Environmental management and urban development in the Third World: A tale of health, wealth and the pursuit of pollution from four cities in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America

Environmentalists, both academics and practitioners, tend to deal with intergenerational problems of a global and rural nature, often neglecting the immediate environmental conditions that especially affect the current generation of urban poor. Much of the writings and actions of urbanists focus on the economic and political dynamics of cities, with little attention to the environmental dimension of urban development. Thus, the terrain at the nexus of environmental management and urban development has not been fully explored.;In order to intellectually provision an expedition into this territory, several guiding themes were derived from the fields of economic development, ecology, governance, and sustainable development. These themes were used to design a methodology for rapid urban environmental assessment, and a research expedition was mounted to cities in developing countries on four continents: Accra (Ghana), Jakarta (Indonesia), Katowice (Poland), and Sao Paulo (Brazil). A wealth of comparative information was developed from environmental indicator questionnaires, urban environmental profiles, and environmental town meetings to answer the following research question: how can strategies be formulated for managing urban environmental problems to enhance the economic productivity, health and ecology of Third World cities?;Conclusions stemming from analysis of this information were that: (1) enhanced public awareness, consultation and participation can improve environmental management; (2) solutions that are not heavily dependent on institutional performance may be necessary in the short run; (3) urban environmental strategies should have an explicit focus on the problems of the poor; (4) city-specific strategies should be guided by the configuration of key economic variables; and (5) careful attention must be paid to the selection of problem areas, their spatial scale, and institutional capacity when designing interventions.;Criteria for assessing and designing effective approaches to urban environmental management were developed, combining theoretical themes with these research findings. No existing modus operandi for addressing Third World urban environmental problems fulfill the criteria. To remedy this, an initial process for urban environmental management is proposed, consisting of rapid urban environmental assessment, a city-based environmental management strategy, and an urban environmental action plan.