Many of the 'mega cities' of the global South face an escalating crisis in the adequate provision of basic services such as water, housing and mass transit systems. Lagos-the largest city in sub-Saharan Africa-exemplifies many of these challenges but has tended to be viewed within a narrow analytical frame. In this essay, 'exceptionalist' perspectives on the African city are eschewed in favour of an analysis which frames the experience of Lagos within a wider geopolitical arena of economic instability, petro-capitalist development and regional internecine strife. An historical perspective is developed in order to reveal how structural factors operating through both the colonial and post-colonial periods have militated against any effective resolution to the city's worsening infrastructure crisis. It is concluded that a workable conception of the public realm must form an integral element in any tentative steps towards more progressive approaches to urban policy-making in the post-Abacha era and the return to civilian rule.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Abiodun, J.O. (1997) The challenges of growth and development in metropolitan Lagos, in: C. Rakodi (Ed.) The Urban Challenge in Africa: Growth and Management of its Large Cities, pp. 192-222. Tokyo: United Nations University Press .
2.
Abrahamsen, R. (2003) African studies and the postcolonial challenge , African Affairs, 102, pp. 189-210.
3.
Achebe, C. (2003) Home and Exile. Edinburgh: Canongate.
4.
Aderibigbe, A. (1959) Expansion of the Lagos protectorate, 1863-1900 . Unpublished PhD thesis, University of London.
5.
Adichie, C.N. (2005) Blinded by God's business, The Guardian (London), 19 February.
6.
Agbola, T. (1997a) The Architecture of Fear: Urban Design and the Construction Response to Urban Violence in Lagos. Ibadan : Institut Français de Recherche en Afrique.
7.
Agbola, T. (1997b) Forced eviction and forced relocation in Nigeria: the experience of those evicted from Maroko in 1990, Environment and Urbanization, 9, pp. 271-288.
8.
Ahluwalia, P. (2001) Politics and Post-colonial Theory: African Inflections . London: Routledge.
9.
Ahonsi, B. (2002) Popular shaping of metropolitan forms and processes in Nigeria: glimpses and interpretations from an informed Lagosian, in: O. Enwezor, C. Basualdo, U. M. Bauer ET Al. (Eds) Documenta 11_Platform 4. Under Siege: Four African Cities. Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos, pp. 129-151. Ostfildern-Ruit : Hatje Cantz.
10.
Aina, D. (1994) The water merchants: killers on the loose, Daily Times (Lagos), 5 February.
11.
Aina, T.A. (1989) Popular settlements in metropolitan Lagos, Nigeria: a socio-economic and structural survey of the habitat of the urban poor, Third World Planning Review, 11(4), pp. 393-415.
12.
Aina, T.A., Etta, F.E. and Obi, C.I. (1994) The search for sustainable urban development in metropolitan Lagos, Nigeria: prospects and problems, Third World Planning Review, 16(2), pp. 201-219.
13.
Ajanaku, I. and Alao, T. (2002) Population boom puts Lagos in distress: as inadequate infrastructure come under severe strain, The Guardian (Lagos), 13 March.
14.
Alao, T. (2002) Many travails of Lagosians: accommodation, security and transportation issues make life a burden, The Guardian (Lagos), 8 March.
15.
Alao, T., Akpabio, R. and Olise, A. (2002) Touts, thugs ... 'kings' of Lagos streets, The Guardian (Lagos), 23 January.
16.
Anas, A. and Lee, K.S. (1989) Infrastructure investment and productivity: the case of Nigerian manufacturing, Review of Urban and Regional Development Studies, 1(2), pp. 65-76.
17.
Anikulapo-Kuti, F. (1975) Water no get enemy, Song recorded by EMI Publishing.
18.
Appadurai, A. (2002) Deep democracy: urban governmentality and the horizon of politics, Public Culture, 14, pp. 21-47.
19.
