Informal settlements had
drawn global attention of many with its blooming population in the past few
years. Numerous efforts had given since then on slums and squatters’ upgrading
in order to address the negative environmental stress, however it is still a
reality struggle on maintaining the sustainability and the long term interest
of the slum dwellers.
Informality is a
heterogenous phenomenon and is mostly regarded by the community as the
fundamental characteristic of underdevelopment of a city. This multifaceted
paradox is derived by the latent nature of developing economies such as low
land versus human capital and by the relationship that the country establishes
regulation, monitoring and provision of public infrastructures with private
agents. The following articles had shown proven data that the average
population of the informal settlements declines with the overall country
development, increases with the stress of governance, and decreases with the
reinforcement of law and regulation (Friedman et al., 2000; Schneider and
Enste, 2000; and Loayza, Oviedo, and Servén, 2005).
Informal architecture is
not born in a day, nor in a short period of time, although it has always been
convenient for people to think otherwise. I believe informality in architecture
is a way of communication by the local poor with the physical masses throughout
the city and it somehow became part of the language of the city. Even the mould
on decaying organic matter has its explanation, that an over-simplified analogy
might be unnecessary and appeared ironic as like all architecture, informal
architecture has a derivation, that is capable of being analysed and explained
to its sources. One can attempt to illustrate certain trait or nature from its
origins to give emphasis on various roles and contacts, thus to say the
circumstances of slum dwellers should be taken into account to ensure a
successful participatory invention.
Why
Community Participation?
At
the UN Habitat conference in Vancouver, Canada in 1976, the urban management
has adopted a pro-participation agenda. The following statement sums up the
consensus that was achieved from the conference:
“Public
participation should be an indispensable element in human settlements,
especially in planning strategies and in their formulation, implementation and
management; it should influence all levels of government in the decision-
making process to further the political, social and economic growth of human
settlements” (UN Conference 1, 1976).
Participation
has been encouraged in all sorts of tasks in urban management for the last 30
or so years, yet in majority of circumstances is not able to permeate all
stages of decision-making progress, as supported by the conference. In certain
circumstances, however, communities are starting to realise and depend on
participatory approached due to various failures in governance for providing
the necessities, such integral approaches to participation may be deemed more
noteworthy in advocating civic engagement than participation appointed from
top-down.
Understanding
community participation
There
are numerous ways to explain the term participation to make it more
understandable. On a basis, ‘dichotomised means/ends’ rhetoric prevails in the
debate about participatory approaches. The distinction between ‘participation
as a tool’ to achieve a certain satisfactory outcome and ‘participation as a
process’ which complements the capacity of individuals to improve on their
lives and facilitates social changes in accordance to the advantages or
disadvantages of marginalised groups (Cleaver, 1999:598). Participation as a
process means ensuring the quality and sustainability of achievements through
beneficiaries’ ownership and increase efficient through their contributions
(Berner and Philips, 2005:18). The shortfall in the approach of tool is that
participation are made subjective throughout the whole programme.
It
is necessary for the beneficiaries to be able to have an overview of the
outcomes of their effort, as well as to be encouraged to entrust their mindset
and energy in the long term process of ‘change’. This suggests an alliance
inclined more to selecting a ‘process’ than a ‘tool’ (Cleaver, 1999). A
programme by its nature after all, will be defined as a ‘package’ filled with
goals to be achieved within a cost-effective budget and a time-limited
framework (Botes and Rensburg, 2000). The process of participation is not just
a venture to establish some outcomes or priorities but rather to gain
acknowledgment for an already assembled package (Botes and Rensburg, 2000:43).
Community participation in several upgrading attempts seen today has been
attended towards this direction.
A
deeper understanding to the complexity of peoples’ lives is infinitely crucial
for an intended intervention to avoid the failures over and over again in the
participatory development. Failures are often seen during the promotion of. The
term community are commonly identifies as a homogenous entity bounded by
natural, social and administrative barriers. If so, it is equally important
that to minimise the threat of defining heterogenous social structure through
simple categorisation of a role such as, women, leaders, poor etc. (Cleaver,
1999:605). An oversimplified perception of the nature of community tends to
exploit those in a ‘wrong’ category thus creates disharmony of the people.
The
debate about appropriate methods in participatory development imposes ‘technique-based
participatory orthodoxy’ which fails to address inter-linkages in social
reality (individual and institutional – both horizontal and vertical) and
distribution of power, information and other resources in a community (Cleaver,
1999: 600). Starting from here, the next part aims to demonstrate difficulties
which have to be taken into consideration speaking about more efficient
community participation in slums.
The
Push Pull Factors and Effects of Rural-Urban Migration
Before even starting to
engage slum dwellers in any possible upgrading movement or enabling a informal
community to change its living environment into a less vulnerable one, we
should first off assess any threats to deal with together with any
opportunities to take advantage of in the process. Every slum is unique with
its own problems, resources and possibilities, and although general strategies
can be presented for slum rehabilitation, every case is exclusive (The
Guardian, 2014).
