The purpose of this study was to augment
the Bank's research on land markets and investigate key
land market issues in four case study cities in South and
East Asia. From the study results, the consultants have
attempted to determine whether or not certain policy
instruments can be adopted in the respective cities and in
other regions of the world. Ultimately the study, in tracing
the role of various land development policies in these

This paper examines the spatial
organization of jobs in Kampala, the capital city of Uganda,
and applies the Lucas and Rossi-Hansberg (2002) model to
explain the observed patterns in terms of the agglomeration
forces and the commuting costs of workers. The paper
suggests that: (i) Economic activities are concentrated in
the downtown -- beyond which employment is spatially
dispersed. (ii) Geographically weighted regressions identify

As the world is urbanizing, many cities
are grappling with a population that is growing rapidly,
thereby increasing demand for land and housing. This
pressure on land and housing markets often is exacerbated by
inappropriate or inadequate policies. The result is a supply
of well-located land and housing that falls well short of
demand and the proliferation of poorly serviced informal
settlements, many of which are located far from jobs, city

The main objective of the Egypt Public
Land Management Strategy is to provide the Government of
Egypt (GOE) with practical and politically feasible policy
recommendations to reform existing public land management
policies and practices in the aim of improving the business
climate in Egypt. This study is presented in two volumes:
Volume one with the main policy note, supported by Volume
two with background notes on access to public land by

The first paper of this section
(Durand-Laserve) documents how increasing pressures on urban
land and the 'commodification' of shelter and
settlement has increased 'market evictions' of
families holding intermediate tide to property, although
international declarations and pressures have contributed to
reducing 'forced evictions.' The second paper
(Mooya and Cloete) uses the tools of the New Institutional

The term “inclusive cities” is
increasingly being used as a “catch-all” phrase to signify
intent but with little precision in its use. In this note we
use “inclusive cities” to mean cities in which we see a
commitment to an inclusive politics with the establishment
of institutionalized interactions between organized groups
of disadvantaged citizens and the state with local
government taking a primary role. They are also cities in

This paper examines poor households in
the city of Mumbai and their exposure, vulnerability, and
ability to respond to recurrent floods. The paper discusses
policy implications for future adaptive capacity,
resilience, and poverty alleviation. The study focuses
particularly on the poor households, which tend to have
greater exposure and vulnerability to floods and limited
ability to respond given the constraints on physical and

This paper estimates slum residents
willingness to pay for formalized land tenure in Pune,
India. In so doing, it offers evidence that the legal
assurance of slum residents occupancy of their lands could
benefit them. Previous studies have discussed legal and
non-legal factors that substantially influence the tenure
security of residents in informal settlements. However, it
remains unclear to what extent, and how, the assignment of

In 2012, the World Bank initiated the
building urban resilience in East Asia program, aimed at
increasing the resilience of cities to disasters and the
impact of climate change by using a risk-based approach to
making public investment decisions. The objective is to
demonstrate a scalable methodology and practical tools for
risk assessment that can be used for city-level investment
decisions. This activity started with engaging selected

Countries everywhere are divided into
two distinct spatial realms: one urban, one rural. Classic
models of development predict faster growth in the urban
sector, causing rapid migration from rural areas to cities,
lifting average incomes in both places. The process
continues until the marginal productivity of labor is
equalized across the two realms. The pattern of rising
urbanization accompanying economic growth has become one of

Since the industrial revolution, the
economic development of Western Europe and North America was
characterized by continuous urbanization accompanied by a
gradual phasing-in of urban land property rights over time.
Today, however, the evidence in many fast urbanizing
low-income countries points towards a different trend of
“urbanization without formalization”, with potentially
adverse effects on long-term economic growth. This paper

This paper aims to contribute to
learning on community engagement and community driven
development (CDD) in urban areas. Specifically, the review
describes the World Bank’s use of participatory and CDD
approaches in urban areas between 2003 and 2013; identifies
the challenges of using participatory and CDD approaches in
the urban context; assesses lessons from the application of
CDD in urban areas through case studies; and makes