Ayeni, M.A.O. (1977) Living conditions of the poor in Lagos, Ekistics, 255 (February), pp. 77-80.
20.
Ayida, A.A. (1981) Industrial estates in Nigeria - Lagos: an assessment. Unpublished MPhil thesis, University College London.
21.
Bah, M., Cissé, S., Diyamett, B. ET AL. (2003) Changing rural-urban linkages in Mali, Nigeria and Tanzania, Environment and Urbanization, 15(1), pp. 13-23.
22.
Baker, P.H. (1974) Urbanization and Political Change: The Politics of Lagos 1917-1967. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
23.
Bakker, K. (2003) Archipelagos and networks: urbanisation and water privatisation in the South, Geographical Journal, 169(4), pp. 328-341.
24.
Beall, J., Crankshaw, O. and Parnell, S. (2002) Uniting a Divided City: Governance and Social Exclusion in Johannesburg. London: Earthscan .
25.
Becker, C., Hamer, A. and Morrison, A. (1994) Beyond Urban Bias in Africa: Urbanization in an Era of Structural Adjustment. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
26.
Boisvert, M. and Senouci, L. (2000) Marginal privatization and infrastructural deficiencies: Anas and Lee revisited, Urban Studies, 37, pp. 1131-1144.
27.
Bourdieu, P. (1998) Neo-liberalism, the utopia (becoming a reality) of unlimited exploitation, in: Acts of Resistance: Against the New Myths of our Time trans., R. Nice, pp. 94-105. Cambridge: Polity.
28.
Brenner, N. and Theodore, N. (2002) Cities and the geographies of 'actually existing neoliberalism', Antipode, 34, pp. 349-379.
29.
Briggs, J. and Yeboah, I. (2001) Structural adjustment and the contemporary sub-Saharan African city, Area, 33, 18-26.
30.
Brown, S.H.1992Public health in Lagos, 1850-1900: perceptions, patterns, and perspectives, The International Journal of African Historical Studies, 25, pp. 337-360.
31.
Budds, J. and McGranahan, G. (2003) Are the debates on water privatization missing the point? Experiences from Africa, Asia and Latin America, Environment and Urbanization, 15(2), pp. 87-113.
32.
Caldeira, T. (2000) City of Walls: Crime, Segregation, and Citizenship in São Paolo. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
33.
Cleaver, F. (2001) Institutions, agency and the limitations of participatory approaches to development, in: B. Cooke and U. Kothari (Eds) Participation: The New Tyranny, pp. 36-55. London: Zed Books.
34.
Clifford, M. (2001) Political Genealogy after Foucault: Savage Identities . London: Routledge.
35.
Davis, M. (2004) Planet of slums: urban involution and the informal proletariat, New Left Review, 26, pp. 5-34.
36.
Dean, M. (1999) Governmentality: Power and Rule in Modern Society . London: Sage.
37.
Echeruo, M.J.C.1977VictorianLagos: Aspects of Nineteenth Century Lagos Life. London: Macmillan.
38.
Ekwensi, C. (1954/1963) People of the City, 2nd edn. London: Heinemann .
39.
Elliot, L. (2005) Nigeria at risk of £17 billion default, The Guardian (London), 26 April.
40.
Enwezor, 0., Basualdo, C. , Bauer, U. M. ET AL. (Eds) (2002) Documenta 11_Platform 4. Under Siege: Four African Cities. Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos. Ostfildern-Ruit : Hatje Cantz.
41.
Expunobi, B. (2001) Poor or pure water, Daily Champion (Lagos), 22 March.
42.
Falola, T. (1998) Violence in Nigeria: The Crisis of Religious Politics and Secular Ideologies. Rochester: University of Rochester Press.
43.
Fapohunda, J. and Lubell, H. (1978) Lagos: Urban Development and Employment. Geneva: International Labour Organization .
44.
Gale, T.S. (1979) Lagos: the history of British colonial neglect of traditional African cities, African Urban Studies, 5, pp. 11-24.
