020). The underlying problems to the temporary infrastructure provision have been debated as inappropriate overarching legislation or policy that do not recognize informal settlements (Satterthwaite, 2012) or unqualified municipal workforce that lacks resources or ingenuity to implement infrastructure programmes (Waliuzzaman, 2020; Tournée and Omwanza, undated). Sietchiping (2005) and Waliuzzaman (2020) blame rigid colonial-based urban planning and its associated stringent urban by-laws that are not providing an enabling environment conducive for residents showcase their knowledges or capabilities regarding viable infrastructure solutions. The last of the four approaches discusses in situ informal settlement upgrading which Cities Alliance (1999:1 & 3) justified ‘as the centrepiece of a global strategy for improving the living conditions of the urban poor.’ Extending this argument, UN-Habitat (2017) and Visagie and Turok (2020) emphasize that greater attention should be focused on refashioning informal settlements to improve living conditions, tape into economies of concentrated population that reduce costs to infrastructure provision and stimulate inclusionary and participatory settlement upgrading. In situ informal settlement upgrading owes its background in the 1970s when the World Bank championed the funding of site and services schemes which made it to be routinely accepted as a relevant approach by many nations which were induced by the expectation of more funding 17 (Satterthwaite, 2012). Earlier on in the 1960s, John FC Turner and William Mangin also produced influential writings following their successful upgrading experiences in Lima (ibid). Further motivation to settlement upgrading was exemplified in the large-scale Kampung Improvement Programme, Indonesia, where in 1969, unserviced village-like settlements or kampungs in the city of Jakarta and Surabaya were provided with water, roads, drainage, as well as sanitation. Yet the biggest flaw of the programme then was it did not involve local residents until recently in the 1990s when community participation become integrated (ibid). According to Satterthwaite (2012), the upgrading leads to improvements in reticulated water, sanitation, electricity, education, health facilities, inter alia, and land tenure issues are resolved. The upgrading model presents a holistic approach for governments, communities and or civil society organisations to physically adapt, design and institute incremental upgrades based on residents lived realities (Visagie & Turok, 2020). However, not all governments have accepted the in situ upgrading as some have inclined to strong pro-poor approaches that deliver subsidized housing for its poor people, the examples of Chile and South Africa (Cities Alliance. 2019, Satterthwaite, 2012). Yet high poverty levels, high urban population projections, constrained state resources as well as growing backlogs of those living in informal settlements limit the state provision approach (Buckley et al. (2016). Apart from in situ informal settlement upgrading being looked at as an empowering, flexible and participatory planning design approach, it can also accommodate existing housing investments where households would have built houses in their bid to prove ‘that their settlement is no longer a “slum” and so avoid eviction’ (Satterthwaite, 2012:208). Unlike other forms of upgrades, Satterthwaite (2012) distinguishes the collaborative upgrading as enabling a settlement-wide approach to infrastructure provision. Through the infrastructure installations and or improvements, Cities Alliance (1999:3) argued that upgrading ‘makes a highly visible, immediate, and large difference in the quality of life of the urban poor.’ Improvement in tenure security which reduces the risks associated with eviction and uncertainty makes ‘poor residents, including tenants, enjoy these benefits and are not simply edged out into newer slums’ (Cities Alliance, 1999:3). Upgraded serviced plots do not only guarantee security of tenure but also ‘acquire a value premium that can be ten times greater than that of comparable unserviced plots’ (ibid:3). Commenting on its implementation, Stevens (2020), however, argues that successful upgrades are realistically feasible where there are no intense population densities which allow communities to agree on a 18 “reblocking” or replanning strategy for the provision of access roads, water, sewerage, electricity and drainage mains servitudes. Generally, African informal settlements are spontaneous in nature lacking adequate space for people-vehicular circulation, infrastructure networks, livelihood- generating initiatives, social as well as recreational facilities (Visagie & Turok, 2020). The spontaneity prompts de-densification in settlements with higher densities. Yet, higher-density challenges could be overcome as happened in Thailand’s CODI programme where, in higher densities ‘community-directed upgrading was often in the form of two- or three-storey terraces as these can accommodate 200 or more households per hectare’ (Satterthwaite, 2012:209). This example underlines the virtues of community-led upgrades to centrally planned non-participative approaches. Highly densified settlements like Dharavi in Mumbai which have above half a million residents in 2 square kilometres or more than 2500 persons per hectare translating to one person per four (4) square meters can consider the Thailand CODI approach. 