The use of IT in scaling up urban slum improvement efforts

Urban slum areas are rapidly expanding throughout the developing world. Many cities are increasing their efforts on upgrading of these areas with strong encouragement and support from developing agencies. Upgrading in the first instance entails the provision of vital water supply, sanitation services, drainage and roads, coupled with a form of secure tenure. Increasingly, programmes include creation of job opportunities and widespread social services. Successes are noted at the project scale, but meeting the scale of the demand has been elusive. Scaling up efforts in order to have an appreciable impact on the ever-growing problem has become the watchword among development agencies. The Cities Alliance—a global programme initiated by the World Bank and UN-Habitat—has made upgrading one of its main target areas. The World Bank itself has upgrading investments as a central thrust of the new urban strategy. Other development agencies, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and many cities also focus increased resources on upgrading. Many conceptualise that information technology (IT) may offer a tool to radically change the face of development. Perhaps upgrading might also benefit from IT, which could provide the impetus for rethinking and restructuring large-scale programmes. How this may be done and what this would entail is currently being explored and new approaches and best practices are gradually emerging. This paper gathers issues that came out of an international conference on large-scale upgrading as a starting point for thinking about IT use. A map explores the various combinations of linking individuals/communities/cities to each other and the internet, and a ‘metaphorical model’ is suggested as the interface at the community level. The paper concludes by considering the practical issues that IT centres would need to address for long-term viability.