**3. Transitions to Sustainable Urbanism in Africa**

#### *3.1. Sustainable Urbanism in Africa: A Broad Definition*

With respect to what kind of sustainable development trajectory is appropriate for African cities, it is worth tendering a comprehensive definition, based on what the key, desirable characteristics of just, sustainable African cities would be. To this end, this study conceives of sustainable African cities as being (1) resilient, adaptive and transformative (e.g., to change effects and shocks, whether emanating from the global, regional or national/local scales), (2) able to leverage intra- and cross-scale interdependencies and relationships (i.e., more internal coherence and resilience through strengthening intra-relations and leveraging cross-scale interdependencies to navigate change), (3) more equitable in respect of the urban citizenry (i.e., with respect to livability and reducing inequalities in access to infrastructure services and provisions, access and mobility), (4) resource efficient and sustainable (i.e., in order to navigate the pressures of resource scarcity and low-carbon development in the 21st Century) and (5) productive (i.e., through economic diversification that boosts economic growth and employment where it is most needed).

In short, the sustainable African city should ideally be inclusive, productive, resilient and sustainable. This speaks directly to the kind of social innovation that is required in African cities, that is, social innovation that draws on inclusive, participatory based processes bottom-up, while also integrating inputs from experts and decision-makers from the top-down (articulated as hybrid by Manzini (2013)). In this framing, gamechanging social innovation can be produced through transdisciplinary, multi-sector and multi-level engagements that are primarily informed by the needs of the communities and urban citizens that these social innovations target [40]. This is particularly important where informality is concerned. As articulated by Roy [41] (p. 152), a "different set of experts" needs to generate knowledge about upgrading, namely, "the residents of informal settlements" themselves. This is because, as Roy [41] (pp. 150–152) points out, "the provision and distribution of infrastructure is not a technical issue but rather a political

process" and that the "question of who sets the upgrading agenda" is central to meeting the needs of informal settlement dwellers. In this respect, social innovation that is inclusive and focused on producing an "*enabling system*: a system of producers and services aiming to empower the social actors involved" [20] (p. 60) is required in the African urban context.

In this paper, the enabling systems are conceptualized as social innovation-based economic ecosystems for SUD (see Section 4). The next section identifies, more precisely, the "nexus" (i.e., food–water–energy–transport) that this enabling system should ideally be oriented upon in the case of African cities, particularly at the household level. Moreover, it presents a rationale for stimulating game-changing social innovation through exploiting the convergence between green technologies and fourth industrial revolution offerings for SUD in the African context.

#### *3.2. Nexus: Enabling Just, Inclusive Sustainable Urban Transitions*

What is clear, is that any successful developmental transition must both stabilize and broaden the African middle class and lift poor households out of poverty at the same time if it is to reduce inequalities (with Africa's Gini coefficient averaging 0.58, above the global average of 0.4) and the entrenched urban divide that persists in African cities [3,42]. Moreover, stabilizing the African middle class is critical to broader transition, as their precarity limits their ability to meet basic needs, service their assets effectively and make significant savings, as well as access entrepreneurial, educational and skills development opportunities [43]. It is also important because local authorities in Africa are generally unable to collect significant revenues locally and remain dependent on central authorities for funds [44] that are often limited and, in turn, subject to corruption and influence from central authorities. Growing and stabilizing the African middle class, who are mainly urban, is hence key to ensuring a macro-level developmental transition that is significantly transformative and raises African living standards to the same level as developed nations [3,35,43].

With respect to stabilizing middle class African household budgets, a key intervention point can be identified by acknowledging that between 50% and 70% of household budgets of the poor is spent on food, water, energy [45] (including transportation [46]), with food alone averaging above 50%. This is commonly referred to in development literature as the "nexus" [47] and, while it mainly pertains to poor African households, it is also significant for the African middle class, who in reality are precarious and earn significantly less than the global middle class (as discussed earlier in Section 2). This is especially the case as the—already high—dependence on imports in the food and energy sectors is projected to increase for most African countries [33]. These nexus effects are critical to account for at the household level, as they are combinatorial and can therefore result in double and triple squeeze effects between food, water, energy and transport costs on households [3].

