This study focuses on the city of São Paulo, Brazil and examines the ways in which irregular and illegal growth have influenced the collective action of social movements of the urban poor. The study describes how São Paulo grew as a socially segregated city during the twentieth century due to...

With a focus on cities in eastern and southern Africa, this paper draws on recent scholarship and my own research in Lusaka, Zambia, to analyse pathways for, and challenges to, greater social mobility for youth against the background of economic, political, and spatial processes that are...

As the world moves towards its so-called urban 'tipping point',urbanization in the global South has increasingly come to be portrayed as the portent of a dystopian future characterized by ever-mounting levels of anarchy and brutality. The association between cities, violence, and disorder is not...

Dar es Salaam is exceptional in East Africa for having a record of relatively little ethnic tension, and remaining tranquil and true to its name, the 'harbour of peace'. This paper explores the interface between ethnic and national identities in Tanzania's capital city, focusing on its ethnic...

This paper aims at understanding the dynamics of sectarian violence in the city of Beirut, by looking at the early phase of violence in the Lebanese civil war (1975-90), and the process of dividing Beirut into various sectarian enclaves controlled by the warring militias. The paper aims to show...

This study assesses temporal and spatial distribution of child deprivation and income poverty using the fifth and sixth rounds of the Ghana Living Standards Survey. The first-order dominance methodology was used to examine five dimensions of deprivation of children aged 7 to 17 years, and the...

Average adult height is a physical measure of the biological standard of living of a population. While the biological and economic standards of living of a population are very different concepts, they are linked and may empirically move together. If this is so, then cohort heights can also be...

Climate variability poses a major risk to agricultural incomes in Africa. In Ghana, most of the country's poor people live in the north and households find it difficult to hold back their productive assets during the lean season. This study investigates the impact of climate variability on...

This paper attempts to measure the extent of inequality within households and its contribution to overall levels of inequality in child well-being. The paper analyses the distribution of resources (outcomes) between girls and boys for four indicators: nutrition, birth registration, school...

In this paper, we convey the concept of first-order dominance (FOD) with particular focus on applications to multidimensional population welfare comparisons. We give an account of the fundamental equivalent definitions of FOD, illustrated with simple numerical examples. An implementable method...