The New City. Future Challenges Reader Volume 2 by Future Challenges

Bertelsmann Stiftung (ed.)

The New City Future Challenges Reader Volume 2

FutureChallenges

The New City

Future Challenges Reader Volume 2

Contents Foreword

The New City

The Risk Is Wanting to Stay (that Same Old Way)

“Friends” of the Environment

Street Children, Education & National Security

What’s a Capital Without the Capital?

Pulp Fiction: Gwadar – An (Un)Success Story

Internal Migrant Workers in Delhi

Future Challenges Team

Foreword

Foreword Future Challenges is a project of the Bertelsmann Stiftung in Gütersloh, Germany and the Bertelsmann Foundation in Washington, DC, with the support of the Rockefeller Foundation. We are a global network of young authors, activists, academics and observers who work to illustrate how complex our modern world really is. Creating a sustainable future for as many of the world’s inhabitants as possible is an admirable goal, but this goal will slip ever farther out of reach if we do not learn to embrace the complexity of the challenges ahead. We must ask ourselves not simply: What is the best way to ensure our safety? Instead, we must begin to ask: What is the best way to ensure our safety while managing changing population trends, providing high-quality education to as many people as possible, and ensuring that the benefits of economic globalization reach deep into our societies? We must demand that our political leadership takes the same approach. If we attempt to tackle our most difficult challenges alone, independent of one another, any solution that we devise will be unsustainable, sabotaged in the long term by unintended consequences that spill over from other issue areas. On the other hand, if we learn to think about our greatest challenges as part of a connected web of issues, all of which have meaningful impact on one another, we may begin to identify solutions that are robust and long-lasting. This second Future Challenges Reader goes on a hunt for ideas that are helping cities worldwide manage their growing populations. From Masdar City near Abu Dhabi to Toronto, Canada, cities are thinking creatively and boldly about the changes they need to make to provide a safe and vibrant home for their residents well into the twenty-first century. In the years ahead, even our greatest cities will need to confront issues of climate change, demographic change and migration, among many others, in their efforts to develop sustainable communities. Perhaps technology and greater economic globalization can help us to meet these challenges, but even with the best technologies, change will be difficult. Changing these massive communities will require great ingenuity and investment of time and effort, at the very least. In this lead article, Steven Watson looks at several examples of cities that are thinking creatively about how to prepare for their growing populations. Our network of authors shares their responses from India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Costa Rica and the United States. We hope you’ll enjoy the second Future Challenges Reader. To get involved with the program or to give feedback on what’s written here, please visit our website (futurechallenges.org) or contact us directly. Enjoy!

The New City

The New City Monday, 19 March 2012

Steven Watson

Contact Information: http://www.thechurchoflondon.com Steven Watson is head of customer publishing for creative agency The Church of London. He works with corporate clients including Google, PlayStation and Volkswagen, and describes himself as a magazine enthusiast.

Cities are our future. The United Nations Population Fund predicts that by 2030, almost five billion people – equivalent to more than 60 percent of the world’s population – will be living in towns and cities. Our biggest cities – the so-called “megacities,” with more than 10 million inhabitants – are growing in size and influence by the day, and the result is a brave new world shaped by both careful urban planning and ad hoc experimentation. Our mass migration towards cities means that we need to get large-scale urban living right. That’s easier said than done – the infrastructural challenges alone are formidable – but cities have always been places of innovation, and as people travel to them from all over the world, they bring with them ideas that will redefine urban living.

Big ideas Some of the most ambitious plans for city living are being seen across Asia and the Middle East, where planning organizations are working in conjunction with private enterprise to deliver genuinely groundbreaking results. Take, for example, Masdar City, a development located 17 kilometers from downtown Abu Dhabi, which is being designed from the ground up in response to the very specific problems presented by building a city in the desert. All cities require huge amounts of energy to either heat or cool their buildings, but in the extreme temperatures of the Arabian Gulf, that becomes an even more pressing problem. Yet Masdar City aims to establish itself as one of the most sustainable cities in the world, home to around 40,000 residents and hundreds of businesses in a high-density, pedestrian-friendly environment, their energy needs met almost entirely by solar and other renewable sources. It’s an ambitious plan and is effectively an experiment being conducted by Masdar, one of the world’s commercial leaders in renewable energy, working in conjunction with the likes of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, General Electric and Siemens (which plans to establish an award-winning Middle East headquarters there). The development’s planners want to make Masdar City a hub of renewable technology, bringing skilled workers from across the Middle East and beyond to create a new center of international talent that will then export its ideas around the globe.

