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[thèse] Alix Chaplain, Désintégration sociotechnique et territoriale au Liban. Le cas de l’électricité

Alix Chaplain soutiendra sa thèse de doctorat en études urbaines, Désintégration sociotechnique et territoriale au Liban. Le cas de l’électricité, préparée sous la direction d’Éric Verdeil, le 14 décembre 2023. Cette thèse a bénéficié du financement de l’Agence nationale de la recherche dans le cadre du projet Hybridelec.

Jury : Marco Cremaschi, Sciences Po; Mona Harb, Université américaine de Beyrouth (rapportrice) ; Sylvy Jaglin, Université Gustave Eiffel ; Francesca Pilo’, Université d’Utrecht ; Sébastien Velut, Université Paris 3-Sorbonne Nouvelle (rapporteur).

Résumé (english below)

Depuis plus de trente ans, le quotidien des Libanais est rythmé par des coupures d’électricité, qui faute des réformes et investissements nécessaires dans les infrastructures publiques, ne cessent de s’aggraver. Jusqu’en 2021, l’opérateur national Électricité du Liban (EDL), impose un rationnement allant de 3 à 12 heures par jour selon les localités, et atteignant depuis des pics de 22 heures. Le réseau public est pourtant présent sur plus de 99% du territoire national, mais EDL ne s’est jamais totalement relevé de la guerre civile, et sa capacité de production d’électricité est bien inférieure à la demande. Loin d’être passifs face à cette situation, les Libanais mobilisent des dispositifs diversifiés d’approvisionnement pour sécuriser leur fourniture d’électricité en complément du réseau public intermittent. Dès la fin de la guerre civile, l’usage individuel et solidaire du générateur diesel se développe, pour ensuite devenir l’objet d’un commerce lucratif, des opérateurs privés de mini-réseaux fournissant des abonnements mensuels d’électricité. En parallèle, depuis une dizaine d’années, les consommateurs investissent dans des dispositifs photovoltaïques en complément du générateur. Dans ce contexte, le réseau conventionnel n’est plus le mode dominant de fourniture : usagers et fournisseurs développent des modèles diversifiés, et de plus en plus complexes, pour pallier les coupures d’EDL et optimiser leur accès à l’électricité.

Le point de départ de cette recherche est donc celui d’une hétérogénéisation structurelle des pratiques, des acteurs, et des dispositifs d’accès à l’électricité au Liban. Or, non seulement cette diversité coexiste avec le réseau, mais elle transforme son système sociotechnique. Ce processus est caractérisé dans ce travail par le concept d’« hybridation », qualifiant les interactions et les interdépendances croissantes entre une diversité de dispositifs sociotechniques et le réseau conventionnel. En croisant la littérature des Science and Technology Studies (STS), de l’écologie politique urbaine, et un corpus de travaux sur la politisation des infrastructures au Liban, la thèse démontre que les hybridations électriques sont façonnées par deux principales variables. D’un côté, en articulant différents dispositifs sociotechniques (générateurs, batteries, panneaux solaires), et en modulant leur relation avec le réseau conventionnel, les usagers régulent les interdépendances entre ces systèmes diversifiés. De l’autre, différents acteurs ayant leurs propres objectifs et rationalités instrumentalisent les dispositifs électriques à des fins politiques, selon des modalités et échelles différenciées.

Ces arrangements sociotechniques et politico-territoriaux contribuent à différencier les conditions d’accès à l’électricité, et à aggraver les inégalités entre des usagers multi-connectés, car disposant de ressources politiques, économiques, sociales, territoriales, etc., et les autres consommateurs, dépourvus de solutions alternatives au réseau défaillant. Avec un phénomène de dislocation, de fragmentation, et d’atomisation, non régulé des pratiques électriques, dans leur forme actuelle les hybridations mettent en tension les interdépendances et solidarités associées au réseau. Ainsi, à travers le cas du Liban, cette recherche pose une question à l’intersection entre le défi de décarboner les mix électriques et celui de garantir un accès équitable à l’électricité : quelle « transition énergétique » dans un contexte de crise chronique d’électricité ?

Sociotechnical and territorial disintegration in Lebanon. The case of electricity.

PhD supervised by Eric Verdeil, Professeur des universités, IEP de Paris

Abstract

For the past thirty years, the daily lives of the Lebanese people have been punctuated by power cuts, which are continually getting worse in the absence of the necessary reforms and investments in public infrastructure. Until 2021, the national operator, Électricité du Liban (EDL), resorted to rationing from 3 to 12 hours a day depending on the area, reaching peaks of 22 hours. Although the public grid covers more than 99 % of the national territory, EDL has never fully recovered from the civil war, and its electricity production capacity is well below demand. Far from being passive, the Lebanese are mobilising diversified systems to secure their electricity supply to supplement the intermittent public grid. Since the end of the civil war, individual use of diesel generators has been growing, and has become a lucrative business. Private operators of mini-grids provide monthly electricity subscriptions. At the same time, over the last ten years or so, consumers have been investing in photovoltaic systems to supplement their generators. In this context, the conventional grid is no longer the dominant mode of supply: users and suppliers are developing diversified and increasingly complex models to compensate for EDL power cuts and optimise their access to electricity.

