Urbanization by implosion

Habitat International 28 (2004) 1–12

Guest Editorial

Urbanization by implosion

Abstract

Urbanization has been primarily a phenomenon of the growth and expansion of cities. Yet there isanother form of urbanization that is proceeding, largely unacknowledged, in rural parts of vast regions inthe Third World. The in-place growth of population in these areas is producing densities that equal orsurpass the urban threshold, i.e. 400 persons per km2. These are mega rural regions whose densities arecomparable to the population concentrations found in exurbs of Los Angeles, New York or Toronto. Thislevel of density transforms spatial organization and land market, both for agricultural and residential lands,as well as precipitates thresholds for community infrastructure. It may or may not bring about social,economic or local government institutions associated with the urban living, but it surely recasts settlementpatterns, land tenure systems and demand for facilities and services in urban modes. This spatialurbanization comes from the process of implosion, i.e. in-place growth. It is building up another urbancrisis outside the cities in many parts of the Third World. Yet it remains unnoticed by the planning andpolicy disciplines as well as organizations. It is another frontier opening up for urban planning in the 21stCentury.r 2002 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.

Keywords: Urbanization; Ruralopolises; Densities; South asia

1. Two types of urbanization

Exploding cities is the familiar metaphor of the current form of urbanization. Cities and towns,growing in population and spreading into the surrounding countryside, spawning suburbs andswallowing up farms and villages, are the idioms of modern urban growth. This expansion ofcities has been long sustained by the migration of populations from rural areas. Yet there isanother form of urbanization that is proceeding, almost unnoticed, in villages and countryside ofthe Third World, through the in-place population growth. In-place population growth in ruralareas is leading to the expansion of villages, multiplication of homesteads, and sprouting of homesamidst fields and barrens. With this form of growth, population densities in vast rural regionsexceed the threshold for defining urban settlements. It is happening in vast stretches of rural India,Bangladesh, Pakistan, China, Indonesia, Egypt, Rwanda, Burundi, Nigeria and other countries ofthe Third World. This is the phenomenon of urbanization by implosion, which builds up urbanspatial organizations through the densification of human settlements.This is a new form of human settlement, made up of diffused development stretching over vast

regions. Where one village ends and another begins is often hard to differentiate in this settlement.

ARTICLE IN PRESS

0197-3975/02/$ - see front matter r 2002 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.

PII: S 0 1 9 7 - 3 9 7 5 ( 0 2 ) 0 0 0 6 9 - 3

Its form may vary from region to region depending on the historical settlement pattern, namelyhomesteads versus nucleated villages, but the density-induced physical urbanization graduallycreates linear bands of development made up of homes, paths, hamlets and villages. The in-placegrowth of rural population generates urbanization that has not been recognized or acknowledged.This is urbanization by implosion.To illustrate urbanization by implosion, I have mapped the rural population densities of the

three countries of South Asia, i.e. Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. The rural density here refers tothe total rural population of a district divided by its total rural area, including the settlement,agricultural and uncultivated lands.Applying the almost universal criterion, for defining urban settlements, of 400 persons per km2

(or 1000 per mile2) to these countries, I have found that most of rural Bangladesh has urban leveldensities (Fig. 1). Similarly, in India, from West Bengal to the outskirts of Delhi is a band ofterritory, about 311,200 kms2 in area, that has rural densities exceeding the urban threshold. Also,the coastlines of Kerala and Orissa provinces are equally dense rural regions (Fig. 2). Pakistan,largely a semi-arid but irrigated plain, has its share of the contiguous high-density rural districts,spread over 56,000 kms2 along a north–south axis beside its eastern border with India, andanother band of similar territory in the Peshawer Valley (Fig. 3). I have called these regionsruralopolises, a hybrid settlement system that is spatially urban but economically, socially andinstitutionally rural rather agrarian (Qadeer, 2000, p. 1584).