The New City

Masdar City, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates Photo by flickr user 350.org http://www.flickr.com/ photos/350org/5072297750/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

But even if Masdar City does succeed in filling its homes and opening its businesses, it will be the exception rather than the rule. We can’t just start from scratch and build a new city every time we need to address urban challenges, and it would be a mistake to assume that advances in technology will always allow us to wave a magic wand over our cities to solve their problems. Often the most interesting solutions are far more low-key and depend more on integrated incentives than on bold new buildings.

Local changes Green Roofs for Healthy Cities is an American organization working to provide food and increase social cohesion in cities by encouraging residents to establish gardens on the roofs of their buildings. As cities get bigger, they need to expand outwards, often into the farmland that was once used to feed their citizens. The rise of international supply chains means that, by and large, we don’t notice this change – as long as our supermarket shelves are stocked, most of us don’t pay too much attention to where the food came from. But as our cities become ever more separated from their food sources, worrying issues of food security are beginning to arise, with some cities becoming almost entirely dependent on produce that has been flown in from hundreds, even thousands of miles away. Launched in 1999, Green Roofs attempts to raise awareness of this troubling development and demonstrates the economic, social and environmental benefits of growing food within cities. By working with local governments, Green Roofs is able to incentivize change; Washington, D.C., for

The New City

2012 06 23 – 3707 – DC – Three Tree Flats Photo by flickr user thisisbossi http://www.flickr.com/photos/ thisisbossi/7492304376/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

example, saw a leap in urban gardening back in 2009 when the city introduced tax subsidies for rooftop gardeners. The opening of another green roof pales in comparison to the giant leaps being made in Masdar City, but both demonstrate the ability of cities to bring together individuals and ideas that can effect real change. The transplantation of ideas among the world’s cities can help steer us towards the peaceful and prosperous future we all want, and several organizations are springing up to make the transfer of ideas easier and more successful. Cities of Migration is led by Canada’s Maytree Foundation and includes input from several global partners, all dedicated to encouraging the movement of people and ideas among the world’s cities. But as Claudia Walther, the Bertelsmann Stiftung representative to Cities of Migration, explains, the process is as much about changing ideas as preserving them: Every city has its own conditions, so if you adopt a good idea, you have to find your own way to make it work. For example, Toronto has a diversity monitor that we’re very impressed by. We want to establish something like that in Germany, but in Toronto it’s set up for visible minorities (people with physical characteristics, like skin color, that mark them out). That makes sense in Toronto, but it would be no good in Germany, because we have a totally different picture of migration. In Toronto they have lots of people from Asia, lots of people from Africa; whereas in Germany the biggest migrant group comes from Eastern Europe and the second-biggest from Turkey, so this question of visible or not visible doesn’t make sense for us. Globalization means that, now more than ever, cities are in competition with each other – competition for business, resources and, thanks to the ease of migration, for people, too. In the case of a

The New City

Mexico City – In Between Photo by Wolfgang Sterneck http://www.flickr.com/photos/ sterneck/5691690070/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

bold new project like Masdar City, the objective is clear – it must find a way to keep the air-conditioning units running, or its new citizens will soon leave their shiny new homes. In older, more established cities it’s harder to see the struggle for survival, but it’s there nonetheless. The challenge, then, is to do what the city has always done best – bring together people and businesses in an environment where they can settle and flourish. The reality of achieving that is very different in the slums of Mexico City than in the old industrial centers of Western Europe, but the principle remains the same. The cities with the best people win.

The Risk Is Wanting to Stay (that Same Old Way)

The Risk Is Wanting to Stay (that Same Old Way) Tuesday, 17 April 2012

Juliana Rincon

Contact Information: jules.rincon@gmail.com Juliana has been based in Costa Rica and Colombia and is now enjoying life in Washington, DC. When off-line, she likes knitting, reading, crafting and running at a pace speed walkers would consider slow.

