The word &ldquo;forced&rdquo; connotes coercing someone to do something against their will. Due to the fact that the constitution opposes the compulsion of any person or group from doing something under coercion or without consent, other, more socially acceptable terms have been utilized to legitimize policies that are &ldquo;forced.&rdquo;
Accordingly, forced evictions have become synonymous to new urban development, city upgrading, and the construction of financial and business centers in Egypt. Describing urban development efforts as such is not a crime, per se; yet, when executed upon the remains of displaced communities without their consent, they become forced evictions.
This commentary attempts to analyze shifts in urban policies in Cairo during the last 40 years, while questioning the government&rsquo;s relationship to the people with regard to developing formal and informal areas. One of its key questions is: In what way do decision makers acknowledge resident populations?
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">Theoretical background</h3>
Based on extensive multidisciplinary research and studies, it is highly recommended to move beyond traditional approaches and welcome different applications of urban development. This could be accomplished through the incorporation of greater sensitivity and regard for culture and tradition in urban planning&mdash;an approach that opposes treating the city as if it were a blank map and forcing society to accept uniform models of development.
Moreover, there is an urgent need to better integrate traditional differences between the formal and informal and reconnect urban spaces that have long remained isolated from one another. This can be accomplished through urban policies that are based on equality, while emphasizing that urban development is a flexible, ongoing process that does not yield fixed results.
In this way, urban growth could come in conflict with previously fixated assumptions by planners and decision makers, and can be understood as a series of benchmarks that must be dealt with continuously to reach a deeper understanding of human relationships with urban environments (Petti, 2008).
The question remains, however: Do decision makers in Egypt acknowledge and address these understandings and new principles?
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">Historical context</h3>
Despite the fact that Cairo&rsquo;s vibrancy is a mix of chaos and spontaneity, a character that reflects methods of survival and represents a personal and collective expression for the city, the city&rsquo;s laws conflict with the principle of &ldquo;the right to the city.&rdquo; That is due to the fact that state approaches to spatial organization embody a lack of urban justice.
The informal sector is a dominant force in Cairo&rsquo;s urban character, constituting around 65% of the city&rsquo;s urban environment (GIZ Egypt, 2000). During the mid-1970s, informal regions became a common phenomenon in Cairo, primarily due to economic liberalization policies (Al-Infitah). Since then, the state decreased its intervention in the economy; thus allowing individuals and private companies to operate according to personal interests.
Liberalization policies continued during the 1980s and 1990s with a rise in Gulf investment and pressure from the World Bank, as a condition to paying back state debt. With new investments directed at the capital city, Cairo became the hub for all economic activity and a magnet, attracting swathes of people from Egypt&rsquo;s diverse regions.
However, the city&rsquo;s inability to accommodate the large influx of immigrants triggered the transformation of farm land into small residential buildings, which later transformed into present-day residential towers. With an absence in real intervention, informal regions continued to grow, eventually becoming permanent neighborhoods for the past three decades.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">Between responsibility and profit </h3>
Following Gamal Abdel Nasser&rsquo;s approach to solving Egypt&rsquo;s housing crises, the state built residential blocks&mdash;known as &ldquo;Government Housing Projects&rdquo;&mdash;that were uniform in appearance, size, location, and even color, as an alternative to informal settlements. These units were usually located outside urban borders of the city (e.g. the Othman project located on the Fayoum Desert Road and El-Salam city on Belbeis Desert Road.) Consequently, they failed to establish suitable living conditions for the poor and further enhanced the growth of informal settlements.
During the late 1990s, however, the government&rsquo;s approach shifted from reaping the benefits of its resources to dividing desert land adjacent to Cairo and selling it to citizens and investment companies. This resulted in the founding of new urban communities (NUC), designed solely for the purpose of investment.
Since then, urban planning considered financial returns first and foremost (Sims, 2019). The state then targeted housing 3.6 million residents in new urban communities in 2006; nonetheless, they were only able to attract 700 thousand residents, or a quarter of the target number. In 2017, 11 years after the target was set, the new cities consisted of only 1.3 million residents (Madd Platform, 2015).
In essence, the new housing projects targeted high and upper middle-income segments of the society, constituting around 89% of residents, while middle-income households represent only six percent and low-income households another five percent. Ironically, it became a parallel model to the informal paradigm, equivalent in pace but opposite in nature. Currently, the New Administrative Capital of Egypt is being built on the same basis as the NUCs, in terms of investment and administration.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">What happens to the heart of Cairo?</h3>
In 2008, Dr. Mustafa Madbouly, the current Prime Minister of Egypt (Ex-Chairman, General Authority for Urban Planning) presented the &ldquo;Cairo 2050&rdquo; project, which aimed to transform the heart of Cairo into a financial and business center. From 2008 to 2011, a diverse group of experts opposed this project on the grounds that it would replace Cairo&rsquo;s identity and sacrifice social values. Their efforts culminated in the project&rsquo;s delay due to the 2011 revolution; yet, in 2014, the Ministry of Housing entrusted Dr. Madbouly to proceed with the project&rsquo;s implementation.
Figure 1:&nbsp;Cairo 2050 project plans for the regions of Maspero, Gazirat Waraq, and Imbaba Corniche
<img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="https://api-aps.aucegypt.edu/uploads/tinymce/1638727166imagePicture1.png" alt="" width="450" height="311">
&nbsp;Source: official image from the general authority for urban planning, 2008
Therefore, the Informal Settlements Development Fund (ISDF) was established to identify informal regions and categorize areas deemed unsafe using the following standards:
Level 1: Regions threatened by natural elements, such as informal settlements located on flood water passageways or under a mountain threatened by an imminent landslide. These settlements are usually demolished and residents displaced elsewhere.