2. High density rural regions in the Third World

These rural regions of high population density, ruralopolises, are not primarily constituted bymetropolitan fringes or exurban parts of urban fields. They are vast bands of territories beyondurban regions, extending over thousands of km2, but studded with cities and towns. Oftenagriculture and household production are the bases of their economies, but they are not insulatedfrom the technological and social currents of modernization. Poverty is endemic in these regionsand the population pressure is transforming their land economy and spatial organization.1 Itis the combination of agrarian economy and high density that defines these regions anddifferentiates them from the high-density countryside of developed countries, such as Japan,the Netherlands, and the Megalopolises of the Eastern Seaboard and the Great Lakes region ofthe US.2

3. Density and spatial transformation

High density is the transforming force that invests rural regions with urban spatialcharacteristics. A high concentration of population in a locality is almost universally taken to

ARTICLE IN PRESS

1The poverty of these (Third World) countries sharpens the uniqueness of the high-density rural regions. Here urban

densities are found in conditions of economic underdevelopment. In South Asia, for example, the per capita GDP was

$470, $440 and $350 respectively for Pakistan, India and Bangladesh in 2001.2The Netherlands and Japan are densely populated countries (456 and 333 per km2 in 1990, respectively), yet they are

rich and industrialized.

Guest Editorial / Habitat International 28 (2004) 1–122

ARTICLE IN PRESS

Fig. 1. Ruralopolises in Bangaladesh, 1991.

Guest Editorial / Habitat International 28 (2004) 1–12 3

ARTICLE IN PRESS

Fig. 2. Ruralopolises in India, 1991.


be an indicator of urbanity. Census definitions of urban areas rely on the density criterion, with aremarkable degree of convergence around the norm of about 400 persons per km2.Wirth (1938) identified density, along with heterogeneity and size, as the defining

elements of urbanism and connected them with the culture and social organization ofcities. Although the sociological characteristics of cities identified in his theory have

ARTICLE IN PRESS

Fig. 3. Ruralopolises in Pakistan, 1998.


been disputed in recent times by Rex and Moore (1967), Harvey (1985) and Castells (1977)and others, density as an indicator of urbanism remains undisputed. High density in ruralareas of the Third World may or may not bring about sociological changes associated withurbanism, but it transforms spatial organizations in three ways: (1) infrastructural needs; (2)changes in the landscape and settlement system; and (3) restructuring of land economy andland uses.High density precipitates thresholds for communal facilities (water supply, drains, waste

disposal, streets, fire protection and public health measures, etc.), intensifies interdependenciesamong land uses and realigns property rights in ways long defined as urban. These are the physicaland spatial changes that occur independently of the social, economic and cultural characteristicsof urbanization. It is in this sense that density has a transformative influence on the spatialorganization of an area. High density lays the ground work for spatial urbanization. This is thecrux of my argument for the urbanization of high-density rural areas by implosion. This argumentwill be elucidated through examples of changes in the spatial organization of high-density ruralregions in the three countries of South Asia.

4. Precipitation of needs for community infrastructure

To illustrate the precipitation of thresholds for community facilities and services, I will trace theevolution of the need for latrines and waste disposal systems in the rural parts of South Asia. Invillages and homesteads, traditionally houses do not have latrines. The most common practice isto ‘go to fields’, behind a bush to relieve oneself. As the population increases, the number ofhouses multiply and villages expand into fields and common lands, thereby reducing the privacyfor purposes of relieving oneself. In vast stretches of high-density rural regions, beyond cities, acommon sight from trains or buses is people squatting in view of each other and passers-by, theirfaces covered and bottoms bared. It is a sight of considerable embarrassment for the people,though they have little choice.The concentration of houses necessitates in-door latrines, which in turn require some mode of