No matter how much it develops, improves, grows, or changes, whenever people, including me, write about the city of Medellín, Colombia, we inevitably fall back to comparing it to how it used to be and point out that it used to be known for its violence, for its murder and as the hub of a massive drug trafficking industry. The National Tourism campaign underlines the past dangers with a slogan that says: “The Risk is Wanting to Stay …” Making the “transformation” the basis of the pitch to promote the city has helped to give it a coveted spot in d iscussions on international development; yet, although it’s a well-known storytelling trope, I think that even as the transformation seems to be helping the city, it’s actually hurting its citizens. Most of us have seen how this plays out in areas far removed from urban development. Makeover shows don’t focus on average-looking people to transform them into beautiful specimens; they use people at the bottom of the attractiveness scale to make the transformation as spectacular as possible. Celebrity interviews tend to highlight rags-to-riches stories, the self-made man (or woman) or how someone overcame great odds to get to where they are now. I personally love these stories; they make me feel like anything is possible if only you apply yourself and work hard. It’s romantic to root for the underdog. This trend seems to prize hard work over results, the process over the finished product. So why do I think it could be hurting the citizens? Colombia is a country that has struggled with terrorist groups, revolutionary armed forces and paramilitary groups for decades and that has evolved a wide range of policies aiming to convince those who join such groups to leave their weapons behind. Incentives include opportunities to study, to own a home, and to start your own business and, in many cases, include stipends for people following the program, so they aren’t tempted to return to a life of crime because of money issues. I think this is a great program, and it has helped many people to turn away from violence towards a life of peace. That being said, it is sad that these same opportunities are not available for all young people starting off in life, before they decide to turn to a life of crime due to lack of opportunities! A taxi driver in Medellín once told me a story about how this policy, which helps others, ended up hurting his family. In a city where, according to the regional newspaper El Colombiano, only 26% of students are able to get higher education, and 50% of those end up dropping out, opportunities for affordable study are highly sought after. His daughter was at the top of a waiting list for a staterun education program; if any of the students ahead of her decided to delay their studies or choose

The Risk Is Wanting to Stay (that Same Old Way)

Studying FAIL Photo by flickr user Mira (on the wall) http://www.flickr.com/photos/ mmj171188/2851322248/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

a different field, she would be in. And as it happened, several of the students dropped out; but at the last moment, a group of people from a reintegration program for ex-militias wanted in, and they were given those spots ahead of the taxi driver’s daughter. His words have lingered with me; what good had it done his daughter to study hard, work hard and do things the right way when a group of people who had made bad choices were now being rewarded for them and were effectively deemed more important than a young woman with dreams and plans? He isn’t the only one who thinks this way. On the program website’s FAQ, there are three questions addressing society’s perception that these criminals are receiving advantages over the average citizen, while the government insists that they are just levelling the playing field. In this Catholic country, it seems that the prodigal son is still the best-loved child. Since there are more people in Medellín wanting to study or work than there are places to accommodate them, the government has been assisting them in the creation of their own enterprises through micro-grants and entrepreneurship programs. These are the types of actions that have benefited Medellín in the eyes of the international community, as this article in The Guardian explains (which doesn’t forget the mandatory reference to the city’s past): However, one important aspect of development strategy today, mainly taking place locally, involves trying to ensure future development outcomes are as equitable, sustainable and pro-poor as possible. A pioneer in this regard is Medellín, in Colombia. Once known as the most violent city on Earth, thanks to its narco-wars and paramilitary violence, Medellín has become something of a laboratory for heterodox local economic development policies paying very real economic and social development dividends, especially for the poor. A new paradigm of community-driven local economic development policy is perhaps in the making, with four key areas gaining ground.

The Risk Is Wanting to Stay (that Same Old Way)

2006_08_07 Photo by flickr user DennisSylvesterHurd http://www.flickr.com/photos/ dennissylvesterhurd/209327846/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

The Risk Is Wanting to Stay (that Same Old Way)

Metroplús – Medellín, Colômbia Photo by flickr user Mariana Gil/ EMBARQ Brasil http://www.flickr.com/photos/ embarqbrasil/7215931166/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

It’s hard for businesses to thrive in Medellín in what the article calls the “chasita economy,” where unproductive, informal micro-enterprises fill the streets but don’t survive or thrive. People working 16-hour days to sell their goods on the streets are working hard – but they aren’t seeing results, and, to give it credit, the government is indeed working on solutions to address this problem. In the meantime, these workers may see their neighbors making easy money through new pyramid schemes, prostitution, petty crime and robbery, drug trafficking, or other shady or criminal activities. In this city, which is being lauded internationally for its transformation, it is still the lucrative illegal trades that are successful, not those in which sheer hard work is being invested. No wonder citizens are confused. We live in a city and culture that prizes hard workers, yes, but only if they are successful. So whenever a story comes out like the one published in April 2012 in Spain’s El País about the 5,000 assassins for hire in Medellín, the success on which we’ve based our prestige as a city takes a tumble, and the city feels attacked and unfairly portrayed. The “transformation” story doesn’t sell as well if things stay the same. The makeover is not complete. Medellín will need to start telling a different story, for itself and for its citizens; a story of hard work, constant struggles and uncertain futures; one that prizes progress, even if it is just in small steps, and recognizes that success is not to be gauged in terms of fame and money alone.

