State efforts to reform the customary land tenure system of Lesotho have failed to produce intended outcomes. An explanation given for this failure is customary chiefs' opposition to state-sponsored reforms, as these were purportedly meant to curtail their power over land. This explanation initially appeared in 1974 connection with the Administration of Lands Act of 1973, and has since been handed down through generations of academics and policy analysts in Lesotho and outside and uncritically accepted as immutable truth.

The spread of COVID-19 in South Africa and other countries in the region has again brought to the fore the fact that very dense, under-serviced, mostly informal, settlements are not healthy places to live. They are also places where the spread of a disease is difficult to prevent or manage.

The kind of emergency response that was required to address the imminent spread of COVID-19 highlighted the widespread vulnerability of the poorest, compounded by highly unequal access to services and ongoing unhealthy living conditions.

For the past few decades, efforts to strengthen women’s land rights in many sub-Saharan African countries have primarily focused on a single approach: systematic registration through individual/joint certification or titling. While registration — individually or with a spouse — may support tenure security in specific contexts, the sheer complexity of land governance practices and tenure arrangements across the continent (both formal and customary) often render an emphasis on systematic titling inadequate.

Les conflits fonciers et leur résolution à l’échelle locale dans un contexte de marchandisation de la terre. Une étude de cas dans les Hautes Terres à Madagascar.

This paper considers the foundations of contemporary African urban economies and how these intersect with the evolution of urban politics, carving a route through a wide range of existing literatures relevant to the politics and political economy of African urban development. It considers the economic and demographic drivers of urbanisation in Africa and their consequences for urban restructuring and uneven development, before turning to the forms of urban politics that have emerged alongside, responded to and also helped shape these urban economic developments.

The housing sector including its institutions, laws and regulations, touches every single aspect of the economy of a country and has interface with practically every social development sector. People living in adequate homes have better health, higher chances to improve their human capital and seize the opportunities available in urban contexts. At the same time, a housing sector that performs well acts as a ‘development multiplier’ benefiting complementary industries, contributing to economic development, employment generation, service provision and overall poverty reduction.

Latin American countries have pursued rural land titling and registration campaigns over the past several decades with a broad range of social and economic goals. These efforts represent a permanent or long-term legal recognition of rights to land as a primary economic asset for agricultural communities and a source of family subsistence, security, and social and cultural wellbeing. Land rights can provide multi-generational benefits to recipients.

Highlights the impact of large-scale housing improvements in a country, enabling everyone living in informal settlements to have equitable access to adequate housing.