The starting point of this research is the structural heterogeneity of practices, actors, and systems for access to electricity in Lebanon. This diversity not only coexists with the grid, but also transforms its socio-technical system. This process is characterised in this research by the concept of ‘hybridisation’, which describes the growing interactions and interdependencies between a diversity of socio-technical devices and the conventional grid. Combining the literature of Science and Technology Studies (STS), urban political ecology, and a body of work on the politicisation of infrastructures in Lebanon, the dissertation demonstrates that electrical hybridisations are shaped by two main variables. On the one hand, by articulating different socio-technical devices (generators, batteries, solar panels), and by modulating their relationship with the conventional grid, users regulate the interdependencies between these diverse systems. On the other hand, various actors with their own objectives and rationales instrumentalise electrical devices for political purposes, in different ways and on different scales. These socio-technical and politico-territorial arrangements contribute to the differentiation of access conditions to electricity and exacerbate inequalities between multi-connected, users who have political, economic, social, and territorial resources, and other consumers, who have no alternative solutions to the failing grid. With the unregulated dislocation, fragmentation and atomisation of electrical practices, hybridisation in its current form is placing a strain on the interdependence and solidarity associated with the national grid. Through the case of Lebanon, this research raises a question at the intersection between the challenge of decarbonising electricity mixes and that of guaranteeing equitable access to electricity: which “energy transition” is possible in a context of chronic electricity crisis?

Transition énergétique dans les économies émergentes : politiques publiques et enjeux urbains

Rencontre entre les équipes des programmes Hybridelec (Hybridations électriques : formes émergentes de la transition énergétique dans les villes du Sud) et  TEChNOPE (Transition énergétique en Chine : Nouvelles Orientations Politiques et Economiques), financés par l’ANR

Date : 25 mars 2022

Lieu : Sciences Po, CERI, 56 rue Jacob 75006 (salle du Conseil, 4ème étage).

Comité d’organisation : Laetitia Guilhot (Université Grenoble-Alpes, Centre de recherche en économie de Grenoble), Eric Verdeil (Sciences Po, Centre de recherches internationales)

Avec l’appui de Alix Chaplain (Sciences Po, Centre de recherches internationales)

Inscription obligatoire auprès d’Alix Chaplain (alix.chaplain at sciencespo.fr). Attention, nombre de places limitées.

9h00 Accueil

9h15 Introduction, par Eric Verdeil et Laetitia Guilhot : présentation succincte des programmes Hybridelec et Technope et des objectifs de la journée

9h30-12h00  Hybridations électriques et politiques de transition en Afrique du Sud et en Inde

Bérénice Girard, Marie-Hélène Zérah : La transition énergétique et les villes en Inde : cadrage national et politiques régionales (Bihar, Haryana)

10h30

Alain Dubresson, Sylvy Jaglin, Transition énergétique en Afrique du Sud et politiques électriques municipales dans la province du Western Cape

12h00 Pause – Pause déjeuner et café

13h30-15h30 Regards sur la transition énergétique en Chine

Lucie Morand, Expérimentations d’une Low Carbon City Pilote de Chine : Stratégie spatiale et programmatique sur un territoire contraint

14h30

Laëtitia Guilhot, André Meunié et Guillaume Pouyanne : Chine : la Longue Marche vers la transition énergétique

15h30-16h00 Discussions finales

Toits solaires à Mossel Bay (Afrique du Sud). Crédit : Alain Dubresson, Sylvy Jaglin

Soutenance de thèse : Emmanuelle Guillou, En réseau – Hors réseau : configurations électriques émergentes dans les aires d’urbanisation diffuse (Sénégal et Tanzanie), 14 janvier 2022

Emmanuelle Guillou soutiendra sa thèse de doctorat en aménagement de l’espace et urbanisme, Université Paris-Est/Laboratoire Techniques Territoires et Sociétés (LATTS) le 14 janvier à 14h, en salle A22 du bâtiment Bienvenüe.

Inscription obligatoire en raison de la situation sanitaire (emmanuelle.guillou_at_enpc.fr). La soutenance sera aussi accessible en visioconférence (par zoom : écrire à Emmanuelle Guillou pour s’inscrire).

