Institutions, organisations and the urban built environment: Facilitative interaction as a developmental mechanism in extra-legal settlements in Zambia

This paper investigated the phenomenon whereby settlements with ostensibly similar socioeconomic status exhibited significantly different physical outcomes, such as in the quality of houses, spatial arrangements and available services. Its specific objective was to examine the relationship between formal and informal institutions and organisations in the production of the built environment. Corresponding to this objective was a hypothesis that situations of extra-legal property rights require State mechanisms in the production of the built environment. Using a theoretical, conceptual and analytical framework provided by the new institutional economics, the study employed the comparative institutional analysis methodology to determine the influence of three types of property rights on the production of the built environment in Zambia. These rights were then used for the categorisation of three settlements, i.e. informal, semi-legal and legalised, in order to examine the interaction of formal and informal systems. Mindolo North, Chipata and Ipusukilo, were selected as the three case study settlements in the city of Kitwe Zambia, respectively. Empirical data were collected using household survey, focus group discussions, semi-structured interviews and observations. Empirical evidence supports the assertion that where property rights are extra-legal or informal, successful development requires that there be facilitative interaction between formal institutions of the State at one hand, and informal institutions and organisations at the other.