Day 1 Tuesday, June 27, 2017
Morning Session
9:00am Welcome and Introduction; Background Information
Thematic discussion on ‘Relationships between the urban poor and more privileged groups, including those of employment, political participation and informal governance practices’.
Sanjay Srivastava and Ben Crow
9:30am Panel 1 | Social Science Perspective:
What have anthropological, sociological and other social science disciplines taught us about the entangled nature of urban lives in general, and relationships between the poor and the rich across a number of registers that affect the latter’s access to resources and their lives as self-directed residents of the city? Examples to be drawn from around the world
Facilitator / chair: Stefan le Courant
11:15am Panel 2 | Perspectives from Action:
What does activism by, say, housing rights and workers’ rights activists, tell us about relationships between the elite citizens and the urban poor? What negotiations take place between the economically and socially marginalized populations and urban elites in sphere of work? How do these negotiations impact access to spaces of the city as equal citizens?
Facilitator: Bernard Barraque
1:00pm - 2:00pm Lunch
Afternoon Session
2:00pm Panel 3 | Policy Perspective:
What is the interface between policies for the poor and the demands of the well-off? How do these policies impact the continuation of the kinds of work the poor undertake for survival? Do they result in trade-offs on the ground between policies intended for the poor and objections by the well-off (where, for example, there might be conflicts between providing housing for the poor and using the land for leisure activities of the well-off)? And, how do policy makers recognize rights to the city by different populations of the underprivileged in a context of large-scale anti-poor discourses that promote their disenfranchisement from urban processes?
Facilitator: Chris Butler
3:45pm Breakout Groups
Participants to be constituted into two interdisciplinary (scholar, activist, policy-maker) groups. Each group will separately discuss the deliberations of the morning panels. Having two separate groups identify the most cogent or interesting points from the morning session will serve to act as an interactive brainstorming process. A representative of the group will present to the larger gathering on the most significant themes from the morning panels.
Group 1 Facilitator: Sanjay Srivastava; Rapporteur: Emily Rains
Group 2 Facilitator: Ben Crow; Rapporteur: Liam Magee
4:50pm Breakout Groups Report Back
Day 2 Wednesday, June 28, 2017
Morning Session
9:00am Welcome to Day 2
Summary of Day 1 deliberations, deliberations and introduction of the theme for the day, viz., the state, bureaucracies and the urban poor.
Sanjay Srivastava / Ben Crow and Day 1 Rapporteurs
9:30am Panel 1 | Social Science Perspective:
What do anthropological, sociological and other social disciplines tell us about relationships between the poor and the state in the context of access to urban utilities and infrastructure? We will pay special attention to scholarship that deals with ethnographies of the state from various contexts around the world. This is an important and growing field with key significance for the comparative four-city project that forms the backdrop to the proposed conference.
Facilitator: Chris Butler
11:15am Panel 2 | Perspectives from Action:
Which are the urban bureaucracies that might form crucial sites of research for the comparative project? What are everyday experiences of the urban poor in dealing with them? What means do the urban poor employ to deal with the state in order to secure resources?
Facilitator: Sanjay Srivastava
1:00pm - 2:00pm Lunch
Afternoon Session
2:00pm Panel 3 | Policy Perspective:
What are the kinds of pressures and constraints within which policy making tales place? What is the relationship between electoral politics and policy making? What concrete policy measures does the state devise – relating to access to resources, education, employment opportunities and basic infrastructure – and why do they succeed or fail?
Facilitator: Ben Crow
3:45pm Breakout Groups
Participants to be constituted into two interdisciplinary (scholar, activist, policy-maker) groups. Each group will separately discuss the deliberations of the morning panels. Having two separate groups identify the most cogent or interesting points from the morning session will serve to act as an interactive brainstorming process. A representative of the group will present to the larger gathering on the most significant themes from the morning panels.
Group 1 Facilitator: Stefan le Courant: Rapporteur: Liam Magee
Group 2 Facilitator: Bernard Barraque: Rapporteur: Emily Rains
4:50pm Breakout Groups Report Back
Day 3 Thursday, June 29, 2017
Morning Session
9:00am Welcome to Day 3
Summary of the deliberations of the previous day and introduction to the theme for the day, viz., urban poor, housing and land. This panel extends the discussion of the previous days through taking up another significant context of negotiations between the poor
Sanjay Srivastava and Ben Crow with Day 2 Rapporteurs
9:30am Panel 3 | Social Science Perspective:
What are the histories of negotiations and contestations over housing and land in the context of the urban poor? What kinds of discourses have either helped to or either facilitate or deny access to housing and land? What different markets and state formations form the contexts of deprivation, housing and land?
Facilitator: Stefan le Courant
11:15am Panel 2 | Perspectives from Action:
What does work by, say, housing rights and workers’ rights activists tell us about relationships between the elite citizens, the state and the urban poor? What are the consequences of ‘urban renewal’ programs with their emphases on ‘Public Private Partnerships’ impact upon issues of land and housing for economically and socially marginal populations? How do forcible land acquisitions and demolitions of poor localities in the name of ‘urban renewal’ impact upon urban deprivations?
Facilitator: Chris Butler
1:00pm - 2:00pm Lunch
Afternoon Session
2:00pm Panel 3 | Policy Perspective:
How do policy makers negotiate between the increasingly market-driven demands for ‘rationalization’ of land policy and the desire of the state to supplement its revenues through selling public lands to the highest bidder on the one hand, and the need for needs-based housing on the other?
Facilitator: Bernard Barraque
3:45pm Breakout Groups
Participants to be constituted into two interdisciplinary (scholar, activist, policy-maker) groups. Each group will separately discuss the deliberations of the morning panels. Having two separate groups identify the most cogent or interesting points from the morning session will serve to act as an interactive brainstorming process. A representative of the group will present to the larger gathering on the most significant themes from the morning panels.
Group 1 Facilitator Ben Crow: Rapporteur: Emily Rains
Group 2 Facilitator Sanjay Srivastava; Rapporteur: Liam Magee
4:50pm Breakout Groups Report Back