“Friends” of the Environment

“Friends” of the Environment Monday, 9 April 2012

Seth Baum

Contact Information: Twitter: @SethBaum Seth Baum is Co-Founder and Executive Director of the Global Catastrophic Risk Institute (gcrinstitute.org), a nonprofit think tank. Baum received a PhD in Geography from Pennsylvania State University with a dissertation on climate change policy. He lives in New York City.

Television shows like Friends and Seinfeld may have inadvertently been among the best things to happen to the environment over the last few decades. These shows are not about environmental issues. They don’t cause people to want to be environmentalists – at least not directly. Instead, these American sitcoms, in a very unassuming way, promote urban lifestyles that incidentally happen to be quite good for the environment. Friends and Seinfeld are among the many shows and movies that take place in Manhattan, where I currently live. The lives of the characters in the shows are ordinary by Manhattan standards but quite different from those of most Americans in that they live in apartments and get around town mainly on foot or public transit. This urban lifestyle requires much less energy and other natural resources than the suburban lifestyle of houses and cars. The popularity of Friends and Seinfeld coincides with the growing popularity of urban lifestyles among Americans, especially young adults. And it’s not just in Manhattan. In my home city of Pittsburgh, one of the few neighborhoods with new residential construction is downtown, where highrise condo buildings are squeezed between office buildings, restaurants, and theaters. I have a few friends living there, and they say it’s fantastic. It is very difficult to say how much credit television deserves for America’s urbanization trend. I’m not aware of any research scrutinizing this, though other research has found, for example, that soap operas appear to have helped lower fertility rates in Brazil. For American urbanization, there are certainly other factors besides TV contributing to the trend. One factor is the rise of cell phones and smart phones, which makes the out-and-about urban lifestyle easier and more enjoyable. But it is indisputable that these TV shows piped the urban lifestyle into millions of suburban homes across the country. These shows taught children growing up in the suburbs that the urban lifestyle was not so strange and, indeed, could be fun and exciting. The fact that it’s also environmentally superior might just be a nice side bonus. The United States still has a long way to go before the bulk of its population lives an environmentally friendly urban lifestyle. Despite the urbanization trends, most Americans still live suburban lifestyles – much more than in other industrialized nations such as Japan and Germany. And it will

“Friends” of the Environment

Manhattan from Battery Park Photo by flickr user f.x.l. http://www.flickr.com/ photos/f_x_l/2833579329/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

Pennsylvania Pittsburgh Photo by flickr user Beechwood Photography http://www.flickr.com/photos/ beechwoodphotography/5905177900/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

“Friends” of the Environment

In suburbia Photo by flickr user monkeyc.net http://www.flickr.com/photos/monkeyc/7277 546/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

take a lot more than just shifts in Americans’ desire for an urban lifestyle: our cities need to be rebuilt on a very large scale. Along the way we’ll inevitably face some difficult decisions, such as what to do with all those old suburbs that no one really wants anymore. But for now, at least we can take comfort in the fact that the trend is starting to move in the right direction. Meanwhile, countries like India and China are rapidly shifting towards car-based cities and transport. It would be highly hypocritical for the US to tell them to do otherwise. However, we can lend some friendly advice. We can speak from experience against cities that leave us stuck in endless traffic jams and remote from culture and commerce. Ideally, the developing countries would leapfrog over the suburban state and go directly to the highly modern, highly desirable, environmentally friendly urban form, just as they’re often leapfrogging over landlines and going directly to cell phones. Here it helps that TV and movies (whether American or otherwise) are available to demonstrate that the urban lifestyle is convenient, fun, and generally desirable.

