Informality through Sustainability

"This is a novel reflection on informal settlements and their conditions linking a robust range of contexts at multiple levels of urbanization with crucial issues of environmental regeneration, economic as well as social equality and racial justice. Inevitably, the discourse on sustainable and responsible practices encompasses the urgency to prioritize a human centered design approach in order to observe and register those patterns. It is in this pursuit of interdisciplinary contributions through the lens of sustainability, where the book might well make compelling revelations."

Maria Perbellini, Dean and Professor, School of Architecture and Design, New York Institute of Technology, USA

"Antonino Di Raimo, Steffen Lehmann and Alessandro Melis explore new directions into understanding the phenomenon of Informality. Presented as a three-part unified framework, Informality opens new research directions and is a must-read for future multidisciplinary thinking and creation of sustainable urbanized worlds."

Tom Kovac, Professor, RMIT University, Australia

"A breakthrough book outside of stereotypes! The authors demonstrate with clarity and methodological rigor that cities are never the product of a single deterministic will, but they are the result of the rise of sudden innovations, of independent – often informal – dynamics which are consolidated by the creativity of the inhabitants, by actions produced by individual and collective actors, whose outcome often exceeds the intentions and control of the most powerful actors. The book explores different resilient communities that, through fertile bricolage, produce powerful alliances between intentionality, spontaneity, causality and design."

Maurizio Carta, Full Professor of Urban Design, University of Palermo, Italy