Barriers and opportunities of community participation in informal settlement upgrading projects: A case study of Slovo Park, South Africa.

Abstract: The Upgrading Informal Settlement Programme (UISP) has been identified as an approach to improve the lives of informal settlement dwellers with minimal interruption to their livelihoods and social networks. In addition, it has been recognised as a progressive approach in human settlements that moves away from the traditional approach of providing housing in the periphery of the city. This approach requires community participation to be at the centre of the development taking place within the settlement. Recent studies reveal that commonly, the state lacks institutional capacity to conduct effective community participation. The paper presents the results of an assessment of community participation in the upgrading process of informal settlements, as implemented at the Slovo Park. The study was conducted using a qualitative approach by means of in-depth interviews with the residents of Slovo Park to gather information on the possible impact of ineffective community participation during the UISP process. The paper reveals that community participation was ineffectively facilitated and this is reflective in the residents’ lack of information pertaining the design layout of the future projects to be implemented in the settlement. Moreover, the paper highlights that ineffective community participation hinders residents of informal settlements from accessing self-provided adequate housing and results in provided basic services such as electricity, inaccessible to the beneficiaries due to their known socio-economic status. Results in this paper can be used to emphasise the importance of meaningful community participation for a successful UISP process