Street Children, Education & National Security

Street Children, Education & National Security Tuesday, 27 March 2012

MissUwaje

Sometimes we forget how privileged we really are; sometimes we take the little things for granted. Sometimes we act and live like we have the right to certain things – the right to a safe and secure home while growing up, the right to love, the right to education, the right to three square meals. For many children in Africa these rights do not exist; they are Africa’s street children, estimated at 40 million (UNICEF 2007). The problem of street children has been growing steadily in the last two decades. An estimated 10 million children in Africa live without families, mostly homeless and in cities (UNICEF, 1984:39). The aforesaid estimates might well be low; in the last two decades or so, crises such as famine, drought, ethno-religious wars and the HIV/AIDS epidemic have led to a giant leap in the number of street children. At first glance they look like regular children, but listening to their stories of rape, physical abuse, gang wars, and child labor while looking into their empty eyes makes it hard to believe them when they say “I am ten years old.” They grow up on the streets, eating from garbage cans, begging, working on the streets, selling their bodies, and fighting to survive. Their stories are often similar but never identical. They are on the street because of abuse (at home or in the community), neglect, peer pressure, sensation-seeking, parents who force them into child labor or begging, or overcrowded homes in which there is no longer space for them. And suddenly they find themselves on the streets, unprepared and all alone. Or maybe not? They always find each other and always stick together; it’s easier to survive in a group. Many of them engage in substance or drug abuse, and when you ask them why, they will tell you it relieves the pressure of living on the streets, or it helps them sleep or overcome pain, violence and hunger, others will say that they do it to stay part of the gang. When you work and live on the streets all day and all night and also take drugs, you don’t have time or the state of mind to go to school. Statistics show that roughly 70% of African street children are school dropouts and 30% have never even been to school. These are 40 million children living the street life with no direction, no protection, no education, no future. One day they will all grow up. They will no longer be children, they will not be able to make a living from begging, and then they will look for alternative means of making money or simply taking it.

Street Children, Education & National Security

Street children Photo by flickr user Bigbluemeanie http://www.flickr.com/photos/ bigblue/81513687/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

Just Say Yes Photo by flickr user A Sheep in Manâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Clothing http://www.flickr.com/photos/kent_ yoshimura/7904274844/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

Street Children, Education & National Security

Street Children Photo by Rudi D. Noetzold http://www.flickr.com/photos/ novemberdelta/6237389214/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

Many governments fail to see the threat that millions of uneducated children pose to national security as children and, later, as adults. These kids have seen real life and real money. On the streets of Lagos, for example, street kids working as window wipers in traffic make up to NGN 2,000 ($12) a day, which is $10 more than what 70% of the population live on daily ($2). Becoming used to a relatively â&#x20AC;&#x153;highâ&#x20AC;? income from a very young age means becoming used to disposable income. If the income stops flowing in, these youths are driven into the arms of gangs, where they are swallowed up by a dark world of crime. With the growing number of street kids, the number of potential armed robbers and threats to personal and national security is growing speedily.

What is Africa doing about this? There are a few centers and homes for these children scattered across Africa. They are funded by the government or private NGOs, and most of them are poorly equipped. They are run by badly trained social workers who try their best to rehabilitate the children in their centers. In these centers, children get the most bare-bones education you can imagine, sprinkled with some vocational training, in the hope that they will give up life on the street for an orderly life. Education is often seen as a means of helping children in the streets â&#x20AC;&#x201C; most of the street children are illiterate with no basic skills to help them get a proper job. Education may help break the vicious cycle of marginalization and help potential street children towards a better life, but it needs to be solidified with top-notch vocational training. Africa needs to sit up and start facing the challenge.

What’s a Capital Without the Capital?

What’s a Capital Without the Capital? Sunday, 17 June 2012

Rabab Khan

Contact Information: http://rababkhan.com Rabab Khan is a freelance writer, editor and research associate. She works with Pakistani NGOs in areas like women’s rights, digital security and violence against women. She also works as a Freelance Social Media strategist and can often be found reading about and trying out new technology and apps.

