Overview ︎︎︎
Urbanisation at the Margins
Nowhere is urban change more vivid than in Lamu’s “new settlements,” where transformation is happening every day. Here, ahead of formal urban planning, it is the people who shape the town’s extensions.
Women, Migration, and Everyday Life in Wiyoni
Wiyoni is a rapidly growing settlement in Lamu where migrant women play a central role in the local economy despite facing challenges related to housing, social integration, and limited infrastructure. This research explores how physical infrastructure and social networks intersect to shape women’s livelihoods and daily life in the community.
The Space Between Work and Prayer
Lamu is going through a socio-economic transformation that has, among others, two key consequences: more Muslim women are entering the workforce and the town is expanding. For these working women, the need to pray outside of the domestic space arises. These projects investigate the strategies that women in Lamu use to appropriate and shape alternative spaces of prayer in the city.
Mpishi Hula Moshi
Food connects the global and local, past rituals and new technologies, personal and collective identities. Through making, sharing, and eating, food becomes a creative medium that redefines relationships between bodies, places, and time. This theme explores food as living heritage in Lamu, blending tradition and modernity.
Ways of Living with the Lamu archipelago
The Lamu Archipelago is undergoing significant transformation, with various forces shaping its future. This theme examines ongoing changes through multiple lenses, focusing on key topics such as the promises and challenges of the Blue Economy, shifts in local fisheries, the impact of climate change, and human-nature relations during times of crisis.
Mama na Bahari
Women play an integral role in Lamu's fishing industry, particularly through sustainable projects such as octopus closures. This theme delves into how women’s participation in these initiatives reshapes community dynamics and social identities. By engaging in sustainable practices, they not only impact local economies but also influence perceptions of gender roles within the broader fishing industry.
Ng'amba // Plastic
The environmental and social impacts of plastic waste can be seen through the lived experiences of locals in Lamu. This theme explores their challenges in managing plastic waste, including local initiatives for recycling PET plastics, and highlights the broader economic inequalities that complicate these efforts.
Lamu's Drainage System
As Lamu expands, older drainage systems have struggled to keep up, while new developments lack proper infrastructure altogether. This topic delves into how these issues affect both the island's residents and its growing economy, exploring the need for better planning and maintenance as Lamu continues to develop.
Ecologies of belonging
Due to the LAPSSET Corridor, the Lamu region is anticipating massive urban growth on the mainland. Yet much of this has yet to materialise. Meanwhile, Lamu island is experiencing its own construction boom. This theme explores how home-building is tied to people’s sense of belonging and to the broader ecology of the region.
Maritime Mobilities
The new port promises future economic prosperity fueled by the smooth transportation of goods and people. But Lamu has been a regional and global node of trade for centuries, and mobility continues to be central to people’s lives. Our work focuses on the relationship between people’s ability to move and their ability to sustain themselves.
Urban Stories of Displacement
LAPSSET’s promise of infrastructure-led development reactivates histories of displacement and forced resettlement in Lamu. This theme explores how these memories and hopes of return are shared and how they impact political claims to address historical and ongoing injustices.
Heritage under Transformation
Lamu town has experienced significant urban growth since its inscription on the World Heritage List in 2001. This theme focuses on the ways in which Lamu negotiates the complex relationship between heritage preservation, changing domestic cultures, and new architectural and urban development.
Security Urbanism
The Lamu region has suffered insecurity since the Shifta War. Current counter-terror securitisation is focused not only on infrastructure and construction sites but also on tourist and transport hubs. This theme explores the impact of securitisation on everyday life.
Urbanisation at the Margins
How are the peripheral settlements of Kashmiri and Kandahari evolving, and what does this tell us about the power to shape the urban?
Authors:
Eleonora Balestra
Hamdat Fathi Mahmud
Fatma Sayyid Athman
Joëlle Martz
By adopting a historical lens, our research traced the stories and memories of those who have built and inhabited Kashmiri and Kandahari over decades of its incremental yet continuous urbanisation.