transporting waste out of a house regularly, namely rudimentary sewers, drains, holding or septictanks. This progression towards (community) infrastructural thresholds continues as the densityincreases. Although local conditions may vary with the soil quality and topography, septic tanksare useful only at the lower end of the development density. For example in North America, septictanks are adequate up to 15 houses per km2, beyond that density communal systems of wastedisposal are necessary to avoid contamination of soil and water (Canter & Knox, 1986, p. 3). InCanada, the rule of thumb is that septic tanks are useful only up to a density one dwelling unit peracre. Beyond this density, some form of communal water and sewerage system is necessary(Ontario, Canada, Ministry of Environment, 1997). South Asian thresholds may be different,though unknown, but widespread land pollution and stagnant pools of dirty water suggest thatthey have been long crossed.Similarly, the need for progressive collectivization of facilities and services and the realignment

of norms and institutions can be observed for water supply, streets, roads, building codes andeven burial practices and cemeteries. As the density of development increases, collective modes ofinfrastructural provisions are required. This is the path of urbanization that rural Europe and

ARTICLE IN PRESS


North America has followed.3 It is now being precipitated in the densely settled parts of Asia andAfrica. The point of this illustration is that the increasing density of houses and settlements leadsto the physical and institutional structures that are essentially urban in character.Of course, there is a lag between the precipitation of urban infrastructural needs and their

fulfillment. High-density regions of South Asia are severely lagging in the provision of suchfacilities and services. In 1990–1991, most rural housing were without inside latrines, about 38%in Bangladesh and 85% in Pakistan, as were about 15–20% of urban housing. The provision ofother facilities and services were equally lacking, though they were needed all the same. Highdensity brings about conditions requiring collective provisions of infrastructure and urbanregulatory regimes, but they may not be provided. Yet despite the lack of these facilities andinstitutions, their needs lay the bases for an incipient urbanization.

5. Changes in settlement patterns and landscape

Another way in which high density transforms a rural area is through the changes in itssettlement pattern, specifically in the spacing and sizes of villages, hamlets and homesteads acrossthe land. As the population in a rural area increases, new households are formed, spawning newhomes and businesses, resulting in the expansion of existing villages, formation of satellites andnew settlements and building of homes in the middle of fields. Incrementally, the landscape comesto be dotted with settlements and homesteads, reminiscent of suburban sprawl. The feelings ofsolitude and the serenity induced by bucolic rural settings give way to a sense of crowding withhuman presence all around. This feeling is captured by an observer of the rural scene inBangladesh: ‘‘there are few horizons which are devoid of settlement, but where they begin and endis often impossible to judge’’ (Gardner, 1995, p. 23).My childhood memories of traveling across what now is a band of high-density rural districts in

Pakistan bring out the thrill of seeing vast tracts of golden wheat fields and wilderness,accompanied by a city boy’s sense of awe of not seeing many humans across the horizon. Now inthe same region, one feels as if one is passing through a suburban corridor, lined with homes,sheds, stores and villages alternating with fields and denuded lands. The visual distinction betweentown and country fades in the high-density rural districts.

6. Evolving residential land economy and the land question

Finally, high density realigns residential land rights and tenures as well as restructures land usepatterns, engendering new needs for public spaces, non-existent before, for streets, paths,playgrounds, drainage ponds, schools, etc. Of course, there is no one model to fit all theexplanations of these changes, because land economy, including tenurial arrangements and land

ARTICLE IN PRESS

3 In the late 19th century, European and North American cities were plagued by cholera, typhoid and malaria

epidemics, fire hazards and other symptoms of the absence of public health, safety and welfare. The answer to these

problems came in the form of public utilities, town planning and welfare services. Even burial practices had to be

regulated to ensure proper disposal of the dead bodies. Similar situations are arising in Third World cities and high-

density rural areas.


