Social Capital for Synergic Partnership: Development of poor localities in urban Ethiopia

Contemporary trends of urbanization in developing countries illustrate a distinctive depiction compared to earlier process in developed countries (Evers and Korff 2000; Gulger 1988; Gulger 1996; Little 1974). Industrialization and economic growth are almost always accompanied by urbanization (Davis 1965; World Bank 2000). However, urbanization in developing regions is a phenomenon, ascribed by a low level of economic development contradictory to the case of accelerated urbanization that began in Western Europe and North America. In some part of the world and particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, cities have been growing without a concomitant expansion of economic activity. The process of urbanization in Africa is mostly embedded on the migration trend, which is rapid and greater in volume. Consequently, its obstructive consequences are higher than those of industrial countries at the time they were rapidly urbanized (Hardiman and Midley 1989; UN-HABITAT 2003b).