International audienceThe multiscalar challenges associated with urban energy policies are the cause of extensive interaction among multiple levels of government and social forces. However, these multilevel systems of action tend to reflect complex and unstable power and resistance patterns rather than stable co-operation processes. Thus, in this paper, a multilevel governance perspective is used as a starting point for understanding where and how multilevel interactions arise in an energy system as well as which issues are creating political conflict and the related consequences for the governance of urban energy policies. This approach is illustrated through a case study of Cape Town, which exemplifies a situation of conflicting policy and agendas at different levels of government, thus creating a great dispersion of initiatives across different scales. Integrating these initiatives within a broader coherent framework, however, is not only a technical matter. As urban energy policies deal with multilevel issues, they imply negotiating dynamic and complex compromises between different types of organisations and authorities while shaping their governance is also a matter of politics
This paper reviews the reforms that have directly and indirectly affected water services in urban areas in sub-Saharan Africa over the last two decades and discusses the difficulties of reconciling a commitment to universal provision with a market-oriented approach where all those served must pay full costs. It then describes the measures that have been taken that seek to reconcile these, including different forms of "user participation" and greater reliance on informal reselling of water to improve provision to low-income households. This demonstrates how most "participation" is about transferring costs from water companies to low-income households. It also highlights how relying on informal resellers may constrain the extension of better-quality services to low-income neighbourhoods and how community-based schemes fail to raise the capital needed to extend water mains to unserved peripheries. Whilst many participatory schemes can, under certain conditions, help towards the aim of ensuring wider access to water, they are in no way a miracle solution and there is a considerable risk of institutionalizing two-tier services which lock low-income groups into more inconvenient, poorquality services.
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