Urban Policy and Performance in Kenya and Tanzania

Abstract

OVER the past ten years, African governments have wrestled with the problems of designing and implementing comprehensive rural development policies. In an overwhelmingly rural continent with, for most areas, only a recent history of urbanisation, such an emphasis is understandable. But if African cities are for the most part young, and small by world standards, they are also growing faster than cities in any other major world region. This rapid growth, superimposed on a meagre resource base, will put increasing pressure on planners to devise solutions for the adequate and equitable distribution of urban services. The solutions that emerge, however, will be heavily conditioned by two sets of factors: the immediate demands of urban growth, and the wider political/administrative and social context within which policy-making takes place. In an effort to explain more clearly how these factors operate in contemporary Africa, this article will compare the formulation and implementation of key urban policies in Kenya and Tanzania from independence until the end of 1973. Because of their importance for lower-income groups, three policy areas -land allocation, housing, and planning - are singled out for more intensive examination in this analysis