Negotiating the city: Urban planning and dwelling amidst China-built infrastructure in Nairobi, Kenya

中国主导的基础设施项目促进了撒哈拉以南非洲地区的快速城市化，但非洲城市的发展仍存在争议。在肯尼亚内罗毕，中国对住房和相关基础设施的大规模融资，从根本上推动了城市规划和居住的新方式，往往是以城市贫困人口的利益为代价的。这些大型项目涉及贫民窟清理、城市搬迁和新的居住形式——高层生活和封闭式社区——这些正在改变城市的社会结构，并进一步加剧现有的社会不平等。为了将这些城市转型理论化，该项目从民族志上调查了内罗毕规划和居住新实践的相互作用。这项研究的目的有两个：1)评估中国的基础设施项目和专业知识如何在内罗毕产生新的城市治理模式；2)展示城市居民如何根据他们的居住实践、未来愿望和发展愿景来支持、挪用或更确切地说，是对这些模式的质疑，同时评估新兴的动员可能性。为了实现这些目标，我将分两个阶段进行为期6个月的民族志田野调查。我将首先对基础设施的制度性“生产者”进行半结构化访谈：中国的资助者、开发商、承包商、建筑工人和地方政府的规划者；其次，我将对基础设施的“使用者”——受发展项目影响的城市基层居民进行参与性观察和访谈。通过辩证地调查跨分析尺度的城市谈判，这种跨学科的民族志研究有助于城市地理学和基础设施人类学。这项研究的成果包括在顶级同行评议期刊上发表的两篇文章，一本专著和一部简短的纪录片，这将扩大我对非学术受众的影响。

China-led infrastructural projects have fostered the rapid urbanisation of Sub-Saharan Africa, yet the development of African cities remains contested. In Nairobi, Kenya, China's massive financing of housing and connective infrastructure is radically propelling new ways of planning and dwelling in the city, often at the expense of the urban poor. These mega projects involve slum clearance, urban relocation, and new forms of habitation - high-rise living and gated communities - which are transforming the social fabric of the city and furthering existing social inequality. To theorise these urban transformations the project ethnographically investigates the interplay of new practices of planning and dwelling in Nairobi.The aims of the study are twofold: 1) Assessing how Chinese infrastructural projects and expertise are producing new models of urban governance in Nairobi. 2) Showing how city dwellers are espousing, appropriating, or rather contesting these models according to their dwelling practices, future aspirations, and visions of development, while assessing emerging possibilities of mobilisation. To achieve these objectives, I will conduct a total of 6 months of ethnographic fieldwork in two phases. I will first conduct semistructured interviews with the institutional 'producers' of infrastructure: Chinese funders, developers, contractors, construction workers, and planners in the local government; second, I will conduct participant observation and interviews among the 'users' of infrastructure: city dwellers who have been affected by development projects at the grassroots. By dialectically investigating the negotiations of the city across scales of analysis, this interdisciplinary, ethnographic study contributes to urban geography and the anthropology of infrastructure. Outcomes from this research include two articles in top peer-reviewed journals, a monograph, and a short documentary, which will extend my outreach to a non-academic audience.