Sometimes I think the shack was better : examining flood-risk in subsidised housing areas in Cape Town.
Doctoral Thesis
2013
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University of Cape Town
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This thesis examines the extent, nature and impact of flooding in informal and subsidised housing areas on the Cape Flats. Drawing on constructivist arguments regarding the subjectivity of risk as a concept, I examine how flooding and risk are conceptualised locally and internationally, and how well these framings compare with people's experiences in subsidised housing areas in Cape Town. I show that flooding remains a significant challenge in subsidised housing areas. Flood-risk has a strong built environment component; the very dwellings that should help to improve people's lives serve instead to transform and perpetuate risk, undermining the developmental objectives of the housing programme. In so doing, I interrogate assumptions about risk, hazard and vulnerability, and the lessons for theory and practice.
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Pharoah, R. 2013. Sometimes I think the shack was better : examining flood-risk in subsidised housing areas in Cape Town. University of Cape Town.