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A full list of STWR's publications as well as related news, articles and blogs can be found below. You can filter the content using the 'category' or 'topics' links in the menu on the left. 

The seven myths of ‘slums’ - myth 2: the poor are to blame

Report / 8th December 2010

The deep-seated myth that the poor are to blame for their conditions of poverty echoes back to the earliest days of industrialisation in Western Europe. With a perverse inversion of cause and effect, the prevalence of extreme urban poverty and slum settlements is blamed...

The seven myths of ‘slums’ - myth 3: slums are places of crime, violence and social degradation

Report / 8th December 2010

A corollary of the myth that the poor are to blame for their poverty is the widespread prejudice against slums as places of social degradation and despair, and against slum residents as perpetrators of violence and crime...

The seven myths of ‘slums’ - myth 4: slums are an inevitable stage of development

Report / 8th December 2010

There is an underlying assumption to much of the debate surrounding slums and urban poverty: that the urban poor will get to our standard of living eventually, and countries of the South will rise to the same level of material affluence as the industrialised North, just so long as...

The seven myths of ‘slums’ - Myth 5: the free market can end slums

Report / 8th December 2010

According to the international institutions and powerful states that drive globalisation (along with most of the business community, conservative political parties, libertarian ideologues and the corporate-controlled media that gives voice to their concerns), we are told that social injustice can only be addressed by the proper application of some version of free market capitalism...

The seven myths of ‘slums’ - myth 6: international aid is the answer

Report / 8th December 2010

Never in the history of cities have there been so many projects for improving slums and the living conditions of the urban poor by international aid agencies, development banks and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). But just as state policies have failed to meet the needs of the urban poor in most low- and middle-income countries...