“My friend and I were trying to drive through the IJP road and then later the I-8 road for hours on end with the roads all practically flooded. One mistimed gear shift and we would have been stranded in the rain on the road for the next 6 hours.” This was Shaukat’s – then a private chauffeur in a local household – story of what happens in Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital, when it rains continuously for more than a few hours or rains too hard. The IJP is a commercial thoroughfare running the length of Islamabad, while I-8 is a popular residential block in the same. Yet, despite their proximity to the capital, sufferings like Shaukat’s are endured by many on any “fine” day in the capital when a downpour sets in. Stories like these, unfortunately, are not just restricted to downpours or even to Islamabad. They apply equally to most of Pakistan’s urban centers, and they don’t spare Pakistan’s provincial capitals, either! “What is the problem?” you might ask. The challenge is that we do not have the infrastructure to cope with such problems. Not only are cities like Karachi and Lahore quick to flood when the rain comes, they are all also faced with a host of other problems in the same vein – perpetuated primarily by a lack of infrastructure and secondarily by the unavailability of resources. Unfortunately, we are no Singapore. We have neither their social acumen nor sense of motivation and responsibility to initiate and bring about an economic, social and infrastructural transformation (1) (2) of a similar magnitude. Our cities continue to expand, and each day their condition worsens from the day before. Such is the plight of even the country’s largest metropolises that older people now look back nostalgically to life in the 1960s as the quintessential Pakistani lifestyle – which we’ve now lost. Karachi, for instance, keeps on expanding horizontally into ever farther reaches, yet the city completely lacks an all-connecting road network. Nor does most of Karachi have access to any sort of water (1) (2) or any viable electricity or drainage system. Islamabad is no different, despite being the only planned city in the country. The Capital Development Authority (CDA), which oversees the developmental affairs of the city, has now started developing new residential sectors in the city, the most recent ventures being E-11

What’s a Capital Without the Capital?

Islamabad Photo by flickr user ayerscolleen http://www.flickr.com/photos/7198580@ N06/4409347544/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

„A village under Flood in South Pubjab, Pakistan – 2010” Photo by M. Farhan Janjua

What’s a Capital Without the Capital?

World Social Forum 2006 (Karachi, Pakistan) Photo by flickr user Skasuga http://www.flickr.com/photos/ skasuga/136705378/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

and D-12. And all this despite the fact that Islamabad’s waste disposal and water treatment problems are similar to Karachi’s. Not to put too fine a point on it, its residents practically drink what they defecate, and Islamabad also has a sizeable shanty and slum ecosystem – lacking in water, electricity, drainage, gas, and well-nigh every other amenity in life. Lahore, the second largest city in the country, falls between these examples, but it leans more towards Karachi’s extreme than Islamabad’s. Combine all of this with an unstable security situation, which dis-courages investors from pouring capital in the country, and you get the perfect formula for regression. Here, Karachi’s stock exchange – Pakistan’s largest – deserves special note. Karachi contributes well over 20% of Pakistan’s GDP, a figure that was once as high as 45%. Its stock exchange, a key component of Pakistan’s economy, has been in a free fall over the course of the last couple of years, thus shattering what little investor confidence the country had managed to retain during the “War on Terror”. And the culprits aren’t just the international players; fingers can be also be pointed at the city’s and Pakistan’s own Kalashnikov culture, introduced under the late, “beloved” General Zia’s regime. With the current law and order situation, we are losing what little hope metropolises like these have of even starting out on the road to recovery! Admittedly, Singapore is practically a one-city nation, so comparison is not really fair. But we need not legitimize excuses like these. There was a time – again, often fondly recalled by the older generation – when people would scratch their heads when the name of Pakistan arose, yet their faces would invariably light up with recognition at the name of Karachi. We have lost all that now.

What’s a Capital Without the Capital?

Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore, and Faisalabad – these are all major metropolises in the country that continue to expand under pressure from urbanization and migration. Yet, they expand without growing properly. Expansion comes in the form of stolen electricity, unsanctioned slums and dirtpacked roads. Not only have we miraculously managed to make even our most enterprising, economically viable cities irrelevant on the world – and even the regional! – stage, we have also turned even our most developed cities into cautionary examples of civil war. They now resemble cities from the poorest countries around the world, thanks simply to abject neglect. There simply won’t be any “New Cities” or “Renewed Cities” for Pakistan. It isn’t just that we’re unwilling to put in a concerted, conscious and responsible effort at doing so, as Singapore has done; it’s just that we’re consciously and deliberately and with great enterprise working towards our own demise.

Pulp Fiction: Gwadar – An (Un)Success Story

Pulp Fiction: Gwadar – An (Un)Success Story Monday, 25 June 2012

Hammad

Contact Information: http://wordsoverwisdom.wordpress.com/ A perennial student, Hammad spends his time exploring the nuances of life, even if the journey isn’t always pleasant. An outspoken writer by passion, and a design student by profession, this is just what he thinks he does best.”