45.
Gandy, M. (2004) Rethinking urban metabolism: water, space and the modern city, City, 8, pp. 371-387.
46.
Gandy, M. (2005a) Cyborg urbanization: complexity and monstrosity in the contemporary city, International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 29, pp. 26-49.
47.
Gandy, M. (2005b) Learning from Lagos, New Left Review, 33, pp. 37-53.
48.
Gordon, C. (1991) Governmental rationality: an introduction, in: G. Burchell, C. Gordon and P. Miller (Eds) The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, pp. 1-52. Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
49.
Graham, S. and Marvin, S. (2001) Splintering Urbanism: Networked Infrastuctures, Technological Mobilities and the Urban Condition. London : Routledge.
50.
Gugler, J. and Flanagan, W.G. (Eds) (1978) Urbanization and Social Change in West Africa . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
51.
Hall, D. (2004) Water finance: a discussion note. Paper commissioned byPublic Services International ( PSI) for the World Social Forum, Delhi/ Mumbai, January.
52.
Holston, J. and Appadurai, A. (1999) Cities and citizenship, in: J. Holston (Ed.) Cities and Citizenship, pp. 1-18. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
53.
Home, R.K. (1983) Town planning, segregation and indirect rule in colonial Nigeria, Third World Planning Review, 5(2), pp. 165-175.
54.
Hyden, G. and Bratton, M. (Eds) (1992) Governance and Politics in Africa . Boulder, CO: Lynne Reinner.
55.
Ikoro, G. (2001) The scramble for branded bottled water market, Thisday (Lagos), 30 July.
56.
Isichei, U. (2002) From and for Lagos, Archis, l(January), pp. 11-15.
57.
Järvelä, M. and Rinne-Koistinen, E.-M. (2005) Purity and dirt as social constructions: environmental health in an urban shantytown of Lagos , International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 29(2), pp. 375-388.
58.
Joyce, P. (2003) The Rule of Freedom: Liberalism and the Modern City. London: Verso.
59.
K'Akumu, O.A. (2004) Privatization of the urban water supply in Kenya: policy options for the poor, Environment and Urbanization , 16(2), pp. 213-222.
60.
Karl, T.L. (1997) The Paradox of Plenty: Oil Booms and Petro-states . Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
61.
Kironde, J. (1992) Received concepts and theories in African urbanisation and management strategies: the struggle continues, UrbanStudies, 29, pp. 1277-1292.
62.
Klein, I. (1986) Urban development and death: Bombay City, 1870-1914 , Modern Asian Studies, 20, pp. 725-754.
63.
Koolhaas, R. and Harvard Project On The City ( 2001) Lagos, in: F. Fort and M. Jacques (Eds) Mutations, pp. 650-720. Barcelona: ACTAR .
64.
Koolhaas, R. (2002) Fragments for a lecture on Lagos, in: O. Enwezor, C. Basualdo, U. M. Bauer ET AL. (Eds) Documenta 11_Platform 4. Under Siege: Four African Cities. Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos , pp. 173-184. Ostfildern-Ruit: Hatje Cantz.
65.
Lefebvre, H. (1967/ 1996) The right to the city, reprinted in: E. KOFMAN and E. LEBAS (Eds and trans.) Henri Lefebvre: Writings on Cities , pp. 147-159. Oxford : Blackwell.
66.
Liebs, H. (2002) Eins A Kasseler. Tausend Plateaus: Der Reisetross der elften Documenta macht in Lagos Station und sucht nach der Balance zwischen Theorie und Kunst, Süddeutsche Zeitung, 15 March.
67.
Lockwood, M. (2005) The State They're In: An Agenda for International Action on Poverty in Africa. Schumacher Centre for Technology and Development : ITDG Publishing.
68.
Mabogunje, A.L. (1968) Urbanization in Nigeria. London : University of London Press.
69.
