Urban informal settlements in Africa: transforming adaptation governance
By: Kareem Buyana and Hakimu Sseviiri
References
- Alegría, A., Poloczanska, E., Loeschke, S., Mintenbeck, K., & Poertner, H. (2024). Towards an IPCC Atlas for comprehensive climate change risk assessments. NPJ Climate Action, 3, 108. 10.1038/s44168-024-00193-3
- Antaki, N., Petrescu, D., & Marin, V. (2026). Living labs as ‘agents for change’. Buildings & Cities, 7(1), 293–305. 10.5334/bc.800
- Archer, D., Almansi, F., DiGregorio, M., Roberts, D., Sharma, D., & Syam, D. (2014). Moving towards inclusive urban adaptation: Approaches to integrating community-based adaptation to climate change at city and national scale. Climate and Development, 6(4), 345–356. 10.1080/17565529.2014.918868
- Asibey, M. O., Appiah, C. A., Okyere, E. A. B., & Bilson, M. A. (2025). Nature where we live: Receptivity to context-sensitive nature-based solutions in African cities. Cities, 167, 106375. 10.1016/j.cities.2025.106375
- Asiedu, J. B. (2020). Reviewing the argument on floods in urban areas: A look at the causes. Theoretical and Empirical Researches in Urban Management, 15(1), 24–41.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/26868293 - Awoyemi, A. G., & Ibánez-Álamo, J. D. (2023). Status of urban ecology in Africa: A systematic review. Landscape and Urban Planning, 233, 104707. 10.1016/j.landurbplan.2023.104707
- Ayenew, W. A., & Kebede, H. A. (2023). GIS and remote sensing-based flood risk assessment and mapping: The case of Dikala Watershed in Kobo Woreda Amhara Region, Ethiopia. Environmental and Sustainability Indicators, 18, 100243. 10.1016/j.indic.2023.100243
- Barcena, A. (2025). Dakar’s flood drainage canals: assembling urban subjectivities, transforming political spaces. Environment & Urbanization, 37(1), 136–158. 10.1177/09562478251317976
- Berrang-Ford, L., Siders, A., Lesnikowski, A., Fischer, A. P., Callaghan, M. W., … Wannewitz, M. (2021). A systematic global stocktake of evidence on human adaptation to climate change. Nature Climate Change, 11(11), 989–1000. 10.1038/s41558-021-01170-y
- Bhanye, J. (2025). A review study on community-based flood adaptation in informal settlements in the Global South. Discover Sustainability, 6(1), p.595. 10.1007/s43621-025-01449-6
- Bulkeley, H. (2022).
Climate changed urban futures: Environmental politics in the Anthropocene city . In G. Hayes, S. Jinnah, P. Kashwan, D. M. Konisky, S. Macgregor, J. M. Meyer & A. R. Zito (Eds.), Trajectories in environmental politics (pp. 263–281). Routledge. - Buyana, K., Lwasa, S., Tugume, D., Mukwaya, P., Walubwa, J., Owuor, S., Kasaija, P., Sseviiri, H., Nsangi, G., & Byarugaba, D. (2020). Pathways for resilience to climate change in African cities. Environmental Research Letters, 15(7), 073002. 10.1088/1748-9326/ab7951
- Castán Broto, V., Westman, L., & Huang, P. (2023). How hegemonic discourses of sustainability influence urban climate action. Buildings & Cities, 4(1), 973–989. 10.5334/bc.390
- Chabou, O., Lazri, Y., Mannucci, S., Ciardiello, A., Rosso, F., & Ferrero, M. (2025). Advancing flood resilience in North African coastal cities: A contextual analysis of Jijel, Algeria. City and Environment Interactions, 28, 100233. 10.1016/j.cacint.2025.100233
- Comelli, T., Pelling, M., Hope, M., Ensor, J., Filippi, M. E., Menteşe, E. Y., & McCloskey, J. (2024). Normative future visioning: a critical pedagogy for transformative adaptation. Buildings & Cities, 5(1), 83–100. 10.5334/bc.385
- DiGaetano, A., & Strom, E. (2003). Comparative urban governance: An integrated approach. Urban Affairs Review, 38(3), 356–395. 10.1177/1078087402238806
- Douglas, I. (2018). The challenge of urban poverty for the use of green infrastructure on floodplains and wetlands to reduce flood impacts in intertropical Africa. Landscape and Urban Planning, 180, 262–272. 10.1016/j.landurbplan.2016.09.025
- Ekoh, S. S., Teron, L., & Ajibade, I. (2023). Climate change and coastal megacities: Adapting through mobility. Global Environmental Change, 80, 102666. 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2023.102666
- Elagib, N. A., Al Zayed, I. S., Saad, S. A. G., Mahmood, M. I., Basheer, M., & Fink, A. H. (2021). Debilitating floods in the Sahel are becoming frequent. Journal of Hydrology, 599, 126362. 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2021.126362
- Fofana, M., Adounkpe, J., Larbi, I., Hounkpe, J., Koubodana, H. D. N., Toure, A., Bokar, H., Dotse, S. Q., & Limantol, A. M. (2022). Urban flash flood and extreme rainfall events trend analysis in Bamako, Mali. Environmental Challenges, 6, 100449. 10.1016/j.envc.2022.100449
- GCA (Global Center on Adaptation) (2022). State and trends in adaptation reports 2021 and 2022: Executive summaries and syntheses. GCA.