Jury :

  • Sylvy Jaglin, Professeure à l‘Université Gustave Eiffel (directrice de thèse)
  • Philippe Lavigne Delville, Directeur de recherches, IRD (examinateur)
  • Luisa Moretto, Professeure à l‘Université Libre de Bruxelles (rapporteure)
  • Pascale Trompette, Directrice de recherches, CNRS, Université Grenoble Alpes (rapporteure)
  • Bruno Valfrey, Président de Hydroconseil (membre invité)
  • Eric Verdeil, Professeur à Sciences Po Paris (examinateur)

Résumé :

Les décennies 1990-2000 ont été marquées, dans de nombreux pays d‘Afrique subsaharienne, par l‘adoption de politiques néolibérales réputées favorables aux objectifs de développement (OMD). Le Sénégal et la Tanzanie ne font pas exception. Dans le secteur de l‘électricité, les faibles taux d‘électrification, d‘une part, l‘incapacité des opérateurs publics à étendre rapidement le réseau conventionnel, d‘autre part, ont conduit leurs gouvernements à engager des réformes institutionnelles caractérisées par la libéralisation du secteur et la création d‘agences dédiées à l‘électrification rurale. D‘abord prérogative des gros opérateurs nationaux ou internationaux, l‘électrification rurale est désormais ouverte à de plus petits opérateurs privés. Assortie d‘un allègement des contraintes administratives et de nouvelles  sources  de financement, la libéralisation profite aux solutions décentralisées (mini-réseaux et kits solaires en particulier).

En résulte, dans les deux pays, une diversification des modes de fourniture d‘électricité reposant sur des dispositifs, des acteurs, des ressources et des modes de gouvernance pluriels, qui coexistent localement et que la recherche analyse comme des arrangements de coproduction. A travers une étude comparative multiscalaire menée, au Sénégal et en Tanzanie, dans des aires d‘urbanisation diffuse, la thèse propose un cadre conceptuel et une méthodologie pour repenser la nature et les conditions de fourniture d‘un service essentiel à partir des arrangements hétérogènes observés. Elle mobilise ainsi le notion de configurations locales de fourniture pour appréhender de manière décloisonnée l‘ensemble des solutions d‘électrification en présence, comprendre leurs interdépendances et examiner les conditions d‘une possible régulation des divers modes de fourniture d‘électricité à cette échelle.

En croisant une approche sociotechnique située des configurations de fourniture d‘accès à l‘électricité et une approche socioéconomique des marchés locaux de l‘électricité, la thèse propose une conceptualisation des géographies émergentes de la fourniture électrique dans des territoires marqués par une urbanisation rapide et diffuse. D‘un côté, elle démontre que les politiques néolibérales d‘électrification ont conduit à une diversification de l‘offre électrique, plus adaptée à la pluralité des demandes, à un accroissement moyen des taux de couverture et des taux d‘accès dans ces espaces, ainsi qu‘à une amélioration – au moins partielle – de la qualité des services fournis sous l‘effet de la concurrence de marché. D‘un autre côté, elle souligne les limites de ces politiques et de leurs logiques marchandes, qui aboutissent à un accroissement des inégalités socio-spatiales à toutes les échelles et à l‘exclusion  des  plus pauvres de toute forme d‘accès à l‘électricité. L‘analyse de ces écueils met en exergue la nécessité de mécanismes de régulation, dont la thèse scrute les prémisses, encore fragiles et disparates. Interrogeant qui obtient quel service et où, elle esquisse enfin des pistes de réflexion sur ce que pourrait être la transition vers un futur service (public) essentiel de l‘électricité dans ces environnements urbains en mutation.

Villes et crise au Liban, le 22/10/2021 au CERI Sciences Po

L’effondrement financier, économique, infrastructurel et social que connaît le Liban trouve ses racines dans trois décennies de politiques publiques mettant en avant un modèle de développement urbain aux effets délétères. Les interventions à ce séminaire, basées sur des travaux doctoraux en cours, analysent ces choix de politique publique et réfléchissent aux alternatives qui s’esquissent, dans le domaine urbain et énergétique.

Générateur électrique à Mar Mikhael, face au port de Beyrouth, devant un immeuble en reconstruction (cliché Eric Verdeil, juillet 2021)

Le séminaire aura lieu le vendredi 22 octobre au CERI, Sciences Po, salle du conseil, de 14h à 17h. Il est organisé avec le soutien du programme Hybridelec, financé par l’ANR.