Unplanned is well-planned, and planned is not planned at all. At least that’s how things work in this part of the world. In history lessons we’ve seen countless occasions on which the best-laid plans and the best intentions were sabotaged by the planners’ own eagerness – by their over-planning. They say that when you become too set on an idea, you stop seeing the ground realities beyond it – and that, fundamentally, is our problem. Four hundred and fifty years ago, the Mughal Emperor Akbar planned a new capital for India – for a sprawling Mughal Empire that spanned 4,500,000 square kilometers. Fifteen years in the making, Fathpur Sikri was deserted within only months of its completion. Yet the village adjacent to it still stands today. Why? Because every contingency had been planned for and every arrangement made, except for what might actually happen. As it stood, the newly built city had no source of water, and the only water in the city was brought across countless miles on beasts of burden. Suffice it to say: a failure, even among failures. Yet, where Akbar’s new capital failed, other cities were born and took root – but only cities that were not expressly planned. Rawalpindi and Murree, for instance, started off as small garrisons and stopovers for travelers. Yet, over time, they have grown into bustling cities in the natural course of development. Murree is now a major local attraction, while Rawalpindi is one of the country’s most strategically important cities, housing its top military brass. Now it might seem from what I’ve said that we have learned our lessons and become aware of our own shortcomings. Perhaps that’s one reason that the country’s capital is still also its only planned city, even 50 years after its founding. However, history is often forgotten, and we repeat our mistakes many times over. In 2002, the Pakistani government decided there was a pressing need for another port city to lessen the strain of trade on Karachi. In its wisdom and eagerness to kill two birds with one stone, a far-flung location with no history of commerce was picked, and it was picked in a province with a history of perceived victimization. And so the seaport of Gwadar was created from the small coastal village of Gwadar. Just as the country’s rulers had thought to make Karachi a key city for international air traffic and then failed, so too did they fail in their ambitions for Gwadar.

Pulp Fiction: Gwadar – An (Un)Success Story

Fatehpur Sikri, India Nov. 2009 Photo by flickr user SangHee Kim http://www.flickr.com/photos/ stylepoint/4206720952/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

While the aim was to perform a record transformation from a fishing village to a bustling urban center of trade that would awe the world through economic, infrastructural, and real estate development, the seaport now stands as a dismal, deserted vestige of the city once meant to herald a new epoch of development for both the country and the region. With blame (1) (2) allocated freely to any and all parties involved, accusing fingers are pointed in many different directions. The Port of Singapore Authority (PSA), which operates the Gwadar port, says that politics and vested interests are keeping Gwadar from becoming a successful venture. Politicians say politics is to blame; others say that it is in fact the military that is delaying further progress on Gwadar. Pakistanis with an aversion to Balochis say that it is in fact the poor Balochis who are to blame – a fact that the hardliners among the Baloch proudly own up to. But that’s not all: those with more interesting ideas place the blame on secret “hands” and international players with vested interests in not letting Gwadar take off – looking with meaningful stares towards our Middle Eastern neighbors in the UAE and to some of our nearer neighbours as well. Some say that both the port and the city were ill-conceived and ill-planned, but nobody listens to them, of course. Regardless of the swirl of conflicting arguments and rumors, and although everyone (the author included) has a dearly-held opinion on the matter, there are still too many questions hanging over Gwadar for it to be a real “New City” or even a seaport. Bad decisions are the root of Gwadar’s difficulties. The region has little to no infrastructure support and is not even connected with the rest of the country’s trade centers, much less with mainland Pakistan, the Central Asian states or China. There is no rail or road network. Add to this Pakistan’s poverty, which means that we have little or no money to create or maintain the monetary and physical infrastructure that could support Gwadar.

Pulp Fiction: Gwadar â&#x20AC;&#x201C; An (Un)Success Story

The End Photo by Muzaffar Bukhari http://www.flickr.com/photos/ mbukhari/7745589972/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

Fishing boats Photo by flickr user Wenchmagnet http://www.flickr.com/photos/ wenchmagnet/2527381795/in/ set-72157605263156908/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

