Reimagining Urban Planning in Africa

A multi-disciplinary examination of urban planning in Africa, exploring its history, and advocating for new approaches.

This book contextualises major urban challenges such as climate change, rapid urbanisation, urban informality, and migration within the evolving planning systems of Anglophone, Francophone, and Lusophone Africa. It argues for the reimagination of urban planning, debating new institutionalism, gated communities, and smart mobility.This book analyses urban planning in Anglophone, Francophone, and Lusophone Africa, exploring its history and advocating for new approaches. In a climate changing world, cities need to be reimagined and designed to be more sustainable. But despite being one of the fastest urbanising continents, Africa has generally weak urban planning systems. The chapters adopt multi-disciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches, combining insights from urban studies and policy sciences, emphasising existing gaps, particularly in decision-making, planning practice and inclusiveness, to offer an in-depth analysis of urban planning in Africa. The authors advocate for the reimagination of urban planning, debating new institutionalism, digital infrastructure, climate urbanism, gated communities, and smart mobility. The chapters provide both theoretical and practical contributions, and advance thinking, policymaking, and implementation of sustainable urban planning approaches in Africa, thus making the book indispensable for advanced students, researchers, and practitioners alike.