https://gca.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/GCA_State-and-Trends-in-Adaptation-2022_Fullreport.pdf - Goodfellow, T., & Jackman, D. (2023). Controlling the capital: Political dominance in the urbanizing world. Oxford University Press.
- Haque, A. N., Bithell, M., & Richards, K. S. (2020). Adaptation to flooding in low-income urban settlements in the least developed countries: A systems approach. The Geographical Journal, 186(3), 314–326. 10.1111/geoj.12348
- Horn, F., & Elagib, N. A. (2018). Building socio-hydrological resilient cities against flash floods: Key challenges and a practical plan for arid regions. Journal of Hydrology, 564, 125–132. 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2018.07.001
- Ibrahim, A. S., & Kepe, T. (2026). Situated urban political ecology of climate resilience planning: The land use planning conundrum in Ghana. Cities, 171, 106758. 10.1016/j.cities.2025.106758
- IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) (2022). Climate change 2022: Impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
https://report.ipcc.ch/ar6/wg2/IPCC_AR6_WGII_FullReport.pdf - IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) (2023).
Summary for policymakers . In H. Lee & J. Romero (Eds.), Climate change 2023: Synthesis report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Core Writing Team (pp. 1–34). Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).https://www.ipcc.ch/report/sixth-assessment-report-cycle/ - Johnson, C., Broto, V. C., Kombe, W. J., Ortiz, C., Lipietz, B., Osuteye, E., & Levy, C. (Eds.). (2025). Co-production of knowledge in action: Emancipatory strategies for urban equality. UCL Press.
- Kabeer, N. (2016). ‘Leaving no one behind’: The challenge of intersecting inequalities. ISSC, IDS and UNESCO, Challenging Inequalities: Pathways to a Just World, World Social Science Report.
- Kasei, R. A., Kalanda-Joshua, M. D., & Benefor, D. T. (2019). Rapid urbanisation and implications for indigenous knowledge in early warning on flood risk in African cities. Journal of the British Academy, 7(s2), 183–214. 10.5871/jba/007s2.183
- Kasper, M. (2025). From dams to tanks to jerry cans: Storage as a multi-scalar analytic. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, 8(6). 10.1177/25148486251372784
- Kemwita, E. F., Kombe, W. J., & Nguluma, H. M. (2023). Acquisition of land in flood risk informal settlements in Dar es Salaam: Choices and compromises. African Journal of Land Policy and Geospatial Sciences, 6(1), 188–208. 10.22004/ag.econ.334630
- Kibii, C., Guerra, F., Bananayo, P. B., & Sandholz, S. (2025). Nature-based solutions for climate change adaptation and resilience in urban informal settlements: Insights from Kibera, Kenya and Villa 20, Argentina. Nature-Based Solutions, 7, 100216. 10.1016/j.nbsj.2025.100216
- Kisembo, T. (2021).
