ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. This chapter presents the politics of slums within the broader context of the urban turn, in which city authorities are assigned new and sometimes conflicting roles. At an analytical level, this also requires that people focus on debates about urban governance. Popular urbanisations of social interest (UPIS) and every informal settlement able to receive physical and legal sanitation from the national, provincial, and district authorities, or other competent body, are also considered as 'young towns'. There is no reference to the status of tenure in the slum areas Act. In contrast, the urban authorities and the judiciary designate as 'squatters settlements' informal settlements on lands occupied and built upon without the permission of the landowning agency. Many urban citizens, have to resort to different forms of social mobilisation to make their voices heard.
