Land Tenure, Politics, and Perception:A Study of Tenure Security and Housing Improvement in Indian Slums.

Housing;Informality;Slums;Tenure Security;India;Urban Planning;Social Sciences;Urban and Regional Planning

Nakamura, ShoheiDeng, Lan ;

University of Michigan

关键词: Housing;    Informality;    Slums;    Tenure Security;    India;    Urban Planning;    Social Sciences;    Urban and Regional Planning;   

Others  :  https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/110337/nshohei_1.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

瑞士|英语

来源: The Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship

【 摘 要 】

Scholars have argued that the persistent risk of forced eviction constrains housing investment by slum residents, who would otherwise have motivation and resources to incrementally upgrade their houses. However, the conceptualization of tenure security and its link to housing investment remains inconsistent, and systematically investigated empirical evidence about the role of tenure security—in particular, the effect of land tenure formalization—has been scarce. Three essays in this dissertation fill this critical research gap with a focus on India. This study is a rare endeavor that bridges the theories of tenure security and housing investment and scholarship on urban informality and politics in India. In so doing, this research theoretically disentangles the interplay of the three elements of tenure security: legal, de facto, and perceived tenure security. Empirically, this dissertation explores how the interaction of land tenure, politics, and the perception of slum dwellers affect housing investment behaviors.In India, some local government agencies legally protect slum dwellers from forced eviction under slum notification (or declaration) policy. Using a nationally representative dataset, the first essay in this dissertation estimates the effect of slum notification on the amount of housing investments by slum residents across India. The second essay further estimates the impact of slum declaration on the longitudinal change in housing structures in Pune. Its statistical analysis of the original household survey detects the positive effect of slum declaration and its heterogeneity. These findings demonstrate that the legal assurance of slum dwellers’ occupancy, instead of the provision of full property rights, can expedite housing improvement. By integrating a survey analysis and the case study of a slum in Pune, the third essay reveals how slum dwellers form beliefs about their rights to develop housing and how these beliefs significantly influence their housing investment decisions. In addition, the study illuminates the complexity in the relationship of (il)legality and politics in urban India, and how this politico-legal interaction affects tenure security and housing conditions in slums.