Flood risk-induced relocation in urban areas: Case studies of Bwaise and Natete, Kampala . In C. Johnson, G. Jain, & A. Lavell (Eds.), Rethinking Urban Risk and Resettlement in the Global South (pp. 290–306). UCL Press. 10.2307/j.ctv1ctgr0k.26 - Lawhon, M., Follmann, A., Braun, B., Cornea, N., Greiner, C., Guma, P., Karpouzoglou, T., Diez, J. R., Schindler, S., Schramm, S., & Sielker, F. (2023). Making heterogeneous infrastructure futures in and beyond the global south. Futures, 154, 103270. 10.1016/j.futures.2023.103270
- Lewis, J. I. (2014). When decentralization leads to recentralization: Subnational state transformation in Uganda. Regional & Federal Studies, 24(5), 571–588. 10.1080/13597566.2014.971771
- Lorenz Fontolan, B., Jorge, S., & Gonçalves, J. (2026). Urban climate governance and urban planning: A systematic review of recent literature (2020–2025). Sustainability, 18(5), 2362. 10.3390/su18052362
- Mahmoud, H., Alfons, R., & Reffat, R. M. (2019). Analysis of the driving forces of urban expansion in Luxor City by remote sensing monitoring. International Journal of Integrated Engineering, 11(6), 296–307.
- Maru, M., Worku, H., & Birkmann, J. (2021). Factors affecting the spatial resilience of Ethiopia’s secondary cities to urban uncertainties: A study of household perceptions of Kombolcha city. Heliyon, 7(12). 10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e08472
- Montfort, S., Callaghan, M., Creutzig, F., Lamb, W. F., Lu, C., Repke, T., Ge, K., & Minx, J. (2025). Systematic global stocktake of over 50,000 urban climate change studies. Nature Cities, 613–625. 10.1038/s44284-025-00260-8
- Mwalwimba, I. K., Manda, M., & Ngongondo, C. (2024). Flood vulnerability assessment in rural and urban informal settlements: case study of Karonga District and Lilongwe City in Malawi. Natural Hazards, 120(11), 10141–10184. 10.1007/s11069-024-06601-5
- Nyam, Y. S., Modiba, N. T. S., Ojo, T. O., Ogundeji, A. A., Okolie, C. C., & Selelo, O. T. (2024). Analysis of the perceptions of flood and effect of adoption of adaptation strategies on income of informal settlements of Mamelodi in South Africa. Climate Services, 34, 100468. 10.1016/j.cliser.2024.100468
- Okaka, F. O., & Odhiambo, B. D. (2019a). Health vulnerability to flood-induced risks of households in flood-prone informal settlements in the coastal city of Mombasa, Kenya. Natural Hazards, 99(2), 1007–1029. 10.1007/s11069-019-03792-0
- Okaka, F. O., & Odhiambo, B. D. (2019b). Households’ perception of flood risk and health impact of exposure to flooding in flood-prone informal settlements in the coastal city of Mombasa. International Journal of Climate Change Strategies and Management, 11(4), 592–606. 10.1108/IJCCSM-03-2018-0026
- Opoku-Boateng, E., Agyei, F., Asibey, M. O., & Mintah, F. (2024). Climate change resilience and social capital: Insights from informal urban neighbourhoods in Kumasi, Ghana. Cities, 152, 105234. 10.1016/j.cities.2024.105234
- Othoo, C., Dulo, S., & Olago, D. (2021). Flood-risk vulnerabilities of sanitation facilities in urban informal settlements: Lessons from Kisumu City, Kenya. East African Journal of Science, Technology and Innovation, 2(4). 10.37425/eajsti.v2i4.371
- Pasquini, L., Taylor, A., McClure, A., Martel, P., Pretorius, L., Mubaya, C. P., & Mamombe, R. (2024). Pathways to transformative adaptation in southern African cities: A criteria-based assessment in Harare and Durban. Environmental Science & Policy, 158, 103784. 10.1016/j.envsci.2024.103784