Nexus impacts, hence, serve as key destabilizing factors for households and any intervention at the household level must necessarily address them. They can plunge households into near-poverty and poverty conditions from month to month. They hamper the ability of households to save, service their assets, engage in entrepreneurial activities in the formal and informal sectors, access basic services and engage in skills development and education for self-advancement. Moreover, this has upstream impacts on local governments, who are unable to collect revenues effectively enough to sustain local government funded programs of action, as previously discussed. Hence, nexus impacts at the household level/scale have significant knock-on effects on local authorities and are key to actualizing broader scale (i.e., city, national and regional) transitions to sustainability.

In acknowledgement of this reality and drawing on the scholarly discourse that emphasizes the importance of working with the everyday realities of African urbanism (especially informality), African urban theorists and practitioners alike have argued for in situ development approaches to take precedence in slums and informal settlements [3,15,48]. In situ development typically seeks to co-construct and implement small-scale, decentralized solutions, drawing on local and indigenous knowledge (e.g., constructing water reserves) or

convenient (low cost, easy to maintain) technologies and systems that can be implemented from household to neighborhood scales [3]. Critically, in situ development ensures that infrastructures and service provisions become available to slum and informal settlement dwellers quicker than bulk infrastructures. Indeed, this coheres with Swilling [40], who rationalizes game-changing local-level in situ interventions and solutions as critical for African urban and multi-scalar sustainability transitions on the continent.

The role of social innovation in actualizing this in situ developmental vision in African cities warrants further discussion, particularly as it is focused on leveraging "new ways of thinking and acting" [21] (p. 2) on the grand developmental challenges of our era—which are complex and integrated [49]—with the specific aim of meeting social needs and goals. Moreover, the discourse around social innovation has risen in significance, as information and communications technology (ICT) offerings have grown and matured [21], enabling social innovation efforts to significantly extend their reach and impact. Critically, social innovation is widely viewed as key for actualizing collective visions of sustainability in local economic development ([20,50–52] in [21]). Social innovation also draws on and combines with both financial and technological innovations in producing and reproducing its offerings, for example, leveraging technological innovations in microfinancing to meet social needs through sustainable technology and infrastructure provisions and services [21,53] (p. 45). Social innovation can emerge from any sector alone—such as civil society, the state and the private sector—but also from the combined efforts of sectors. Likewise, social innovation can also emerge from transdisciplinary cooperation and collaboration [21].

Similarly, in the African context, Swilling [40] (p. 1) argues for "game-changers" in sustainable urban development that follow from precisely the modes of engagement through which social innovation is generated, i.e., that new, innovative systems and solutions emerge from cross-sector, transdisciplinary and multi-level interactions that are primarily informed by the context of implementation (i.e., the communities themselves). Collectivity (typically through participation) and relationality (i.e., cross-scale, cross-sector and multi-level) typically play a key role in unlocking solutions that are fit for context and give voice and primacy to the citizenry. That is, by generating cross-pollination of ideas about how to develop solutions that may range, for example, from innovations in financing to technological and systems innovation, to innovations that leverage local and indigenous knowledge(s) [23].

In their review of 29 cases of social innovation across nine domains, Angelidou and Psaltoglou [21] emphasize the importance of ICTs—i.e., digital social innovation (DSI)—in the recent rise of the prominence of social innovation. Taking their cue, this study argues that the potential for boosting social innovation through new technologies and systems solutions in SUD in Africa is even higher when considering the convergence between green technologies and fourth industrial revolution offerings. Note that the emphasis here is not necessarily on primary innovation in these areas, but rather generating systems solutions that are appropriate for context by recombining, "in a creative way, already existing products, services, places, knowledge skills and traditions" [20] (p. 61), an approach that is core to social innovation.

Many green technology offerings and systems solutions are particularly suited to the African context. They are predominantly decentralized and/or semi-decentralized and can operate independently or supplemental to bulk infrastructures. They are also scale-able and for example can be scaled up to neighborhood scales and higher (e.g., micro-grids). Green technology offerings and solutions are also customizable to local contexts, as they can be taken up in different systems configurations. This allows absorption considerations to be made, taking local specificities and contextual factors into account, as well as the specific needs of communities. Moreover, they are, in most cases, easy to install, service and maintain and low-skills levels are required, creating opportunities for low-skilled and semi-skilled workers (especially the youth) to be trained and absorbed into employment. There are also many low-cost options available, a key factor in ensuring absorption in this context.