Level 2: Regions with more than 50% of its buildings either dilapidated or neglected. They, too, are usually demolished and their residents re-housed in other areas or in the same area after it has been properly developed.
Level 3: Regions located adjacent to health hazards--under overhead transmission lines or adjacent to factories. They undergo redevelopment that is appropriate to the area.
Level 4: Regions where tenure security issues exist. They, too, are redeveloped by local authorities however they see fit.
According to the ISDF&rsquo;s 2013 report, the governorates of Cairo and Giza included 90 regions deemed unsafe (the first level included 14 regions, the second 65, the third 10, and the fourth one). Out of all four, the second category necessitates precise expert evaluation, as well as complicated working methodologies.
Nonetheless, interviews with evaluators of the Maspero region from the ISDF and Cairo and Giza governorate offices, proved they were not necessarily construction experts. Evidently, the photographs below portray four clearly distinct regions classified under the second category, making it even more difficult to trust published evaluations and classifications.
Figure 2:&nbsp;Distinct regions classified under the second category
<img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="https://api-aps.aucegypt.edu/uploads/tinymce/1638727209image23.png" alt="" width="450" height="350">
Source: Madd Platform and the Informal Settlements Development Fund
Another alarming observation indicated that the second level represented 72% of Cairo and Giza&rsquo;s total number of unsafe regions. Most of these regions are located either in the heart of or adjacent to historical neighborhoods. Given the law allows for the demolishment of regions deemed as unsafe, Cairo is, thus, threatened by the loss of its historic heritage.
Losing the Maspero neighborhood, which was considered part of historic Cairo (UNESCO), the residents were compensated through three options: sums of money, housing units in the Asmarat Project, or a housing unit in the same region after its redevelopment.
Approximately 80% of the population requested to be compensated by means of the suggested sum of money-60 thousand Egyptian pounds per family. Around 12% preferred new apartments in the Asmarat Compound, while the remaining eight percent insisted on returning to their home region after it was developed (Maspero Residents Association for the Defense of Land and Housing). Since strict stipulations on the treatment of redeveloped housing units are absent, it is expected that the new units will eventually be sold to reap the benefits of the new real estate value following their development.&nbsp;
<img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="https://api-aps.aucegypt.edu/uploads/tinymce/1638727269image24.png" alt="" width="450" height="225">
&nbsp;Source: Google earth, 2015 and 2018
Other regions, such as the Arab al-Yasar neighborhood, deemed by UNESCO a world heritage site within historical Cairo, are being prepared to meet the same fate as Maspero. Sections of the neighborhood have already been demolished and the affected population have either been financially compensated or provided housing units in the Asmarat Project.
Gazirat El-Waraq also continues to face state recalcitrance and insistence on demolishing sections of the neighborhood. Due to these policies, a crisis of trust exists between the state and the people, who claim that state interventions are for the sole purpose of demolishment and preparation for gulf investment projects.
The region of Nazlat Alsaman has also witnessed similar attempts, resulting in a conflict with the area&rsquo;s population that has resulted in injuries and the arrest of a number of residents.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">Conclusion</h3>
In 2017, the Cairo 2050 plan was supported by a presidential decree launching the &ldquo;Egypt without Slums 2019&rdquo; project, which aims to re-house populations within unsafe regions. Despite the fact that more than 320 regions are nationally classified as unsafe under the first two categories mentioned above (Informal Settlements Development Fund reports for Cairo and Giza, 2014), no intervention has taken place yet. This, in turn, raises people&rsquo;s concerns regarding inconsiderate evacuation methods and the absence of any form of negotiation.
In addition to that, another worrisome questions lingers: what could possibly replace people&rsquo;s lost homes and national history? Most of the plans proposed for the neighborhoods at the heart of Cairo aim to establish investment projects and financial and business centers. This is, in practice, a strategic conflict between the vision of the new administrative capital and the vision of developing the heart of Cairo.
In this way, the state is creating two regions competing for the same goal, which could possibly weaken both sides. More so, where should investors direct their funding? In the new capital or in the commercial heart of Cairo? While this may seem as a highly pessimistic view of Cairo&rsquo;s future, or a conceptualization of Cairo as a prime location for post-apocalyptic movies, the state could consider developing inclusive, socially just strategies to build a more optimistic future for the country. Nonetheless, the current process is not promising and must be re-evaluated before it becomes too late.
<hr>
References
<ul>
<li>
Petti, A. (2008). Post-It City Project. CCCB and Direcci&oacute; de Comunicaci&oacute; de la Diputaci&oacute; de Barcelona. 
</li>
<li style="font-size: 10pt;">
Sims, D. (2019, March 31). Alternative Policy Solutions Public Lecture: The Distorting Luxury of Infinite Space: Egypt&rsquo;s New Capital, New Cities, and New Industrial Areas. American University in Cairo. ‬‬
</li>
<li style="font-size: 10pt;">
Madd Platform. (2015). Maspero Parallel Participatory Project. Friedrich Ebert Foundation. Retrieved from <a href="https://issuu.com/maddplatform/docs/maspero_parallel_participatory_proj">https://issuu.com/maddplatform/docs/maspero_parallel_participatory_proj</a>. 
</li>
</ul>

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