uses, depends on property systems, land development processes and land use practices, which varyfrom locality to locality and region to region.Even within the ruralopolitan districts of the three South Asian countries, settlement patterns

range from nucleated villages to free-standing homesteads; land tenures include community orpublic ownership of residential land, customary entitlements to the residential use of villagecommons, family joint freeholds or altogether individual ownership. These variations in theparameters of the residential land economy affect demand, supply, prices and uses of land,tenurial institutions as well as the transactional practices, giving rise to varying structures of localland markets, particularly in the residential sector.How the population growth and consequent high demand for homes and settlements affect

varying residential land economies can be glimpsed from the observations of high-density ruralregions of South Asia.In Bangladesh, dispersed family/clan compounds (Baris) divided into quarters for individual

households are the predominant form of rural housing. The ‘market’ for residential land iscircumscribed within family bounds and regulated by customary entitlements. The indigentmembers of a clan have a sort of entitlement to live in family compounds as uthuli residents, aform of obligatory charity (Indra & Buchignami, 1997).As the number of households increase, homestead land is divided and subdivided to the point of

saturation. Thereafter, new homesteads are started in fields, incrementally carving new paths andstreets, installing (tube) wells and building ponds, thereby expanding settlements and convertingfarmland or village commons to residential uses.As the population density increases, the pressure on land increases in parallel, resulting in more

and more land being put to residential use. The agricultural land is lost and open spaces,commons or even flood plains are carved up. The rural density in many parts of ruralopolitan

Bangladesh can be as high as 3000–5000 persons per km2, resulting in as much as 10% (or more)of the total land area of a village/locality taken by the residential uses. Even at densities of 400–1000 persons per km2, about 3–5% of a village land area is consumed by its settlement (Khan,2000, p. 46). The pressure on land further adds to the misery of the landless, leaving them without,even, any land to live on (8–9% residential landless in rural Bangladesh) and dependent on theirfamily/clan’s charity for shelter.In ruralopolitan regions of India and Pakistan, except Kerala, nucleated villages, divided in

caste/clan quarters, are the predominant form of rural settlement. Often provincial land laws andcustomary norms delineate village sites, set aside commons and define households’ rights ofaccess, use and conveyance. There is rarely an open market in residential lots, though somemonetary transactions or barter of property/services may accompany use and transfer of landamong clan members. The population pressure, and consequent high density, leads to the divisionof family compounds, building over village commons and implantation of satellite villages andhomesteads on farms around a village (Qadeer, 2000). This process steadily transforms farmvillages into mini towns and pockmarks surrounding fields with clusters of homes, paths, storagesheds even shops. The compact village as a form of settlement gives way to sprawled residentialclusters surrounding an overgrown village. The countryside takes the appearance of a leap-roggedsprawl.High density also necessitates the development of some rudimentary forms of the external

elements of homes, namely streets/paths for access, drains and wells, spaces for bus and carriage

ARTICLE IN PRESS


stands, as well as animal pens and storage sheds. These external elements may be incrementallybuilt up, but they require additional land (apart from the capital), which may add up to 10–25%of the area of house lots. These are the manifestations of creeping urbanization.High density and sprawl precipitate issues of land use compatibilities and efficiencies (by land

and service costs) of development. Some of the common sources of conflict in these ruralopolitanregions are the drainage of waste water from homes on surrounding lands and difficulties of rightsof way. The point is that the increased density of development leads to the need for land useregulations, systematizing of paths, streets and drains, albeit land use planning, which in turnnecessitate a formal system of local governance, community decision-making and land useregulations—all being steps towards the emergence of an urban land economy.

