Informality:
Rethinking the Urban
The
International Contemporary Urban Issues Conference is aiming at fostering
discussions of theory and research on urban issues by DAKAM (Eastern Mediterranean
Academic Research Center). Focusing on a multidimensional urban phenomenon,
this international conference aims to deepen the understanding of informality
by opening it to discussion with contributions from various disciplines like architecture,
urban planning, sociology, history, economy and anthropology.
Emergence of informality as a concept in
scholarly discussions can be traced back to the 1970s when “the informal
sector” was first used by ILO reports on employment and poverty. The results of
the global economic restructuring -such as the flexibilization of production
and employment relations, deterioration of collective responsibility and
welfare functions of the state- damage the security of urban poor in terms of
housing and working. Meanwhile, recent socio economic public policies seem to
intensify the condition of informality. Now, it is widely accepted that informal
way of living is a necessity for the urban poor as a survival strategy. Hence, informal
work and housing constitute a significant proportion of urban economies and
policies.
What is new in the neo-liberal age is the extending
scope of informality. Today, the boundary between the formal and informal is
blurred more than before since most urbanites, including the middle classes,
experience both formal and informal encounters in their everyday life. Besides,
even the urban rich contribute to informality by the development projects on
the invaded peripheral land. Consequently, contemporary informality affects not
just a marginal segment of the society but a majority of people living in urban
space.
DAKAM’s CUI 2013 symposium offers a platform for
specialists and young academics to interact and share knowledge with
non-governmental organizations, businesses and policy makers, as well as fellow
researchers. These academic activities serve to bring the gap between research
and practice, expanding the opportunities for positive cross-sectoral
collaborations in response to the challenging realities of cities in the 21st
century.