1.1
A Continent in Transition
▲ Cairo, Egypt. Despite economic growth, the continent still experiences massive urban poverty. ©Manal ElShahat. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic
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CHAPTER ONE
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he 2000-2010 decade was one of major changes in Africa’s developmental outlook - some say a turning point. Various statistical and other indicators appear to support increasingly positive perceptions of the new political and socio-economic opportunities for Africa in the decades to come, although they also indicate vast challenges. Africa is currently in the midst of a number of simultaneously unfolding and highly significant transitions, among them demographic, economic, technological, environmental, urban and socio-political. These transformations invite complete rethinking of current developmental trajectories, so as to further facilitate and sustain Africa’s strategic repositioning in the world. Despite a feeble global economy, Africa’s performance is promising, with an increasing number of nations progressing towards high rankings among the world’s emerging economies. Domestic economic performance has been particularly robust in Angola, Ethiopia and Nigeria; while
Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda are all experiencing sustained growth. However, not all African economies have performed well, especially those affected by continued or renewed social unrest, civil strife or conflict. In demographic terms Africa is growing rapidly and, where economic performance allows, emerging middleclasses are now starting to create sizable consumer markets (see Box 1.1). Booming cities are stimulating many nations’ construction industries - a sector with a high multiplier factor. Despite significant economic growth, Africa still experiences massive urban poverty and other social problems. Therefore, the prevailing worldwide view that cities are engines of growth and human development may very well be challenged by the unfolding realities in Africa, unless this urban economic and general developmental progress is translated into more broadly shared well-being among nations’ socio-economic strata. In political terms, Africa is also in the midst of major