7. Summing up

I have argued, with illustrations from South Asia, that the population of growth in large ruralexpanses of many Third World countries is leading to the formation mega rural regions that arespatially and environmentally urbanized. The transformative force is the urban-level density ofpopulation. These high-density rural areas may continue to be economically, socially andadministratively rural in character, censuses may continue to classify them as rural, but theirsettlement patterns, residential land markets and infrastructural needs are increasingly urban inform and scope. This combination of the institutional rurality and the spatial urbanity is a newphenomenon, particularly in its regional sweep that is creating another idiom of urbandevelopment—namely, ruralopolis. It is a form of urbanization that emerges with largeinstitutional deficits or lags between needs and provisions for facilities, services and resourcesas well as administrative organizations on the one hand, and spatial-environmental structures andcommunity institutions on the other. The following is a summary, albeit in general terms, of thestructural elements of this urbanization, though these features of the emerging settlement systemshould be treated as hypotheses at the present state of our knowledge:

* emergence of a sprawl-like pattern of villages, hamlets and homesteads, alternating with farmsand open spaces and linked with cities and town, forming a landscape of diffused development;

* realignment of the size, form, spacing and functions of settlements with increasing density;* precipitation of thresholds for such community/collective facilities as water supply, drainage,

waste disposal, paths and streets, police stations and playgrounds, and for the correspondinginstitutions for their development and management;

* emerging conflicts among land uses within settlements and between residential activities andagricultural, open space and ecological uses, land use planning and regulations direly needed;

* loss of agricultural lands, (sub) division of community commons and forests;* upcoming crisis of land scarcities for farming as well as settlement purposes, need for the

economical use of land resources;* residential land scarcities and erosion of customary entitlements for residential use in villages,

particularly affecting the poor;* gradual shift from the familistic/community-based to individualistic systems of tenure in the

residential sector, incipient commodification of residential lots, rural housing shortages;

ARTICLE IN PRESS


* increasing landlessness for residential purposes, potential homelessness of the poor, squattingan increasing reality;

* public lands needed for provisions of community infrastructure and external elements ofhouses, about 10–25% of residential uses;

* the expansion and densification of lower tier settlements builds up thresholds and demands forhigher-level activities (e.g. dispensaries, hospitals, shops and stores, municipal governments) inupper tier towns and cities of district settlement systems. Cities expand and towns grow,partially, as a secondary impact of the rural growth. The urbanization by implosion gives newstimulus to the expansion of cities.

8. Implications for research and policies

The phenomenon of high-density rural regions is quietly building up land scarcities andinfrastructural deficits, both for farming and residential uses, though in this article the concernis with the land for settlements. The combination of high density and rurality is intriguingtheoretically, because one of the defining characteristics of urbanity, namely high density, is foundin agrarian and economically poor rural regions of the Third World. Futhermore, such densitiesare not limited to a few districts or small swaths of rural territories, but they extend over megaregions, hundreds of kilometers long and wide. This paradox suggests that these regions are a newform of settlement system that may not be explained by the conventional urbanization theories.Unraveling the structures and processes of these regions is the challenge for students ofurbanization and land economy.The immediate task is to understand, through research, what changes high density induces in

the residential land market, tenurial system, modes of supply, prices and distribution, patterns ofland uses and dynamics of development, albeit various parameters of the residential land economyas well as the infrastructural thresholds. Listed above are some hypotheses gleaned fromobservations of South Asian high-density rural regions. These are the broad indicators of theemerging structural changes in the land economy, spatial organization and institutional bases ofhigh-density rural regions.Perhaps an equal, nay larger, issue is the emergent scarcities of agricultural land, as settlements

swallow up farms and uncultivated tracts. Public policies and planning in these regions will haveto reconcile and balance these competing demands and maintain the economic and ecologicalsustainability of local communities. It will be a new frontier for regional and community planning.A series of parallel studies are needed in different parts of the high-density rural regions in the

Third World. It is unlikely that one overarching model will fit all high-density localities andregions of varying geographical, social and economic characteristics. There may be commontendencies and themes, but the structural and institutional configurations are likely to be specificto regions and, even, localities.Issues raised by the increasing densities in rural regions, ruralopolises, recapitulate the familiar

‘urban crisis’ of the Third World across whole or large parts of those countries. Among suchproblems may be the pressure on land, the erosion of entitlement-based distribution of land forliving and increasing ‘marketization’ of this basic need, increasing landlessness and consequenthomelessness in rural areas; loss of wilderness, village commons and farm land, uneconomical

