Sustainable development for the urban poor: applying a human rights approach to the problem

Despite increased efforts to promote sustainable development, living conditions for the low-income majority in cities of the developing countries have continued to deteriorate. With the growing role of the private sector in urban finance, local governments are abdicating to the private sector not only service provisioning but also the role of planner and arbiter of the public good. However, until local governments and civil societies are adequately empowered, it is important to identify and implement mechanisms for monitoring the distribution and application of the benefits of these processes in urban areas. To be effective, such monitoring mechanisms need to be anchored in the language and spirit of human rights charters and covenants promulgated by the United Nations at both local and national levels.

In this context, the paper reviews the negative impacts of privatisation of water and sanitation for low-income and isolated communities. It also illustrates a range of existing and proposed cases of public-private partnerships (PPPs) in urban development and management that have emerged over the past decade. The paper discusses the following issues:

• how market forces in an unregulated and rapidly globalising economy might further exacerbate the discrimination and segregation of marginalised and vulnerable groups in terms of access to adequate housing
• the concerns about global integration of national and local economies without the existence of regulatory institutions that protect vulnerable and marginalised groups
• incipient examples of institutions and practices at the local level that appear to soften the negative impacts of international economic integration
• a prospective research agenda for collecting and analysing information that will help clarify policies and institutional set-ups to ensure that the right to adequate housing is progressively realised.

The paper also reviews suggestions that the capacity of low-income and marginalised groups to influence private sector action is buttressed by a competent and adequately resourced local state along with civil society institutions pushing strenuously to motivate the private sector to achieve social goals.

Finally, the author suggests that there is an urgent need to conduct research seeking to understand better how to govern global economic integration so that it ensures everyone’s right to adequate housing and the foundation of healthy urban settlements. The author recommends the development of the following research areas, in order to identify and understand the differences in policy and outcomes in different regional, national and local contexts:

• identifying policy parameters of competing approaches to the integration of urban economies into the international economy
• identifying the roles of different social actors in promoting global integration and ameliorating the negative impacts of such integration
• measuring changing levels of economic integration over time
• identifying the causal links between economic integration and well-being
• assisting government and civil society organisations to use a human rights framework to identify policies and measures that can improve conditions for low-income and marginalised groups.