10 – Reduced inequalities
Securing the Right to Housing and Services in eThekwini’s Informal Settlements
Key Concepts: Spatial Inequality, Right to Housing Like other major cities in South Africa, Durban’s eThekwini Metropolitan Municipality faces a growing population fuelled by migration from both rural areas and neighbouring countries. Many new residents find shelter in informal settlements which are, although real communities, often overcrowded and unsafe, lacking critical infrastructure. The municipality’s Human…
Sexual Orientation and Human Rights in Botswana – The City of Gaborone’s role
Botswana stands out in the African context for its unique approach to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender (LGBT) issues. In addition to societal stigma, their sexual behaviour was criminalized by the penal code. Gaborone City Council did not have jurisdiction over the legalization of same-sex sexual activity or identity, but it did have an important voice…
Borås and Vracar – Serbia
Accessibility – organisation policy, structure and practice Both municipalities want to improve their capacity to reach out to and get input from people with disabilities, since they feel they are stuck in the “old way” of getting and giving out information. This causes a risk to fail to include the perspectives of people with disabilities…
Language rights in local governance, South Africa
This teaching case illustrates the importance of communities to engage the municipality in their own language and the tension and potential exclusion that arises when community members are forced to engage in a mainstream language. On the one hand, the municipal administration, working with limited resources, wants to limit the number of languages used, and…
Falkenberg, Sundays river valley och Sarah Baartman district – South Africa
Building bridges The partners state that children and youth exclusion often is perpetuated by poverty and inequality, which limit access to resources and opportunities for young people to improve their social mobility and economic prospects. For the South African partners the objectives are to gain capability to: No interventions or activities for youth shall be…
Ekerö och Cape Agulhas, Sydafrika
Inclusion through developing dialogue and cooperation between civil society and the municipality The aim of the project is to investigate how to develop dialogue and cooperation between civil society (non-governmental organisations or networks and citizens) and the respective municipalities. A focus area for the cooperation will be identified, such as developing methods for citizen dialogue,…
Haparanda and Solwezi – Zambia
Empowering of women and youth in local democracy and development work Haparanda and Solwezi are carrying out this Inception to have the opportunity to jointly develop a project plan closely linked to issues of inequality and empowering of women. The partners intend to find strengthening approaches to improve developmental inequalities through equitable service delivery without…
Valdemarsvik, Palapye and Central district – Botswana
Ensuring youth participation The two municipalities cooperating with the district level in Botswana, though the involvement of Central district in the partnership, are committed to achieving Agenda 2030 through a rightsbased approach and aim to work more systematically with human rights at a local level. At this stage both partners have established a mutual challenge…
Incorporating immigrant voices? Formal access to participatory mechanisms in the city of Barcelona
Democratic innovations to enhance the participation of city-zens in urban settings have advanced in the world in the last decades. Avenues such as citizens’ assemblies, deliberative polls, participatory budgeting, e-petitions and online consultations have become part of the repertoire of participation available to urban residents. However, a pending question is whether local authorities envision specific…
