Karachi: The Land Issue

by Arif Hasan, Noman Ahmed, Mansoor Raza

Karachi is one of the fastest growing cities in the world. It is Pakistan's only port and the major contributor to the country's economy. In addition, it is also a diverse city, with its population politically divided along ethnic lines. These three factors make urban land and that on the city
fringe, a highly contested commodity around which federal, provincial, and local landowning agencies; corporate sector interests; formal and informal developers; international capital and military cantonments, compete for control and for extracting maximum value from it. The victims of this battle
for turf and profits are the city's social and physical environment and its low and lower middle-income groups.

This book deals with the history, evolution, and present day realities around who owns land; its legal and illegal acquisition, land-use conversions and development; the actors involved and their relationship with each other and with the public at large; the often violent conflicts that take place
in this process and the measures that can be taken to regulate the land market for the creation of a better urban environment and for providing homes to its less privileged.

Genres: Pakistan

380 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2015

Reviews

[Colin · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a book written by six authors, and it shows in terms of structure and organization. There is not a lot here that you won't also find in other accounts on Karachi (including some articles previously published by the authors), but the book does include extensive annexes and maps in which field research for the book (largely conducted in 2011) appears to be reproduced largely in raw form. The book is (I think probably deliberately) oblique in some of its discussion of the role of specific political actors like the MQM and the military cantonments in the land markets (although they are discussed to some extent), but it does provide some insight into the multitude of competing land authorities and the means through which land is apportioned in the city (there is a fair amount of detail on the various legal regimes, but the book also fairly effectively makes the case that none of that actually matters in practice). I found the discussions of (very limited) housing finance and the revenue incentives that caused the 2001 - 2009 local government bodies to champion various development projects the most interesting points of the book, but they weren't developed at length or given a particularly coherent place in a larger plan. Might come back to the book as a reference in the future, but on the whole I found this an unsatisfying treatment for such a critical aspect of Karachi's political and economic system.

[Haider Hussain · Rating 3 out of 5]

An informative and perhaps the first of its kind book on the issue of land in one of the most populous cities in the world. With its seaports and financial centre, Karachi is the economic hub of Pakistan. For the past many years, Karachi has been expending both vertically and horizontally in order to accommodate more than 23 million population. However, the city seriously lacks urban planning and land development due to the presence of multiple landowning agencies and their overlapping functions, land mafias, and constant tussle between different layers of governments. Although the contents are not exhaustive and it’s more like a reference book, it does provide a starting point for further case studies.