Migration, Urbanisation and Conflict in Africa (MUCA)

Africa, the world's least urbanised region, is experiencing the fastest rates of urban growth on the globe. Although partly a consequence of natural population increase and reclassification of previously rural areas as urban, in many cities in-migration constitutes the dominant source of urbanisation. While this trend has potential to contribute to economic growth and dynamism, rapid urban population growth can leave already overstretched municipal authorities unable to catch up, leading to massive failures in infrastructure and service provision, proper tenure documentation, and regulated settlement patterns. Africa's urban dwellers are increasingly vulnerable to risks relating to demographic pressure, impacts of climate and environmental change, and social, economic and political hazards. A significant proportion of Africa's urbanites are likely to settle in slums, with uncertain property rights and public services, and will struggle to secure a decent life in contexts of few employment opportunities. All too often these processes also produce increasing social tension, conflict and violence. These dynamics have direct and wide-ranging ramifications for the delivery of SDGs, most notably in terms of keeping up with service delivery demands and providing decent, well-paid jobs to a rapidly increasing urban population (SDG 8). This potentially translates into increasing vertical inequality (SDG 10), as well as difficulties in building sustainable cities (SDG 11) and ensuring peace, justice and the rule of law (SDG 16). Yet despite the widespread consensus that urban sustainability and inclusion are now crucial for future stability and wellbeing in most African countries, the ways in which migration feeds into current urban challenges is poorly understood. Urban in-migration has complex and contradictory consequences in contemporary Africa, and is all too often associated with 'crisis narratives' and disorder in the absence of an adequate knowledge base on when and how migration leads to conflict. Some existing research has explored changing rural-urban migration dynamics, while other research examines the rise in different forms of urban violence - but very little research has explored the crucial inter-relationships between all three phenomena (urbanisation, migration and violent conflict) in a sustained and comparative way. These relationships are however only like to rise in importance in the context of population growth, increased pressure on land, and displacement related to climate change. MUCA will address this gap, providing an evidence base to facilitate a better understanding of the conditions under which migration combines with other factors to worsen urban conflict - or indeed to alleviate it. This will be pursued through a structured comparative research design that involves nine cities covering three very different kinds of migration-affected cities spread across the three research countries of Ethiopia, Nigeria and Uganda. These countries are chosen to offer a spread of Eastern and Western African cases and different legacies of conflict and population movement. The three city types are i) large 'primate' cities affected by competition over high value land, high ethnic diversity and conflict over lucrative resources in the informal economy; ii) secondary cities affected by major industrial investments (historically or more recently) that are seeing new forms of in-migration and conflict relating to tensions around employment, land, and service delivery; and iii) cities experiencing a major influx of people displaced by regional or international conflicts. Through an exploration of the migration-conflict-urbanisation nexus in these cities, guided by the aims and objectives set out in the section on 'objectives', MUCA will provide evidence for development agencies, urban planners, and policy makers to build a more peaceful urban Africa in the years to come.