{UAH} Transformative infrastructure in urban Africa

Dear colleagues

We are happy to invite contributions to our call for papers for the
upcoming 2020 RGS-IBG Conference that will take place in London, 1-4
September 2020.

Please find the details below, and consider for yourself or circulate
to anyone who might be interested. Deadline is 10th February 2020.

Title: Transformative infrastructure in urban Africa
Session organisers: Barbara Lipietz, Daniel Oviedo and Jesse Harber (UCL/SOAS)

This session intends to bring together interdisciplinary research on
the use of infrastructure—understood in the broadest sense—to effect
broader social, economic, and political transformations in Africa.
Infrastructure – its absence, under-development or inadequacy – has
been identified in both academic and policy circles as a key factor of
African underdevelopment. In turn, an important literature extols the
role of infrastructure as an important developmental 'fix' for the
continent. However, the 'hardwiring of Africa' approach is not without
its critiques. Infrastructure never performs a neutral 'developmental'
role, but rather represents an intervention, deliberate or
inadvertent, into its social, economic, and political context. Papers
in this session will analyse infrastructure projects in this light, as
"transformative" (however defined).

We invite papers that engage with multiple forms of infrastructure,
from 'hardwiring' to digital and financial infrastructure, including
perspectives that develop the concept of 'people as infrastructure' or
governance infrastructures,through quantitative and qualitative
methods applied to the African continent. We wish to interrogate the
notion of an infrastructural fix in the highly diverse contexts of
Africa; as well as to explore the governance, regulatory, financial
and political aspects of transformative infrastructure in place. We
welcome contributions that speak from the perspective of secondary
cities or peri-urban areas across the African continent (including
northern Africa); as well as historical and comparative work.

Possible topics for the session include:


• Regional, cross-border, and global infrastructures as relevant to urban Africa
• Policies and practices representing an attempt to "leapfrog"
traditional infrastructures
• Experimental or otherwise novel governance or regulatory
arrangements around infrastructure
• "Smart cities" and the biopolitics of infrastructure
• Private, splintering, or "pirate" infrastructures of the rich or poor
• Socio-cultural infrastructures and institutions
• Material, social, financial and digital infrastructures beyond
traditional sectors (e.g. mobility, housing, energy, and water)
• "People as infrastructure" and its transformations over time
• Infrastructure projects with an explicit or implicit agenda for
governance reform
• Governance of infrastructure and the influence of local, regional
and national borders


We seek submissions from colleagues at any stages of their academic
career, including PhD candidates. This panel is part of a broader
project aimed at developing an open access edited volume on
Transformative Infrastructures in Africa, with UCL Press.

Timeline:

* Deadline for submission of abstracts: 10th February 2020
* The session convenors will communicate the RGS response as soon
as informed by the organisers after the 14th February session proposal
deadline
* Deadline for reduced rate ('early-bird') registrations: 12th June 2020
* RGS-IBG International conference: Tuesday 1st- Friday 4th September 2020

All interested in contributing to this session, please e-mail an
abstract not exceeding 250 words, with title, names, affiliations and
email addresses of all authors to: b.lipietz@ucl.ac.uk ,
daniel.oviedo@ucl.ac.uk and jesse_harber@soas.ac.uk

Thanks very much
Jesse Harber

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