Green technologies and solutions that have potential for absorption in the African urban context at the household and neighborhood/district scales are shown in Figure 1. At city scales, green activities, such as agro-industrial symbiosis, waste recycling, waste to gas/energy plants and public transit systems, have significant potential for uptake and indeed have been taken up in some major cities. For example, Addis Ababa has implemented a waste-to-energy plant that will process 80% of the city's waste while supplying 30% of the city's electricity needs [54]. It also boasts its own light rail system since 2015, which can carry 15,000 passengers in each direction [55]. Lagos City in Nigeria boasts both a light rail and bus rapid transit system and so does the City of Johannesburg in South Africa. Kenya has one of the most dynamic solar power markets in Africa, having adopted solar power in the 1980s, producing thousands of solar technicians since then [3].

**Figure 1.** An inexhaustive account of green technology and fourth industrial revolution offerings that may be combined for SUD in Africa.

Additionally, fourth industrial revolution offerings, shown in Figure 1, can serve as significant catalysts and facilitators of the absorption potential of these green technology offerings and systems solutions by (1) helping develop the skills base that is required for roll-out and implementation, (2) assisting with data-driven systems optimization and customization of solutions, (3) optimizing resource efficiencies, while improving resilience to potential shocks, (4) contributing to local production and (5) providing innovative, new non-predatory micro-credit, financial and banking services and savings schemes that low-income households can access.

Countries like Kenya, where mobile phone enabled money transfer and microfinancing services are offered by M-Pesa, are actively engaged in absorption of blockchain technologies [56]. Blockchain and the ubiquity of mobile phones and telecommunications are already at the heart of many innovative offerings that are transforming both urban and rural citizenries' abilities to access previously inaccessible services on the continent, for example, in the agricultural sector, which is dominated by small farmers [57]. One new blockchain initiative seeks to provide loans to 50,000 smallholder farmers in Africa, to the value of USD 10 million. This project is a collaboration between Block Commodities, an African blockchain based commodities trader, Wala, a financial services platform powered by Blockchain, Dala, which provides crypto-tokens that supports instant, borderless micropayments at no cost and FinComEco, which assists farmers in gaining wider market access for their crops [58]. In Ghana, BenBen [59] provides a trust-based, Blockchain enabled platform for land tenure and property that "aggregates both formal and informal public

transaction data", integrating diverse property market data sources to provide verified and rated land data for use by differing market actors.

The potential convergence between green technologies and fourth industrial revolution offerings hosts considerable promise for development and economic diversification on the continent, but whether development will prove to be inclusive and equitable depends in large part on how these solutions are customized to African urban contexts. This is in turn dependent on who participates in the processes that conceptualize and implement that customization. To cater for the vast array of stakeholders and interest groups who will be affected by any deployment of smart solutions in African cities, this customization requires a more inclusive, participatory approach towards local implementation of sustainability agendas. In this respect, social innovation is oriented on precisely those considerations that are key for realizing SUD in African cities. Social innovation can broadly be described as constituted of two key discursive streams: "the first one (is) predominantly concerned with the role of social innovation in local development, building on the role of citizens and their communities in neighborhoods, cities and regions and the second one (is) concerned with socio-technical transitions, focusing on the process and involved actors in social innovation in addressing social challenges ... " [21] (p. 5). This simultaneous focus on socio-technical transition and inclusive local development is precisely what is required in the African urban context, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa. The next section mobilizes this assertion by drawing on a theory of transitions to sustainability (i.e., the multi-level perspective, or MLP) [26] and economic ecosystems theory [25] to contextualize and characterize the role that an entrepreneurial state led approach can play in local SUD in African cities. It also discusses the value that this perspective brings for African states and city governments, in particular, in respect of the role that they can play in facilitating economic ecosystems that drive broader transitions to sustainability while boosting economic diversification—i.e., through a technology and infrastructure led transition—at the same time.