Maier, J. andHuber, A. (1989) Lagos: Stadtentwicklung einer afrikanischen Metropole zwischen hoher Dynamik und Chaos. Koln: Aulis Verlag Deubner .
70.
Maier, K. (2002) This House Has Fallen: Midnight in Nigeria. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
71.
Mamdani, M. (1996) Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
72.
Marris, P. (1961) Family and Social Change in an African City: A Study of Rehousing in Lagos. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
73.
Marshall-Fratani, R. (1998) Mediating the global and the local in Nigerian Pentecostalism, Journal of Religion in Africa, 28, pp. 278-315.
74.
Mbembe, A. (2001) On the Postcolony. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
75.
Mccarney, P.L. (1996) Considerations on the notion of 'governance'—new directions for cities in the developing world, in: P. L. McCarney (Ed.) Cities and Governance: New Directions in Latin America, Asia and Africa, pp. 3-20. Toronto: Centre for Urban and Community Studies, University of Toronto .
76.
McCarney, P.L. (2003) Confronting critical disjunctures in the governance of cities, in: P. L. McCarney and R. E. Stren (Eds) Governance on the Ground: Innovations and Discontinuities in Cities of the Developing World, pp. 31-55. Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press/ Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
77.
McNulty, M.L. and Adalemo, I.A. (1988) Lagos, in: M. Dogan and J. D. Kasarda (Eds) The Metropolis Era. Vol. 2. Mega-cities, pp. 212-234. London : Sage.
78.
Miller, N.S. (1961) The development and planning of Lagos Island, Journal of the Town Planning Institute, 47(July/August), pp. 202-205.
79.
Mitchell, T. (2002) Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-politics and Modernity . Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
80.
Mouffe, C. (2000) The Democratic Paradox. London : Verso.
81.
Mouffe, C. (2002) For an agonistic public sphere, in: O. Enwezor, C. Basualdo, U. M. Bauer ET AL. (Eds) Documenta 11_Platform 4. Under Siege: Four African Cities. Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos , pp. 87-96. Ostfildern-Ruit: Hatje Cantz.
82.
Muench, L.H. and Muench, C.Z. (1968) Planning and antiplanning in Nigeria: Lagos and Ibadan, Journal of the American Institute of Planners, 34(6), pp. 374-381.
83.
Obi, C. ( 2001) The Changing Forms of Identity Politics in Nigeria . Uppsala: Africa Institute.
84.
Obibi, C. (1993) Static utilities, stalled growth, The Guardian (Lagos), 6 May.
85.
Odame Larbi, W. (1996) Spatial planning and urban fragmentation in Accra , Third World Planning Review, 18, pp. 193-215.
86.
Ogah, D. (1998) Dry taps, broken roads ... despite N33b water scheme , The Guardian (Lagos), 16 February.
87.
Oguibe, O. (2000) Twin capitals of nascent Africa, in: Century City, pp. 59-67. London: Tate Modern .
88.
Okome, O. (2004) Die Stadt in Angst. Lagosbilder im nigerianischen Videofilm am Beispeil von Kenneth Nneubues Rituals (1997), in: T. Wendle (Ed.) Africa Screams: Das Böse in Kino, Kunst und Kult, pp. 211-217. Wuppertal: Peter Hammer.
89.
Okonta, I. and Douglas, O. (2003) Where Vultures Feast: Shell, Human Rights, and Oil. London: Verso.
90.
Olanrewaju, D.O. (2001) Urban infrastructure: a critique of urban renewal process in IjoraBadia, Lagos, Habitat International, 25, pp. 373-384.
91.
Olarewaju, T. (1998) For the world, insufficient water rules, Guardian (Lagos), 26 March.
92.
Olukoju, A. (1993) Population pressure, housing and sanitation in West Africa's premier port-city: Lagos, 1900-1939, Great Circle , 15, pp. 91-106.
93.
Olukoju, A. (2003) Infrastructure development and urban facilities in Lagos, 1861-2000. Occasional publication No. 15, Institut Français de Recherche en Afrique, Ibadan.