Pulp Fiction: Gwadar – An (Un)Success Story

To put icing on the cake, let us note that these questions are only now being asked. Let’s consider that some unaccountable potentate high up in the echelons of power approved all of this for political reasons and without making any informed decisions. He might well have pocketed a few million rupees for the ruination of what could otherwise have become a national asset. Consider as well that the federation continues to exclude the Balochis themselves – traditionally treated as second class citizens in the country – from the entire process. The results of this, in the form of Baloch insurgency movements, appear every day on the local news. Interestingly, these, too, are blamed on foreign intervention (1) (2). There is, of course, a cherry to top off what has by now become a veritable crème gâteau: China has committed to take over the operations of the port once the current contract for its operation is up. This time, the move finally elicited an international response, with our neighbors and other “allies” expressing “security concerns” about the venture, which eventually resulted in the Chinese government expressly stating that all it intended was to operate a trade port in Pakistan. Perhaps this is an overlong and useless case study, but its purpose is to emphasize the obvious. Present-day Pakistan is not fit for a “New City” anymore, even in the conventional sense of the word. Our only recent effort at such development has been a dismal failure. Not only have we stirred up international controversy, we have also further alienated the people of the region while showing an astute lack of administrative prowess and an astute skill in corruption – displaying a lack of governance, spending huge sums of taxpayers’ money, and raising national ire, while endangering national sovereignty on all fronts. There’s no telling; this might just be the case with any “New Cities” we plan. We’re just unfit; it isn’t cynicism; it’s the nature of the beast.

Internal Migrant Workers in Delhi

Internal Migrant Workers in Delhi Monday, 30 July 2012

Anuja Upadhyay

Contact Information: anujaupadhyay@gmail.com Anuja Upadhyay is a Nepali, blogger and writer. Presently she is involved with Future Challenges as the Regional Editor, Asia. She has several years of experience in community development work and the print media in India and Nepal.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;I was just twelve years when I came from Uttar Pradesh (a northern state of India) as a migrant worker, with the help of a relative,â&#x20AC;? says Ram Charan Yadav, my neighborhood vegetable vendor. He sits outside my apartment complex and claims to have been selling vegetables here for the last twenty-six years. I have seen him there for the last eight years, ever since I first moved to this neighborhood. The hope of better work opportunities and a burning desire to do something in life brought him to Delhi in 1976. Ram had no idea then that he would be working in Delhi for so long. His wife joined him a year after his arrival, and now Delhi seems like his home. His initial days were tough, when he started out as a fabric block print worker. Although Ram gets nostalgic thinking of his home in Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh, he says he cannot go back, as there is no work for him there. The only option would be to work in the fields, which he doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t want to do. His old mother lives with his brother and his family. He puts up in a nearby area called Govindpuri. He visits the Azadpur vegetable market daily to stock up on fresh vegetables, which he sells at a slight profit, and he spends his time with procurement, transportation, cleaning/washing, sorting, arranging, and dealing with customers. He saves about INR 2500 ($45) every month, after expenses. He complains about occasional harassment from municipal bodies and the waste of vegetables due to lack of storage, which leads to a loss of business from time to time. Otherwise, he says he is happy. He is just one internal (rural to urban) migrant worker among the millions who come to Delhi. Everybody is not as fortunate as Ram. Many live in appalling conditions in overcrowded slums where safe drinking water is scarce and sanitation nonexistent. Often subject to violence, they keep moving in search of better employment. In India the unorganized or informal sector includes vegetable vendors, rag pickers, construction laborers, factory workers, sweepers, car cleaners, and domestic helpers, the majority of whom are migrant workers. Although they account for a large percentage of the employed population, they rarely figure in major discussions. Delhi is the melting pot for migrant workers in both the organized and unorganized sectors. The lack of opportunities in rural India makes people flock to the cities, especially the national capital,

Internal Migrant Workers in Delhi

Street Vegetable Stall Photo by Bruce Thomson http://www.flickr.com/photos/80375783@ N00/3252369093/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

Slums Photo by flickr user James Guppy http://www.flickr.com/photos/97938415@ N00/3860169672/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

Internal Migrant Workers in Delhi

Old Delhi Photo by Magnus von Koeller http://www.flickr.com/photos/ magnusvk/6891438090/ (CC BY-NC-SA)

in search of a better life. More than 200,000 people migrate to Delhi every year. The bulk of migrants are from the neighboring states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, followed by migrants from states like Rajasthan, Haryana, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Odisha, Chattisgarh, and Assam. Many claim that the influx of migrant workers from various cities in India is pushing the city to its limits, and it does indeed put a tremendous stress on Delhi’s infrastructure. The migrant population is often blamed for causing the population explosion in urban areas. However, in Delhi, and many other cities in India, this is not the case. Instead, the change in demographics is due to natural growth – a baby boom of sorts. The various roles taken by migrant workers – from delivering fresh fruit and vegetables to our doors to cleaning our cars, collecting our garbage, and doing our domestic chores at affordable rates – have made our lives so much easier, and their contribution should not be overlooked. Instead of blaming migrant workers for crime, population increase, and stressing the infrastructure, shouldn’t the government try and do something to improve their lives?

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