These stories revealed the many ways in which residents navigate fragmented land tenure, engage in tacit negotiations with neighbours, and cope with the ambiguous status of their neighbourhoods within the frameworks of urban governance that are currently gaining relevance and capacity in Lamu.
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Eleonora Balestra
Hamdat Fathi Mahmud
Fatma Sayyid Athman
Joëlle Martz
By adopting a historical lens, our research traced the stories and memories of those who have built and inhabited Kashmiri and Kandahari over decades of its incremental yet continuous urbanisation.
These stories revealed the many ways in which residents navigate fragmented land tenure, engage in tacit negotiations with neighbours, and cope with the ambiguous status of their neighbourhoods within the frameworks of urban governance that are currently gaining relevance and capacity in Lamu.
“Some would term what is happening in these settlements as classical urban sprawl. There isn’t much order; the only authority present at that time were the original land owners, who allowed the people to settle there. The way they build is very different to the old town [...] these are the houses of their own dreams.”
- Resident of Lamu Town
affiliated with the
National Museum of Kenya
Constant tacit or explicit negotiations characterise informal urbanisation in Kashmiri and Kandahari, which stands in sharp contrast to the municipality’s practice of marking new structures that don’t fit regulatory norms with a bright red ‘X’. These visual markers point to tensions that result from growing enforcement capacities of rigid laws, recently published land-use plans, and broader development projects that mismatch more incremental, negotiated ways of urbanising.affiliated with the
National Museum of Kenya
Urbanisation in these settlements is shaped by both necessity and hope for future recognition.
Projects
Urbanisation at the Margins #2501
Between Formal Plans and Everyday Life
On my daily walks through the narrow streets of Kashmiri and Kandahari, I developed a little guessing game. Whenever I came across new red markings on bare, unplastered walls, I would try to guess what might have led the municipal surveyors to judge a particular building as failing regulations. Most of the time, I had barely a clue. But what grew from these regular observations of red X’s along my routes was a much more pressing question:
How do the residents here, the people I had come to think of as neighbours, respond to the growing presence of local urban authorities? And how does this shape the production of urban space, which until now had been almost entirely in the hands of those who call this place home?
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To this day, Kashmiri and Kandahari are shaped by self-building practices, but formal rules are starting to have a greater influence as the local government becomes larger and more effective in enforcing them. This research looks at how urban spaces are being shaped through the ongoing interaction between everyday building practices and official regulations.
How do the residents here, the people I had come to think of as neighbours, respond to the growing presence of local urban authorities? And how does this shape the production of urban space, which until now had been almost entirely in the hands of those who call this place home?
To this day, Kashmiri and Kandahari are shaped by self-building practices, but formal rules are starting to have a greater influence as the local government becomes larger and more effective in enforcing them. This research looks at how urban spaces are being shaped through the ongoing interaction between everyday building practices and official regulations.
In Kashmiri and Kandahari, it is common for people to build their own houses, either by constructing them themselves or hiring professionals. Hardly a day passes without the sounds of construction nearby or the sight of donkeys carrying sand or building blocks through the streets. Prominent urban anthropologist Teresa P.R. Caldeira has described what is happening here as “peripheral urbanisation.” She theorises it as more than just development at the physical edges of a city; rather, it is a mode of producing urban space that is driven by the agency of residents themselves. Tied to financial means and personal opportunities, this process is typically incremental and interacts with formal markets and governance systems in ways that cross and connect these seemingly separate spheres. Such relationships are often described as transversal.
“transversal” is something that moves sideways and thus crosses boundaries — between formal and informal, powerful and less powerful, official and unofficial worlds.
Re-Engaging Informality
To explore and describe the interactions between residents and local government, I chose to use the terms formal and informal — a distinction that many influential scholars have criticised for decades. Building on these critiques, this study takes a closer look at the complexities of informal spaces.
