Based on pioneering research on urban land access in Angola by the NGO, Development Workshop, and the UK-based Centre for Environment & Human Settlements, this book argues that the so-called “anarchic” land development in Angola’s cities presents a unique opportunity to develop new approaches to post-war urban land management. In 27 years of civil war, millions of Angolans fled the countryside for the relative safety of the big cities and their crowded shantytowns. With their meager resources, they built dwellings on land obtained by mostly informal mechanisms, often with little security of tenure.
The recommendations on policy and practice are grounded in Angola’s reality. Drawing on field research and recent international experience in urban land management, the themes discussed include: growth and settlement patterns in peri-urban areas, formal and informal mechanisms to access land, cultural values and perceptions about land, institutional capacity for urban land management, decision-makers attitudes and perceptions about urban development, and land policy and legislation in Angola”.
Equally important this book documents the use of action research as an advocacy tool in the drafting of the 2004 Land Law and in the associated public consultation process. The latter was the first-ever such process with broad popular participation in Angola. While the book focuses on urban land issues, these need to be seen in a wider context of changing governance in Angola, and indeed in the Sub-Saharan Africa region.
Published by: Development Workshop with financing from the Department for International Development (DFID) UK, Norwegian Foreign Ministry and Novib (OXFAM Netherlands).
Purchase: For sale at DW’s office in Luanda.
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