Visions of the City: Accra in the 21st Century, and: Landlords and Lodgers: Socio-Spatial Organization in an Accra Community (review)

These two books take diametrically opposite approaches to the study of Accra. Unfortunately, neither yields a satisfactory understanding of the city and its people, although each contains some interesting material. Visions of the City: Accra in the 21st Century attempts to take a broad overview of the city, but, as a collection of conference proceedings, much of it is overly general and some is not even about Accra. At the other extreme, Landlords and Lodgers: Socio-spatial Organization in an Accra Community is filled with minute details about one specific section of Accra but lacks sufficient analysis for a portrait of either that community or the larger city.

Visions of the City consists of papers presented at an international seminar organized by the Ghana Institute of Architects and the Goethe Institute in Accra in 2000. The seminar had as its major theme the question of what the city of Accra would be like in the twenty-first century and the challenges that it would face. One of the goals of the conference organizers was to consider Accra in relation to other world cities; hence, a number of the papers are on related issues in other world regions. Most of the papers use perspectives drawn from city planning on topics such as housing, urban renewal, and sanitary facilities.

Of the fourteen papers in the volume, only nine focus primarily or exclusively on Accra. The other five include two on German cities, one on South Africa, one on African cities in general, and one broad theoretical discussion that constructs a typology of cities. While a typology could contribute to an understanding of African cities, this particular one, by the urban anthropologist Setha Low, is not as useful as those that have been developed by others (see, e.g., Anthony O'Connor's work). Similarly, Ronald Wall's contribution on African cities is so general that it contributes little that is new. Two of the papers in the section on civic participation focus on Germany, but given the importance of participation in current approaches to planning and development, it is unfortunate that the specific relevance of the German activities for Accra is not discussed.

Of the nine papers that do consider Accra, several contain useful data on topics such as population growth, housing, and poverty. Yet the discussion is still very general and uninformative, such as a statement that "the informal sector has become a major employer in the city" (45). On the other hand, a few of the contributions do provide new data and/or insights. For example, H. N. A. Wellington includes a brief and informative description of the history of Accra's development, while Alf Bremer provides a discussion of Ga Mashie, one of the city's oldest and poorest sections, and presents some interesting proposals for restoration of housing and training of young people. Deborah Pellow's paper, "And a Toilet for Everyone," concludes the volume with the question, "What does it take to get a toilet in Accra? Surely the fulfillment of this very basic right," she says, "should be a priority for the early 21st century" (143).

No doubt the existence of toilets is important, in Accra and elsewhere. Yet I would have liked to see discussion of other subjects that are central to the social and economic life of the people of Accra. For example, there is no examination of markets. Finally, the book has just a few maps, and these are of poor quality.

In contrast to Visions of the City, Pellow's Landlords and Lodgers is based on many years of anthropological research in one...