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Distinction from above and below

Dados Bibliográficos

ID24141237
AutoresJ Sumich (0000-0001-5486-2798, University of Essex, autor correspondente), Sandra Manuel (0000-0001-6540-1786, Kaleido Technology (Denmark))
Ano2026
Volume96
Fascículo3
Páginas409-427
Data de publicação2026-08-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoAfrica (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0001-9720 • E-ISSN: 1750-0184
EditoraCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0001972026102071
OpenAlexW7208711213
IdiomaEN
Referências citadas21

Many scholars have argued that the explosive growth of gated communities in African cities results from the soaring inequalities and insecurities unleashed by the adoption of neoliberalism. Based on our analysis of Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, we demonstrate how gated communities are the latest attempt in a long-term social engineering project that aims to use the built environment to create the desired urban subject. We then trace how utopian ambition and aspiration bring such projects into being and how lack of resources and faulty management exacerbate internal tensions that cause them to fall apart. We argue that it is not only the lack of cultural knowledge or the ‘one size fits all’ authoritarian imposition of modernizing plans that causes these projects to fail. Instead, through the case study of Mozambique, we trace the ways in which seemingly exclusionary spatial forms, such as a gated community, draw upon the legacies of former utopian projects.

Authoritarianism · Capital (architecture) · Cultural capital · Inequality · Social capital · TRACE (psycholinguistics) · Urban and Rural Development Challenges · Urban Planning and Governance · Water Governance and Infrastructure