ABSTRACT
I began this research project with a genuine enthusiasm for the ideals and proscriptions of the Sustainable Cities Program in African cities. I wanted to construct – and thought I saw the makings of – a counter-narrative to the prevailing sense that ‘‘African cities don’t work’’ so common to both popular and scholarly understandings in the west (Simone 2004, p. 1). On paper, the participatory, grassroots Environmental Planning and Management framework seemed to me at the very least a vast improvement on past planning and at most a revolutionary idea. Having had more than two decades of experience living, studying, and researching in eastern and southern African cities, it seemed to me inescapable that environmental problems like those stemming from inadequate solid waste management needed to be addressed. The EPM approach seemed to me a practical way of balancing community participation with a strengthening of local states. Here and there, I can see elements of what I thought or hoped I would find in
the three case study cities I’ve studied. In people like Peter Tembo, Ruth Mundia, Mzamose Mbewe, Bimkubwa Ali, or Kasu Bachu, I found ordinary working class Africans trying to take charge of the solid waste crisis around them in their poor neighborhoods. Government officials and working group leaders like Sheha Juma, Makame Muhajir, Litumelo Mate, Martin Kitilla, Daniel Nkhuwa, or Joash Nyitambe suggested to me that what AbdouMaliq Simone (2004, p. 1) calls a ‘‘more generous point of view’’ might indeed be warranted, one that sees these cities as ‘‘works in progress.’’ On the surface, Dar es Salaam is a somewhat cleaner city than it was a decade ago, and both Dar and Zanzibar have programs in place to recycle some of their solid waste. All three cities at least have a few relatively new avenues for popular agitation over policy, and some broken shards of local electoral democracy. Ultimately, though, I completed the research with a jaundiced eye on the
realities of the program’s accomplishments or even possibilities. In this conclusion, I want to address four reasons for my doubts, connecting the case
studies to broader claims. It is no surprise by this point in the book that these reasons have to do with neoliberalism, sustainable development, good governance, and the politics of cultural difference. I discuss each in turn in the next four brief sub-sections.
