Realizing the Right to Sanitation in Deprived Urban Communities: Meeting the Challenges of Collective Action, Coproduction, Affordability, and Housing Tenure. (April 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: McGranahan, Gordon
• Is Part Of: World development. Volume 68(2015)
• Page Start: 242
• Page End: 253
• Publication Date: 2015-04
• Subjects: sanitation -- urban poverty -- coproduction -- rights-based -- human rights; Economic history -- 1990- -- Periodicals; Economic assistance -- Developing countries -- Periodicals; 330.9
• DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.12.008
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0305-750X

Abstract

Summary: There are serious institutional challenges associated with low-cost sanitation in deprived urban communities. These include a collective action challenge, a coproduction challenge, a challenge of affordability versus acceptability, and a challenge related to housing tenure. This paper examines these challenges, revealing both the importance of community-driven sanitation improvement and its difficulties. The nature of the challenges, and the means by which two successful community-driven initiatives have overcome them, suggest that while recognizing the human right to sanitation is important this should not be taken to imply that typical rights-based approaches are the appropriate means of realizing this right.