KARACHI: The demolition this past summer of Islamabad’s Afghan Basti triggered a heated debate on the rights of the poor, access to housing and the development of cities. But how to accommodate, house and provide facilities to the numerous migrants that are moving to urban centres is a problem that is not unique to Pakistan.

In 2030, according to the United Nations Population Fund, an estimated five billion people will live in cities, and this global trend of urbanisation has become the focus of much debate and research. Thus the talk, ‘A multifaceted and splintered urban globalisation’, held at the Alliance Française on Tuesday, couldn’t have been more relevant.

Part of the ‘Open Doors in Pakistan’ series, the talk featured the writer and publisher Olivier Mongin followed by a short panel discussion with Prof Noman Ahmed, chairman of the department of architecture and planning at the NED university. While Mr Mongin talked about the history of urbanisation and globalisation, Prof Ahmed focused on the rapid urbanisation of Karachi, pointing out that the city’s population had rapidly mushroomed due to five different waves of migration since 1947.

Urbanisation is a global phenomenon but a coherent strategy from governments is still lacking

Mr Mongin lamented the lack of involvement of the state in urban migration, pointing out that it had given rise to the informal sector and phenomena such as ‘nocturnal homes’. According to the writer, migrants to Istanbul would build homes “in the dark of the night” to avoid being caught by the police or the municipal authorities. The residents of these homes were later given permits, and thus, what was “informal became formal”. Similarly, Prof Ahmed pointed out how facilities such as ‘public’ transport “have been taken over by the informal sector”.

However, both panelists emphasised that the lack of a coherent strategy could lead to violence. Prof Ahmed said the “mobility of information and ideas has changed the lifestyle and expectations of people”, and when these “expectations” were not met, youth became frustrated and resorted to violence. Mr Mongin agreed with him, stating that when, as in the case of the French government, “you provide housing without jobs and facilities, you create violence”.

Indeed, he said, the emphasis on housing over facilities was the wrong approach to tackling urban migration –– for the writer, it was all about mobility or, as he put it, “the new globalisation is the globalisation of mobility”. For instance, Mr Mongin said, non-governmental organisations spent too much of their time emphasising housing over facilities because it was “more satisfying to circulate a photo of a house than roads”. According to the writer, a lack of access to facilities could also lead to two-tier citizenship as was evident in cities such as Dubai and Singapore, where those who moved to the cities to work did not have the same rights as those permanently residing there.

While the numerous reasons for migration were explored, it would have been interesting if the panelists had discussed how climate change has affected migration to cities. While Mr Mongin mentioned how increasing desertification correlated with increasing urbanisation, it wasn’t explored further. Similarly Prof Ahmed didn’t talk about how natural disasters such as floods have contributed to the rise of internally displaced people in Karachi. The talk could have also been more connected and coherent, and Karachi, as a case study, could have been explored in more depth.

As Mr Mongin put it, Pakistan is a “lab of urbanisation” and how we chose to tackle this phenomenon shall affect the identity and culture of the country’s cities. And while globalisation tends to bring people together, it can also tear them apart. Or, as Mr Mongin said, “An architect … like journalists, use different fragments to tell a story…[but] as we enter globalisation, we tend to fragment ourselves more.”

Published in Dawn, October 7th , 2015

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