The political and administrative context of slum improvement : two contrasting Indian cases
This essay describes two entirely different approaches to slum improvement implemented in comparable contexts. The first case concerns slum improvement projects in two rapidly growing million-plus cities in Andhra Pradesh. The second case is that of the ten-year experience in the construction of toilet blocks in Indian urban slums by urban poor federations and women's cooperatives, with the support of the NGO SPARC.
Author Robert-Jan Baken has been invited to write this essay for the IRC symposium Sanitation for the Urban Poor. He has done a PhD on the land markets in two cities and has authored a number of publications on the same topic. For his PhD he has done extensive research in all informal settlements of two cities in India – Vijayawada and Vishakhapatnam.
[Format of the essay is based on WEDC conference paper´s format]