- Petzold, J., Hawxwell, T., Jantke, K., Gonçalves Gresse, E., Mirbach, C., Ajibade, I., Bhadwal, S., Bowen, K., Fischer, A. P., Joe, E. T., & Kirchhoff, C. J. (2023). A global assessment of actors and their roles in climate change adaptation. Nature Climate Change, 13, 1250–1257. 10.1038/s41558-023-01824-z
- Priem, J., Piwowar, H., & Orr, R. (2022). OpenAlex: A fully-open index of scholarly works, authors, venues, institutions, and concepts. Preprint at
https://arxiv.org/abs/2205.01833 - Rahman, M. F., Falzon, D., Robinson, S. A., Kuhl, L., Westoby, R., Omukuti, J., Schipper, E. L. F., McNamara, K. E., Resurrección, B. P., Mfitumukiza, D., & Nadiruzzaman, M. (2023). Locally led adaptation: Promise, pitfalls, and possibilities. Ambio, 52(10), 1543–1557. 10.1007/s13280-023-01884-7
- Rodina, L., Harris, L., Ziervogel, G., & Wilson, J. (2024). Resilience counter-currents: Water infrastructures, informality, and inequities in Cape Town, South Africa. World Development, 180, 106619. 10.1016/j.worlddev.2024.106619
- Rözer, V., Mehryar, S., & Surminski, S. (2022). From managing risk to increasing resilience: A review on the development of urban flood resilience, its assessment and the implications for decision making. Environmental Research Letters, 17(12), 123006. 10.1088/1748-9326/aca8bc
- Sakijege, T., Sartohadi, J., Marfai, M. A., Kassenga, G. R. & Kasala, S. E. (2014). Assessment of adaptation strategies to flooding: A comparative study between informal settlements of Keko Machungwa in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and Sangkrah in Surakarta, Indonesia. Jàmbá: Journal of Disaster Risk Studies, 6(1). 10.4102/jamba.v6i1.131
- Satterthwaite, D., Archer, D., Colenbrander, S., Dodman, D., Hardoy, J., Mitlin, D., & Patel, S. (2020). Building resilience to climate change in informal settlements. One Earth, 2(2), 143–156. 10.1016/j.oneear.2020.02.002
- Schubert, J. (2024). Maintaining a city against nature: Climate adaptation in Beira. Buildings & Cities, 5(1). 10.5334/bc.378
- Sethi, M., Lamb, W., Minx, J., & Creutzig, F. (2020). Climate change mitigation in cities: A systematic scoping of case studies. Environmental Research Letters, 15(9), 093008.
- Seto, K. C., Churkina, G., Hsu, A., Keller, M., Newman, P. W., Qin, B., & Ramaswami, A. (2021). From low-to net-zero carbon cities: The next global agenda. Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 46(1), 377–415. 10.1146/annurev-environ-050120-113117
- Shackleton, S., Ziervogel, G., Sallu, S., Gill, T., & Tschakert, P. (2015). Why is socially-just climate change adaptation in sub-Saharan Africa so challenging? A review of barriers identified from empirical cases. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, 6(3), 321–344. 10.1002/wcc.335
- Shaffril, H. A. M., Samah, A. A., & Samsuddin, S. F. (2021). Guidelines for developing a systematic literature review for studies related to climate change adaptation. Environmental Science and Pollution Research, 28(18), 22265–22277. 10.1007/s11356-021-13178-0
- Sharifi, A. (2020). Trade-offs and conflicts between urban climate change mitigation and adaptation measures: A literature review. Journal of Cleaner Production, 276, 122813. 10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.122813
- Shi, L., Chu, E., Anguelovski, I., Aylett, A., Debats, J., Goh, K., Schenk, T., Seto, K. C., Dodman, D., Roberts, D., & Roberts, J. T. (2016). Roadmap towards justice in urban climate adaptation research. Nature Climate Change, 6(2), 131–137. 10.1038/nclimate2841
- Singh, N., Sahoo, D., & Moharaj, P. (2026).
