Urban Governance and Disease Outbreaks: Cholera in Harare and Ebola in Monrovia

Abstract

Both the cholera outbreak in Harare (2008–2009) and the Ebola outbreak in Monrovia (2014–2016) spread rapidly through informal settlements that make up much of the urban fabric of these two cities. These outbreaks occurred in the context of increasing precarity of the urban poor, resulting from forced displacement, and provoked by contestation over economically and politically strategic urban spaces. Despite this, only in Harare has the disease outbreak been linked to urban governance, while the Ebola outbreak in Monrovia has yet to be conceptualised with reference to urban governance. This chapter argues that the origin of the disease itself, differences in local government structures, and the framing of the outbreak by the international community all shaped how urban governance has been considered in these two outbreaks. The chapter draws attention to how urban policies shape disease outbreaks, regardless of whether such outbreaks are explicitly politicised.