2.2.3 Informal settlement upgrading entangled in policy-practice challenges Despite the adoption of upgrading in several countries’ policies, there is often a disjuncture between the policy or programme intention and what happens in practice. According to Huchzermeyer (2011:23), the political and bureaucratic engagement with the underlying cause of the growth of informal settlements is often inadequate, culminating in simplistic and ‘symptom- oriented’ diagnoses of what in reality are complex manifestations of informality and poverty. Huchzermeyer (2011) therefore argues that because of such misconception, politicians and bureaucracies resort to simplistic undertakings of eradication rather than tackling the complex process of informal settlement upgrading. In the context of Bandung, Indonesia, Jones (2017) positions the challenges and complexities of informal settlements in developing countries in relation to in-situ upgrading policies and other restructuring strategies. The Bandung city introduced an unsustainable slum upgrading policy that shifted from in situ solutions to ‘vertical housing towers which appear incompatible in accommodating the way of life practiced in kampung adaptive urbanism contexts’ (ibid:1). The storey housing was not in sync with the way the poor live, thus in essence, reshaping and restructuring the residents’ lifestyles in line with formal housing markets. In its 2008 edition on the State of African Cities, the UN-Habitat provides a further reason for disjuncture between policy and practice. It portrays the East African Region’s persistence of informal settlements as being the result of ‘the politicizing of informal settlements 19 and social housing in party lines, current in election years and forgotten as soon as the ballot count is completed’ (UN-Habitat, 2008:14). Illustrating the tendency of a negative portrayal of informal settlements mentioned above, UN-Habitat (2008:115) also notes that informal settlements in that region are ‘associated by the government and city authorities with illegality and social ills. They are viewed as breeding grounds for crime, prostitution, drug trafficking and disease.’ In sub-Saharan Africa, Zimbabwe is cited as a typical case of unsympathetic governance of informality through the clearances in Operation Murambatsvina, a poorly conceived and carried out clean-up operation in 2005 that obliterated informal sector advances on which many livelihoods were based (Tibaijuka, 2005). The operation failed to enrol a people-centred approach resulting in serious social and economic disasters (UN-Habitat, 2008). Huchzermeyer (2011:87) associates the episode with ‘the depressing topic of mass eviction in African cities’. Similar informal settlement eviction approaches have also been effected across the African continent becoming ‘an epidemic of forced evictions, on an unprecedented scale’ (Jean du Plessis, 2006:184 cited in Huchzermeyer, 2011). Another extensive demolition occurred in Abuja, Nigeria, following an ‘overly ambitious modern master plan’ (Huchzermeyer, 2011:92), which instigated bulldozing of Abuja’s flourishing informal settlements (COHRE, 2008 cited in Huchzermeyer, 2011). A similar event occurred in Luanda, Angola, where armed state security forces carried out mass evictions in 2002 (COHRE, 2005b cited Huchzermeyer, 2011), because the government was determined to build ‘one million new low-income houses by 2012, rather than to upgrade the existing informal settlements in situ’ (Huchzermyer, 2011:88). Conclusions drawn from the case studies in Bangladesh, East Africa and sub-Saharan Africa indicate there is need to reform the bureaucratic and political approaches to informal settlement upgrading that frame illegality and shifting or diverting approved upgrading programmes implementation. There is evidence that collaborative inclusion of the community can produce contextually relevant responses that can bring new insights and reimaginations of complex informal settlement challenges beyond myopic and simplistic conceptualisations. Based on the foregoing discussions, informal settlement upgrading remains a key process through which infrastructure is provided in informal settlements, notwithstanding variation between the original intent of upgrading and actual practice in some global South countries. The debates have provided 20 a platform to understand how infrastructure governance, the next theme below, is planned and determined for informal settlements. 2.3 Infrastructure governance This theme addresses the concept of infrastructure as applied in urban setting as well as governance and how it is conceptualized in different global contexts. The section then analyses governance systems in theoretical terms. The other sub-headings discussed are governance of infrastructure and how it is conceptualised under macro-meso-micro infrastructure governance arrangements. The last discussion item is on infrastructure governance and the Principle of the Hiding Hand and other Hands typifying possible governance configurations in different infrastructure provision contexts. 