Climate change and social inequality: A systematic review of differential vulnerabilities and adaptation challenges . In P. Datta, P. Mishra, & B. Behera (Eds.), Climate change and human well-being. Springer. 10.1007/978-3-032-25479-5_12 - Sutherland, C. (2025). Urban reform coalitions for transformative sustainability: Reflections and lessons from Durban, South Africa. Environment & Urbanization, 37(1), 116–135. 10.1177/09562478251332260
- Swilling, M., & Hajer, M. (2017). Governance of urban transitions: Towards sustainable resource efficient urban infrastructures. Environmental Research Letters, 12(12), 125007. 10.1088/1748-9326/aa7d3a
- Tasantab, J. C., Gajendran, T., & Maund, K. (2022). Expanding protection motivation theory: The role of coping experience in flood risk adaptation intentions in informal settlements. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 76, 103020. 10.1016/j.ijdrr.2022.103020
- Tavares, C., Pereira, R. S., Bonnin, C., Duarte, D., Mills, G., Morakinyo, T. E., & Holloway, P. (2024). A global (south) collective burden: A systematic review of the current state of climate-related hazards in informal settlements. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 114, 104940. 10.1016/j.ijdrr.2024.104940
- Tawfik, G. M., Dila, K. A. S., Mohamed, M. Y. F., Tam, D. N. H., Kien, N. D., Ahmed, A. M., & Huy, N. T. (2019). A step by step guide for conducting a systematic review and meta-analysis with simulation data. Tropical Medicine and Health, 47(1), 46. 10.1186/s41182-019-0165-6
- Teebken, J. (2024). Disrupt and unlock? The role of actors in urban adaptation path-breaking. Buildings & Cities, 5(1). 10.5334/bc.383
- Theokritoff, E., Lejeune, Q., Costa, H. P., Irfan, K., Khan, M. S., Kropf, C. M., Lindberg, H. G., Marques, I. G., Menke, I., Schleussner, C. F., & Thomas, A. (2025). Climate overshoot implications for local adaptation planning. Climate Policy, 26(2), 344–351. 10.1080/14693062.2025.2502111
- UN-HABITAT (2016). World cities report 2016: Urbanization and development. Emerging futures. UN-HABITAT.
https://unhabitat.org/sites/default/files/download-manager-files/WCR-2016-WEB.pdf - UN-HABITAT (2018). Pro-poor climate action in informal settlements. UN-HABITAT.
https://unhabitat.org/sites/default/files/download-manager-files/1553169801wpdm_Pro-poor%20Climate%20Action%20in%20Informal%20Settlements%20-%20FINAL.pdf - UNDRR (United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction) (2025). Global assessment report on disaster risk reduction: Resilience pays: Financing and investing for our future. UNDRR.
https://www.undrr.org/media/107058/download?startDownload=20250928 - Vedeld, T., Hofstad, H., Solli, H., & Hanssen, G. S. (2021). Polycentric urban climate governance: Creating synergies between integrative and interactive governance in Oslo. Environmental Policy and Governance, 31(4), 347–360. 10.1002/eet.1935
- Werners, S. E., Wise, R. M., Butler, J. R., Totin, E., & Vincent, K. (2021). Adaptation pathways: A review of approaches and a learning framework. Environmental Science & Policy, 116, 266–275. 10.1016/j.envsci.2020.11.003
- Williams, D.S., Máñez Costa, M., Celliers, L., & Sutherland, C. (2018). Informal settlements and flooding: Identifying strengths and weaknesses in local governance for water management. Water, 10(7), 871. 10.3390/w10070871
- Wilson, R. H., & Smith, T. G. (2016).
Urban resilience to climate change challenges in Africa . In K. Archer & K. Bezdecny (Eds.), Handbook of cities and the environment (pp. 208–242). Edward Elgar. 10.4337/9781784712266.00016 - Wolff, E., French, M., Ilhamsyah, N., Sawailau, M., & Ramirez-Lovering, D. (2021). Collaborating with communities: Citizen science flood monitoring in urban informal settlements. Urban Planning, 6(4), 351–364. 10.17645/up.v6i4.4648
- Zehra, D., Mbatha, S., Campos, L. C., Queface, A., Beleza, A., Cavoli, C., Achuthan, K., & Parikh, P. (2019). Rapid flood risk assessment of informal urban settlements in Maputo, Mozambique: The case of Maxaquene A. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 40, 101270. 10.1016/j.ijdrr.2019.101270
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5334/bc.732 | Journal eISSN: 2632-6655
Language: English
Page range: 824 - 839
Submitted on: Sep 30, 2025
Accepted on: Jun 30, 2026
Published on: Aug 10, 2026
Published by: Ubiquity Press
In partnership with: Paradigm Publishing Services
Keywords:
© 2026 Kareem Buyana, Hakimu Sseviiri, published by Ubiquity Press
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.