Life and Livelihood, on the Street

Abstract

��� n a series of moves that are having grave consequences for the poor and working class, governments across the globe are going after some of the most dedicated and hardest-working citizens I have come across—urban street vendors. Politicians in two leading Indian cities, Mumbai and Chennai, have vowed to wage war against hawkers, pressing forward with laws that would restrict who can sell on the streets and where they can locate their stalls. These proposals have drawn sharp criticism from Ajay Maken, India’s Minister for Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation. 1 In Guangzhou, China, municipal authorities have repeatedly set loose the chengguan—a squad of violent city control agents—on people who do business on the street. In March 2013, this created a brawl when one of the officers was photographed battering a female vendor in front of her young daughter. 2 In Sao Paulo, Brazil’s largest city, the mayor has declared war on camelos—unlicensed itinerant vendors—repealing a 15-year-old decree that had granted them space in the city and muscling them away from some of their most vigorous and historic markets. 3 In Lagos, Nigeria, sub-Saharan Africa’s chaotic megacity, the state government has criminalized street vending and taken bulldozers and axes to centrally located street markets and squatter communities. 4