World Bank and Urban Development: From Projects to Policy

by Ramsamy; Edward

• ISBN13: 9780415344395
• ISBN10: 0415344395
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-07-25
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

This significant text examines the factors, both internal and external to, the World Bank that have influenced its urban development agenda. It explores how the bank become involved in urban lending, how it fashioned its ideas into projects and programmes and how it translated these into specific policies. It expertly uses the case of Zimbabwe to illustrate the complex relationships between the banks urban division and the various national and sub-national actors in framing an appropriate urban policy. Arguing that the establishment of the bank's urban division and shifts in its urban agendas ought to be viewed as symbiotic with geopolitical and intellectual strands, it also demonstrates that while shifts in the banks urban policy have important consequences of domestic agendas, it is incorrect to view the bank as an agent of domination. This book is undoubtedly essential reading for those involved in the areas of urban studies and development studies.

Author Biography

Edward Ramsamy is Assistant Professor of Africana Studies at Rutgers University.

Table of Contents

List of figures	x
List of tables	xi
Acknowledgements	xii
Abbreviations	xvi
Introduction	1	(4)
Theorizing the World Bank and development	5	(31)
Toward social lending: shifts in the World Bank's development thinking	36	(31)
The search for an urban agenda at the World Bank	67	(31)
The fall of poverty alleviation: the politics of urban lending at the World Bank	98	(27)
Beyond global and local: a critical analysis of the World Bank and urban development in Zimbabwe	125	(45)
Globalization, neo-liberalism, and the politics of the World Bank's current urban agenda	170	(15)
Conclusion	185	(7)
Notes	192	(11)
Bibliography	203	(17)
Index	220