While these conditions of
slums are generally “defined in terms of a lack”, they should also be
understood as loci of opportunity for the often marginalised poor. Due to the
limitation of land in the urban areas of the city, informal settlements are
often forced to move from places to places. (Basically any left over lands that
could accommodate the slum dwellers.) The migration cause the dwellers to build
everything temporary. If something remains in situ, it remains in its usual
place (Longman, 2011). The authorities should as well include informal
settlements as potential genius loci so that they could once and for all
maintain the spatial substances and living quality of the slums.
Rather, the city has been
pushing it away and declaring it ‘illegal’. As a consequence, almost half of
the world population who are dwelling in informal urban settlements are pushed
outside the border, out of the institutional horizon. The dwellers’ needs,
demands, cultural activities and social relations are not acknowledged neither
by governance nor by the community, including architects. Despite being
declared as queer and distorted in terms of environmental and architectural
quality and has been abandoned for decades, it is still remained a dominant
manner of building and should be involved in the debate of future architecture
developments.
Lack
of Amenities
My
other assertion is consequently something that is distinct which is slum
communities must be embedded in all aspects of urban planning and that they
must be seen as inherent parts of the urban fabric, same like public participation which is an integral
process and therefore it should not be divided into partial participation.
Infrastructures such as water, sanitation, drainage, roads and emergency
access, street lightings, electricity, communal spaces and structural quality
are some of the aspects that should be included in slum settlements. Failing to
do so would not only lead to the current general conception of participation as
a way of cheap and insincere effort, but also as a inefficient mechanism for
the solution of partial problems at local level.
Governance
and Its Impact On Slums
The basis of the human
condition and quality living should be publicly raised and debated. It’s
however and irony to have the will to upgrade slums but does not address them
as part of the urban fabric equally. It forms limitation, of almost everything.
Factors of governance being able to distract architecture from making it more
responsive to the the present conditions such as outdated government qualities,
inappropriate private legal systems, incompetent national as well as being
short sighted on the urban development policies.
Innovations are generated
through conflict and negotiation between individuals of constructing and
designing. While building typology tend to be averagely basic, the hidden
complexity that emerged from distinctive synthesis of regulated and
non-regulated building policies maintain a profoundly hybrid spatial quality.
Hence, a ground that cultivates alternative architectural proposition of the
self-governing characteristics of a building speaks to the presence of others,
from the prospect of everyone that has involved themselves in the building
process.
The
myths of slum of it being just an illegal underdevelopment and a disgrace to
the city is therefore a constraint for the governance as well as the community
to envision the mission of slum elimination. There is a need for the local
government to stop working around the issue of slums but should work through it
in his own initiative. Accordingly, if people continue to perceive these
communities as marginalised, they will eventually continue to be marginalised. This
in fact from an organisational and managerial point of view, should be
recognised as a major obstacle for a sustainable and equitable urban
development.
Communicated
Limits of Participation in Malaysia Slums
A kampong
(in Malay and Indonesian) is a village known in Malaysia (also Brunei,
Indonesia, Singapore and Cambodia). This term applies to traditional villages,
especially consist mainly of indigenous peoples, and has also widely used to
refer to urban slum areas and enclosed developments within towns and cities.
The traditional kampong village designs and
architecture have always been visioned to reform by urbanists and modernists
and few successful efforts had since been adapted by contemporary architects in
various projects. Nevertheless, traditional kampongs are regarded as a famous
tourist attraction.
The idea of a spirit of a
place refers to the direct response of the builders to climatic considerations,
geographic make-up of the land and the culture of a particular society. Thus,
these ‘traditional houses’ with its isolated mass, raised platform, generous
verandahs, full length windows with ventilation grilles and high roof formed to
ease the circulation of air and shed off heavy rainfalls which contrast
strongly with those of heavy masonry walls with barrel vaults that contained
only little openings or flushed with too much transparency for the sake of a
work of art. The colonial and sino-eclectic heritage in Malaysia presents
excellent examples of this type of natural identity.
The architecture of
informality proclaim to the designing and building as part of an continuing
process, where fundamental architecture values such as function, strength, and
beauty are not given in advance but are gained though associations. Instead of
architecture of static geometrical objects, it introduces dynamic and
participatory processes and systems. It supersedes the mainstream aspects and
is well distinguished by relationships over compositions, expression over mass,
networks over structures and adaptation over stasis. Architectural relevance
are hence reconstructed beyond hidden official protocols, by allowing the
people to take full control and form their own living space. Thus, design and
architecture becomes an evolutionary process that can reciprocate to a variety
of initiatives. An open-ended system provides the means for the community to
share and compare knowledge and all in all learn from mistakes in order to
optimise spatial transformations for the better. Its sustainability is embedded
in the construction process; in a world of growth and change, a building might
seem incomplete or of lack, but is ideally functional and rational.