94.
Onibokun, A.G. (1996) Governance and urban poverty in Anglophone West Africa, in: P. L. McCarney (Ed.) 1996 Cities and Governance: New Directions in Latin America, Asia and Africa, pp. 159-169. Toronto: Centre for Urban and Community Studies, University of Toronto.
95.
Onibokun, A.G. and Faniran, A. (1995) The impact of structural adjustment on housing, environment and urban productivity in Nigeria. Ibadan: CASSAD.
96.
Osborne, T., Barry, A. and Rose, N. (Eds) (1996) Foucault and Political Reason: Liberalism, Neo-liberalism and Rationalities of Government. London : UCL Press .
97.
Osumah, A. (2001) How Lagosians search for potable water, Post Express (Lagos), 14 February.
98.
Otchet, A. (1999) Lagos: the survival of the determined, Unesco Courier (http://www.unesco.org/courier/1999_06).
99.
Owusu, K. (2001) Drops of Oil in a Sea of Poverty: The Case for a New Debt Deal in Nigeria. London: New Economics Foundation.
100.
Page, B. (2004) Cyborg apartheid and the metabolic pathways of water in Lagos. Paper presented to the conference Techno-Natures held at the University of Oxford, 25 June.
101.
Peil, M. (1991) Lagos: The City Is the People. London: Belhaven.
102.
Pieterse, E. (2005) At the limits of possibility: working notes on a relational model of urban politics, in: A. Simone and A. ABOUHANi (Eds) 2005Urban Africa: Changing Contours of Survival in the City , pp. 138-173. Dakar: CODESRIA /London: Zed Books/ Pretoria: University of South Africa Press.
103.
Post, J. (1997) Urban management in an unruly setting: the African case, Third World Planning Review, 19, pp. 347-366.
104.
Pullen, G. (1966) Some problems of rapid urbanization in Lagos, Nigeria, Journal of TropicalGeography, 23 pp. 55-61.
105.
Rabinow, P. (1989) French Modern: Norms and Forms of the Social Environment . Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press.
106.
Rakodi, C. (2002) Order and disorder in African cities: governance, politics, and urban land development pressures, in: O. Enwezor, C. Basualdo, U. M. Bauer ET AL. (Eds) Documenta 11_Platform 4. Under Siege: Four African Cities. Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos , pp. 45-80. Ostfildern-Ruit: Hatje Cantz.
107.
Richter, P. (2002) Flirt mit dem Desaster: Was macht die 'documenta' in Nigeria?, Frankfurter Allgemeine, 24 March.
108.
Riddell, B. (1997) Structural adjustment programmes and the city in tropical Africa, UrbanStudies, 34, pp. 1297-1307.
109.
Robinson, J. (2002) Global and world cities: a view from off the map , International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 26, pp. 551-554.
110.
Rose, N. (1999) Powers of Freedom: Reframing Political Thought . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
111.
Sala-I-Martin, X. and Subramanian, A. (2003) Addressing the natural resource curse: an illustration from Nigeria. Working Paper WP/03/ 139, International Monetary Fund, Washington, DC.
112.
Schmitz, R. (2002) Im Strudel: Lagos überleben: Die vierte documente-Plattform, Frankfurter Allgemeine, 26 March.
113.
Simon, D. (1995) The world city hypothesis: reflections from the periphery, in: P. L. Knox and P. J. Taylor (Eds) World Cities in a World-system , pp. 132-155. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
114.
Simon, D. (1997) Urbanization, globalisation and economic crisis in Africa, in: C. Rakodi (Ed.) The Urban Challenge in Africa: Growth and Management of its Largest Cities , pp. 74-118. Tokyo: United Nations University Press.
115.
Simone, A. (1998) Urban processes and change in Africa. Working Papers 3/97. CODESRIA, Dakar.
116.
Simone, A. (2001) Straddling the divides: remaking associational life in the informal African city, International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 25(1), pp. 102-117.