The disenfranchised express a deep desire to live an informal life, to run their own affairs without involving the authorities or other modern formal institutions” (Bayat 1997, 53)
The disenfranchised express a deep desire to live an informal life, to run their own affairs without involving the authorities or other modern formal institutions” (Bayat 1997, 53)
It is important not to think of informality only as the opposite of official, state-defined rules, as it is more than the absence of such. It is an alternative form of social organisation. Flexibility, adaptability, and openness to negotiation may support people who are commonly excluded from formal systems. Though often connected to poverty, informality isn’t limited to people with low incomes. Middle-class people, too, increasingly live, work, and invest in informal spaces.
Everyone can engage with informality; some have the privilege to do so quietly, while others carry that label openly on their shoulders.
Everyone can engage with informality; some have the privilege to do so quietly, while others carry that label openly on their shoulders.
Tracing the In-Betweens
The foundations of urban life in Kashmiri and Kandahari are built on informally subdivided land, where former shambas (Kiswahili for agricultural land) were split and sold by their owners. As urbanisation gradually built over the small path that once separated these plots, the municipal garbage truck, which used to pass through to reach the town’s main dumping site behind Kandahari, was forced to find new routes. Over time, a new path, commonly referred to as TakaTaka road (TakaTaka is a Kiswahili term for garbage), emerged there, where unequal opportunities to build left plots empty.
Today, the municipality relies on this informally developed infrastructure, but it is mainly the residents who actively defend it. When someone attempts to lay a foundation for a new house on this road, others tend to whistleblow immediately. As a result, state enforcement is typically quick to show up at the construction site to intervene and halt construction attempts within hours.
The case of the TakaTaka road shows how the formal system sometimes works with informal structures to help achieve its own goals, while people involved in informal activities may use formal rules to advance their interests.
The way the TakaTaka road emerged is a good example of ‘mutual accommodation’ — a term used by urban scholar Carole Rakodi to describe how formal and informal actors work together to get access to land in African cities. My research shows that this idea also helps explain what’s happening in Kashmiri and Kandahari today.
As formal and informal actors adjust to one another, they sometimes, whether intentionally or not, help to legitimise each other’s actions. This is how mutual accommodation takes shape.
The case of the TakaTaka road shows how the formal system sometimes works with informal structures to help achieve its own goals, while people involved in informal activities may use formal rules to advance their interests.
The way the TakaTaka road emerged is a good example of ‘mutual accommodation’ — a term used by urban scholar Carole Rakodi to describe how formal and informal actors work together to get access to land in African cities. My research shows that this idea also helps explain what’s happening in Kashmiri and Kandahari today.
As formal and informal actors adjust to one another, they sometimes, whether intentionally or not, help to legitimise each other’s actions. This is how mutual accommodation takes shape.
Listening to Urban Rhythms
The people of Kashmiri and Kandahari have been shaping their neighbourhoods through mutual accommodation long before state institutions became involved in these areas. This study found that their incremental ways of building — a new wall here, a small extension there — make it easier for neighbours to adjust to one another over time. These slow, flexible timelines, shaped by gradual, adaptive, and sometimes opportunistic actions, allow people to create their own forms of acceptance and legitimacy, outside any formal rules or laws.
In contrast, formal planning tends to arrive with strict, project-based timelines and fixed ideas about what should happen and when. These big projects rarely leave room for the kinds of everyday negotiations that allow residents to quietly accommodate one another. Without this slow process of adjustment, formal interventions can easily feel disruptive, even threatening, and often struggle to gain acceptance within the community.
The frictions and accommodations evident today will shape the evolving relationship between state authority and resident agency in the future, as planning efforts continue to permeate the informal urban fabric of Kashmiri and Kandahari.
The frictions and accommodations evident today will shape the evolving relationship between state authority and resident agency in the future, as planning efforts continue to permeate the informal urban fabric of Kashmiri and Kandahari.