Assessment
of Community Participatory Development in Slums
If
participation is translated into ‘managerial exercise based on ‘toolboxes’ of
procedures and techniques’, a risk of oversimplified solutions ignoring
inclusion of different social groups becomes real (Cleaver, 1999: 608). There
is a range of obstacles faced by community participation in all sorts of
studies made by theorists all over the world. It is then divided in 2 sections
of challenges which is the external and internal impediments.
External
obstacles demonstrates literal approach in slum upgrading that are likely
dictated by top-down and with political intervention whereas internal obstacles
presents the main topics of the assessment of circumstances for slum dwellers’ participation.
The divide here is not between formality and informality but rather a
differentiation on within informality. This in turn means that informality must
be understood not as the object if state regulation but rather as produced by
the state itself (Roy, 2009 p.149). The three factors that challenge community
participation in slums, which are also the most communicated limits of participation
in Malaysia slums, follow:
Heterogenity:
whose interests matter?
An
informal settlement consists of diverse interest groups and individuals of
various social, cultural or religious status, political interest, livelihood
activities and needs to be fulfilled. Their perceptions of a community action
and ‘common good’ differ in hand with their role in the community. In a slum
new inhabitants may live with old timers, owners with tenants, employed with
those unemployed, legally working with informally self-employed, dwellers of
different generation, age, sex, education level, characteristics etc. ‘It is
reported that the slum communities are often less likely to participate due to
their divisions of language, tenure, income, gender, age or politics, than in
less diverse communities’ (Botes and Rensburg, 2000: 48). Are the governance
and the architects committed to opt all diversity contained in slums to make
the best out of it? It is then motivated as a intervention of improvement than
a one-sided approach.
Encouragement
vs. Segregation
Local
elites, slum leaders or agents intend to attract outsiders’ interest and to
speak out for the community needs. ‘There is always the danger that
decision-making at the community-level may fall into the hands of a small and
self-perpetuating clique, which may act in its own interests with disregard for
the wider community. In this regard, (Friedman, 1992: 29) has used the term ‘positioning
for patronage’ (Botes and Rensburg, 2000: 48).Then, no recognition of
exploitation and marginalisation inside the settlement is observed (Berner and
Phillips, 2005: 24). The poorest, disabled, in-debt or similarly disregarded
slum dwellers benefit the least, if ever. The conditions of slums in Malaysia
demonstrates how the most vulnerable groups are still excluded from making
their choice and from increasing their voice to the public.
The
so-called ‘community leaders’ are often consciously channeling selected
informated from the intervening agency towards the community to prevent a lost
in social status or in an effort to gain more support from the ‘bottom’ to address those ‘above’. These in
time has resulted in slum dwellers being hesitant to participate in most
development programmes. The gradual role of political interest in slum
population is slowly faded and has driven the slum communities further away from
being in the norm.
Selective
slum belief
As
De Wit shows political representatives that may influence officials to
implement a programme in a particular slum just before an election, making it
clear that the slum people should be grateful to him, and that he expects them
to vote for him (1997: 19). These promises are rarely fulfilled and often left
slum dwellers in no choice but to do as what they say. Rarely satisfied
expectations decrease a readiness to participate (Botes and Rensburg, 2000:
51). Slum dwellers’ memories count and as mentioned before, the readiness of
participation as an individual is required. Believing process without product
leaves communities feeling that nothing and promised changes are never really
going to happen other than a lot of talking, thus, losing the social energy
from the communities.
Conclusion
Certainly,
many slum residents are poor. But in every slum, there are experiences,
aspirations, engagements and great entrepreneurial energy which cannot be
regarded as null. Therefore, slums must be recognised as inherent parts of the
broader urban context. It also has to be recognised that slums will be around
for a long time to come, whatever incentives are put forward. Consequently,
planners, politicians, researchers and the general public must realise the
vital functions that slums can represent. Slum communities will however remain
marginalised as long as they are regarded as such. This has historically – and
will in the future – lead to strategies which are not efficient, sustainable or
equitable in the long run.
It
is my belief that by overcoming prejudices and depreciatory attitudes, the
developmental potential of slum communities may be realised and improved.
Rethinking informal habitats, building on their existing socioeconomic and
cultural patterns through community participation will hold many promises, both
for the urban poor themselves and for the greater urbanities in which they
reside. Moreover, if slums are going to constitute the primary habitat of mankind
in a couple of decades, it should be regarded as a moral imperative to resolve
these issues with regard to future generations within the context of
sustainable development.
If
our cities are to remain engines of development and progress, the “impoverishment
of urbanity” must be addressed in a manner which makes such development
sustainable and equitable for everyone. The continuous slum upgrading efforts
through community participation and enabling strategies should be carried out
unceasingly. Perhaps most importantly a rebirth of the slum lies on the way we
interpret these communities and integrate them in the planning and
organisational processes of
formal architecture. The question of informality is then a secondary one. It
should be regarded as a moral responsibility for governments and authorities to
provide for, and support, basic needs and sustainable livelihoods for their
inhabitants, whether they are formal or informal urban residents.
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