The presentation gives an overview of an ongoing study that focuses on claims and official responses related to land, housing and basic services in the fringes of Windhoek, Namibia and Gaborone, Botswana. The research seeks to contribute to debates on the broad socio-political and institutional implications of claim-making dynamics between residents and public authorities.
The presentation will mainly focus on the findings of the Namibian component of the study. In contrast with antagonistic readings of such situations that focus on resistance, autonomy and rights, it is argued that both resident strategies and official policies outline incremental paths of betterment and intersect in multiple ways. The presentation ponders whether, and how, such incrementality may be productive of institutionalized forms of relations between citizens and authorities, and calls attention to the principle of mutual dependencies as a key aspect in them.
Finally, some preliminary comparative observations are made on the situation in Botswana versus that in Namibia, based on the author’s ongoing field research in Gaborone and its vicinity.
Dr Lalli Metsola is Postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Social Research, University of Helsinki. He is currently in Botswana carrying out field studies on “Residential claims, emergent citizenship regimes and the prospects of stability in Southern Africa”. He is collaborating with Prof. F. T. Kalabamu, Department of Architecture & Planning, Faculty of Engineering & Technology.