Introduction

Informal modes of earning a living are expanding rapidly in cities in Africa and beyond. This has its most evident physical expression in the vast unplanned settlements in the peripheries of cities. But a large number of urban residents also daily invade central areas of the city and operate in its interstices in the pursuit of their livelihoods. Their growing numbers are often understood as a problem by many city authorities. Concerned with projecting an image of a modern and orderly city and influenced by ideals of ‘cityness’ circulating internationally, urban authorities in many cities feel urged to deal with what they consider a growing menace. This chapter illustrates how authorities in Nairobi intervened to ‘clean up’ the city centre from undesirable informal actors through the creation of a hawkers market and a ban on communal minibus traffic. It uncovers the disciplinary technologies deployed in an attempt to govern these ‘unruly’ populations as well as the ways in which vendors resisted and engaged with these interventions.

Expanding urban informality has often been seen as a sign of urban involution, an abnormal form of urbanism whose dark future will only lead to further decay and abjection (see Davis 2004). In contrast to such dystopian views, a growing and diverse body of work distances itself from such doomsday interpretations and provides more positive readings of urban informality. James Holston (2008) depicts informal housing areas in the peripheries of São Paulo as sites of an emerging insurgent citizenship.