A feasible policy instrument for Informal Settlement Upgrading in South Africa?

My PhD examines the role of planning instruments in the lack of efficacy in transforming the apartheid spatial structure. This presentation focuses on my third case study of the PhD, the implementation of the 2004 national Informal Settlement Upgrading Program (UISP) policy instrument, in the City of Johannesburg. The research indicates a need to reconceptualise how we view informal settlements and thereby the current instrument for upgrading them. Alternative approaches need to be based on a continuous pragmatic management approach as opposed to an unrealistic linear project-based approach resulting in some sort of imagined ‘formalised suburb’. The presentation will explore some of the reasons for this need to change approach and some of the alternatives.