ARTICLE IN PRESS


settlement patterns, land use conflicts and pressing needs for urban-type facilities, services andinstitutions, including land use planning. These conditions are leading towards major upheavals inthe environmental, spatial and agricultural land sectors of the rural regions, where densitiesare increasing up to or beyond urban levels. The Land Question comes to the fore at anunprecedented scale.To illustrate the scale of problems that are likely to arise, we have only to refer to the rural

population forecasts for Bangladesh, where rural density for the whole country already hasexceeded 400 persons per km2, while the overall (including urban) density is about 900 persons perkm2. In 2000, it had a rural population of about 103 million, which though growing slower thanthe urban population, will top 124 million in 2030 (United Nations, 2002). About 8–9% of therural population had no residential land to live on in 1990 (Qadeer, 2000, p. 1594). The majorityof rural houses in rural areas lacked inside latrine, sanitation and clean water. With such ahousing and environmental backlog, the next 30 years will witness the need for additional ruralhousing for about 21 million people, approximately 4.5 million homes, requiring about 100,000 haof land for residential uses. Farm holdings are already among the lowest in the world. Bangladeshis an extreme case of land scarcity. Its total land area is 144,000 km2. Yet even Pakistan and Indiawill experience severe pressures on rural lands and environments from residential demand,requiring an estimated 10 million and 23 million additional rural homes, respectively, in theperiod 2000–2030.Urban implosion in the countryside is marching towards cities that are expanding out. It is

enveloping the exploding cities to turn almost whole countries into swaths of urban territories.This situation poses policy challenges of Malthusian proportions. Urban planners, policy makersand urban researchers have to simultaneously understand and respond to this second wave ofurbanization. Their ingenuity and professional skills will be challenged as never before.

Acknowledgements

This article traces the practical implications of the theoretical argument developed in myprevious article (Qadeer, 2000).The three figures included here were initially published in theearlier article and are being reproduced with the permission of the Editor, Urban Studies.

References

Canter, L. W., & Knox, R. C. (1986). Septic Tank System: Effects on Ground Water Quality. Chelsea, Michigan: Lewis

Publishers Inc.

Castells, M. (1977). The Urban Question: A Marxist Approach. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

Gardner, K. (1995). Global migrants, local lives. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Harvey, D. (1985). The urban experience. Baltimore, MD: The John Hopkins University Press.

Indra, D. M., & Buchignani, N. (1997). Rural Landlessness, Extended Entitlements and Inter-household relations in

South Asia: a Bangladesh case. Journal of Peasant Studies, 24(3), 24–65.

Khan, S. (2000). Spatial organization, residential land and housing conditions of high-density rural areas in Homna

Thana. Bangladesh Research report submitted for the Master’s in Urban and Regional Planning Degree, Queen’s

University, Kingston, Canada.

ARTICLE IN PRESS


Ontario, Canada, Ministry of Environment (1997). Guidelines for ‘‘Provincial Water Protection Fund,’’ August.

Ministry of Environment, Ontario.

Qadeer, M. A. (2000). Ruralopolises: the spatial organization and residential land economy of high-density rural

regions in South Asia. Urban Studies, 37(9), 1583–1603.

Rex, J., & Moore, R. (1967). Race, community and conflict: A study of sparkbrook. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

United Nations, Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs (2002). World Urbanization

Prospects. The 2001 Revisions. ESA/P/WP 173.

Wirth, L. (1938). Urbanism as a way of life. American Journal of Sociology, 44, 1–24.

Mohammad A. Qadeer*School of Urban and Regional Planning, Queen’s University,

Kingston, Canada K7L3N6

E-mail address: [email protected]

ARTICLE IN PRESS

*Corresponding author. Tel.: +416-778-9700.


Urbanization by implosion

Documents

Transcript of Urbanization by implosion