2.3.1 Infrastructure and its criticality to urbanisation Infrastructure has been defined and understood based on its permeating and interconnecting essence, a network and lifeblood that sustains socio-technical and political systems leading to urban functionality, sociality, and regulation (Graham & Marvin, 2001; Neuman, 2006; Amin, 2014). One typical definition and key referent in this discussion is given by Neuman (2006:6) that infrastructure is ‘the physical network that channels a flux (water, fluid, electricity, energy, material, people, digital signal, analog signal, etc.) through conduits (tubes, pipes, canals, channels, roads, rails, wires, cables, fibers, lines, etc.) … with the purpose of supporting a human population, usually located in a settlement, for the general or common good. It consists of a long-lasting network connecting producers and service providers with a large number of users through standardized … technologies, pricing, and controls that are planned and managed by coordinating organizations.’ The conceptualization of infrastructure systems as networked social and spatial provisions of essential services produces a universally networked city (Coutard & Rutherford, 2016). Salient elements about the network ideology are taken as ‘the most efficient means of supplying urban services; network performance increases with size….and the solutions to problems created by the networks reside within the networks themselves’ (Coutard & Rutherford, 2016:3). In essence, networked city infrastructure provides ‘the vital technological sinews of the modern city: its road, bridge and transit networks; its water and sewer lines and waste disposal facilities; and its power… 21 [that] permit urban functioning and facilitate urban economic development’ (Tarr and Konvitz, 1987: 195). Socio-technically, Guy and Karvonen (2011:1) emphasize infrastructure as a materiality-technicity relational process that provide indelible vitality in ‘the messiness of the contemporary city.’ In this infrastructure is viewed as mediative and integrative of urban life, yet it can lead to splintered urbanisms (Graham & Marvin, 2001; Graham, et al, 2010). Herman and Ausubel (1988:1) describe urbanisation and infrastructure as: ‘Cities are…densest expressions of…a set of infrastructures, working sometimes in harmony, sometimes with frustrating discord, to provide us with shelter, contact, energy, water and means to meet other human needs…sharpen[ing] our understanding of the similarities and differences among regions, groups and cultures.’ Networked infrastructures, therefore, significantly contribute to the construction and effective control of modern urbanization processes by facilitating various urban socio-economic and political diversity (Coutard & Rutherford, 2016). In socio-political terms and constant community- led contestations and infrastructure citizenship, infrastructure is looked at as ‘a core lens for understanding the city’ (Lemanski. 2019:588), also ‘as a gathering force and political intermediary of considerable significance in shaping the rights of the poor to the city’ (Amin, 2014:137). In the context of informal settlements in Brazil, Amin (2014:137) argues that infrastructures of water, sanitation housing and electricity are ‘the staples of life… co-constructed by the poor’ to make and unmake residents’ livelihoods. In more abstract terms, Star (1999:380) extends the definition of infrastructure as the seemingly ‘invisible, part of the background for other kinds of work.’ This invisibility makes infrastructure to be regarded as the unseen, the forgotten and the hidden background, or the boring, unexciting technical mechanisms often left only to technical personnel, planners and a host of other implementers (Graham & Marvin, 2001; Wegrich et al., 2017). Altogether, what the above definitions demonstrate is that infrastructure is more complex than simple basic provisions of urban services but fluidly encompasses technical, social, environmental, political and economic contexts. 22 2.3.2 Debates on conventional networked and non-network types of infrastructure This section identifies different types of technical or economic infrastructures, what Neuman (2006) and Guy and Karvonen (2011) call the physical infrastructure, with an intention to highlight differences between conventional networked and non-networked infrastructural typologies. According to World Bank (undated:13) different large-scale networked economic infrastructures of power, water and sanitation, waste disposal, transport, among others are vital to livelihoods and economic production. However, Graham and Marvin (2001) and Wegrich et al (2017) analyses networked infrastructures as often overlooked with their criticality surfacing when they fail, break down, destroyed or are disturbed owing to their susceptibility to natural or civil disturbances. The often-monopolized large-scale infrastructures domains, however, require high levels of investments, constant maintenance and accountability to sustain national economic growth as well as citizens’ welfare as infrastructure is ‘malign in th