117.
Simone, A. (2002) The visible and invisible: remaking cities in Africa , in: O. Enwezor, C. Basualdo, U. M. Bauer ET AL. (Eds) Documenta 11_Platform 4. Under Siege: Four African Cities. Freetown, Johannesburg, Kinshasa, Lagos, pp. 23-43. Ostfildern-Ruit : Hatje Cantz.
118.
Simone, A. (2004) For the City Yet to Come: Changing Life in Four Cities. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
119.
Simone, A. (2005) Introduction: urban processes and change, in: A. Simone and A. Abouhani (Eds) Urban Africa: Changing Contours of Survival in the City, pp. 1-26. Dakar: CODESRIA/ London: Zed Books/ Pretoria: University of South Africa Press.
120.
Subirós, P. (2001) Lagos: surviving hell, in: Centre De Cultura Contemporània De Barcelona (Ed.) Africas: The Artist and the City, pp. 34-45. Barcelona: Centre de Cultura Contemporania de Barcelona/ACTAR.
121.
Sulaimon, O. (2000) War against water scarcity, Daily Times (Lagos), 15 May.
122.
Swilling, M., Simone, A. and Khan, F. (2003) 'My soul I can see': the limits of governing African cities in a context of globalization and complexity, in: P. L. Mccarney and R. E. Stren (Eds) 2003 Governance on the Ground: Innovations and Discontinuities in Cities of the Developing World, pp. 220-250. Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press/ Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
123.
Tostensen, A., Tvedten, I. and Vaa, M. (Eds) (2001) Associational Life in African Cities: Popular Responses to the Urban Crisis. Uppsala : Nordiska Afrikainstitutet.
124.
Uduku, N.O. (1994) Promoting community based approaches to social infrastructure provision in urban areas in Nigeria, Environment and Urbanization, 6, pp. 57-78.
125.
Un Department Of Economic And Social Affairs ( 2004) Urban agglomerations. Population Division of theDepartment of Economic and Social Affairs, United Nations ( http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/wup2003/2003urban_agglo.htm ; accessed 25 June 2005).
126.
Un Human Settlements Programme (Habitat) ( 2003) The Challenge of Slums: Global Report on Human Settlements 2003. London: Earthscan.
127.
Un/Wilbur Smith Associates (c.1980) Master Plan for Metropolitan Lagos: Vol. I Existing conditions and needs. Vol. II Short range (1985) and long-range (2000) development programme . Prepared by UN sub-contractor Wilbur Smith and Associates in collaboration with the UNDP Project Staff and the Lagos State Government.
128.
Un Technical Assistance Programme (1964) Metropolitan Lagos. Report prepared for the Ministry of Lagos Affairs .
129.
Vasager, J. (2005) Talk is cheap, and getting cheaper, The Guardian (London), 14 September.
130.
Vidal, J. (2005a) 'People wake up angry at being alive in a society like this', The Guardian (London), 5 March.
131.
Vidal, J. (2005b) Flagship water privatisation fails in Tanzania , The Guardian (London), 25 May.
132.
Watts, M. (1984) State, oil and accumulation: from boom to crisis , Society and Space, 2, pp. 403-428.
133.
Watts, M. (1994) Oil as money: the devil's excrement and the spectacle of black gold, in: S. Corbridge, R. Martin and N. Thrift (Eds) Money, Power and Space, pp. 406-445. Oxford: Blackwell.
134.
Watts M. (2003) Development and governmentality, Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography, 24, pp. 6-34.
135.
Watts, M. (2004) Antinomies of community: some thoughts on geography, resources and empire, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 29, pp. 195-216.
136.
Williams, B.A. and Walsh, A.H. (1968) Urban Government for Metropolitan Lagos. New York: Frederick A. Praeger/ New York: The Institute of Public Administration .
137.
World Bank (1992) Governance and Development. Washington, DC: World Bank.
