Adaptability of the built environment of informal settlements to increase climate resilience in Dhaka, Bangladesh

Abstract

Informal settlements in Dhaka, like many other contexts of the Global South, develop through asset-accumulation. Households heavily invest in housing when they first arrive at the settlement and accumulate other types of capital, both for production and consumption purposes. Across time, education and financial capital increase; in the meantime, community social capital remains an influential asset for development. However, asset-ownership among different groups within low-income households living in these informal settlements varies depending on the existing power-relations. These variations are reflected by how landowners develop housing and informal settlements to rent out, how house-owners construct and reconstruct houses and infrastructure in a squatter settlement, and how renters cope with hazards doing minor modifications within their living spaces. Adaptability and transformability of the built environment-the buildings, streets and infrastructure as well the people acting on them-are influenced by the complex power-relations based on asset-ownerships. This chapter builds on the argument that spatial injustice produces uneven power-relations, which in turn lead to asset differentials which affect adaptability and transformability (i.e. resilience to climate change) which thus produces environmental injustice-thus a vicious cycle. Using examples from different informal settlements in Dhaka in the backdrop of accelerating climate hazards of increased heat and water-logging from intense rainfall, this chapter examines the differential power-relations between city planners and residents of informal settlements; houseowners and renters; along with female and male members of the households in building resilience in their built environment. The exploration traces the process and outcome of different types of development as well as the accountability and participation of different actors. The findings indicate that resilience itself can be ‘unevenly distributed’ with societies and also across space, especially at the neighbourhood and household levels, and the inequalities in accessing different physical, financial and social assets are key determinants of ensuring environmental justice.