Présentations

Petra Samaha, doctorante, CERI Sciences Po : Land as a Cash Machine. The case of Lebanon

Alix Chaplain, doctorante, CERI Sciences Po : La diversification des configurations de fourniture d’électricité au Liban : vers une différenciation territoriale et sociopolitique des pratiques d’accès

Discutant : Jihad Farah, Professeur, Département d’urbanisme, Université Libanaise

Organisateur : Eric Verdeil, Professeur, chercheur au CERI-Sciences Po

Inscription obligatoire via ce formulaire

Soutenance de thèse : Mélanie Rateau, 24/9/2021

Bonjour à tous,

J’ai le plaisir de vous annoncer la soutenance de ma thèse en Aménagement de l’espace et Urbanisme intitulée

Configurations électriques, inégalités d’accès et pratiques citadines à Ibadan (Nigéria) et à Cotonou (Bénin)

réalisée sous la direction de Sylvy Jaglin et d’Armelle Choplin, au Laboratoire Techniques, Territoires et Sociétés et à l’école doctorale « Ville, transports et territoires » de Paris-Est Sup.

La soutenance aura lieu le vendredi 24 septembre 2021 à 15h en ligne sur Zoom (Lien : https://univ-eiffel.zoom.us/j/81447037484 et Mot de passe : STv46a4t) et à la Cité Descartes, en salle A221 du Bâtiment Bienvenüe (places limitées et passe sanitaire exigé). Les personnes souhaitant assister à la soutenance doivent impérativement se connecter caméra et micro fermés.

Le jury est composé de :

  • Armelle Choplin, Professeure associée à l’Université de Genève (co-directrice)
  • Sylvy Jaglin, Professeure à l’Université Gustave Eiffel (directrice)
  • Franck Scherrer, Professeur à l’Université de Montréal (rapporteur)
  • Éric Verdeil, Professeur à Sciences Po Paris (examinateur)
  • Marie-Hélène Zérah, Directrice de recherche à l’IRD (rapporteure)
  • Invité au jury : Olivier Coutard, Directeur de Recherche CNRS au Latts (invité)

Résumé : Dans les villes d’Afrique subsaharienne, les réseaux électriques sont défaillants, insuffisants et parfois absents alors que la demande augmente. Pour satisfaire leurs besoins, les citadins mettent en pratique une pluralité technologique donnant lieu à divers assemblages sociotechniques. À l’échelle de chaque ville, il en résulte une configuration électrique urbaine. Comparant une sélection de quartiers reflétant la diversité urbaine à Ibadan (Nigéria) et à Cotonou (Bénin), la recherche démontre que les pratiques citadines d’accès à l’électricité alimentent des processus d’hybridation dans lesquels l’amélioration de la qualité et de la continuité du service dépend de logiques marchandes et sociales ambivalentes qui ne permettent pas de sortir les citadins les plus vulnérables des trappes de la pauvreté. Finalement, la transition électrique urbaine nécessite d’aller au-delà du référentiel du réseau conventionnel unique et uniforme, pour penser les contours d’un service urbain socio-techniquement hétérogène, articulé à la diversité des conditions de vie urbaine.

Mots clés : accès à l’électricité ; hétérogénéité urbaine et infrastructurelle ; inégalités intra- et interurbaines ; régimes d’accès ; Ibadan ; Cotonou ; Nigéria ; Bénin

Abstract : In the cities of sub-Saharan Africa, electricity networks are deficient, insufficient and sometimes absent, while demand is increasing. To meet their needs, city dwellers use a variety of technologies that give rise to different socio-technical assemblages. At the scale of each city, this results in an urban electrical configuration. Comparing a selection of neighbourhoods reflecting urban diversity in Ibadan (Nigeria) and Cotonou (Benin), the research shows that urban practices of access to electricity fuel processes of hybridization in which the improvement of the quality and continuity of the service depends on ambivalent market and social logics that do not allow the most vulnerable city dwellers to escape from the traps of poverty. Finally, the urban electricity transition requires going beyond the reference of the single, uniform conventional network to consider the contours of a socio-technically heterogeneous urban service, linked to the diversity of urban living conditions.

Keywords : access to electricity; urban and infrastructural heterogeneity; intra and inter urban inequalities; regimes of access; Ibadan; Cotonou; Nigeria; Benin

Alix Chaplain and Eric Verdeil contributed to the seminar Models for Tackling Lebanon’s Electricity Crisis

The Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy at the American University of Beirut hosted a seminar about Models for Tackling Lebanon’s Electricity Crisis, in partnership with the SOAS-Anti Corruption-Evidence initiative. The seminar featered two researchers from AUB working on a project about the recent reform of electricty management in the city of Zahle, which allowed a 24/7 electricity supply through a private company. In addition, Dr Hassan Harajli from UNDP CEDRO and Alix Chaplain, PhD candidate at Sciences Po-CERI and a researcher in the Hybridelec project. Their presented were discussed by Eric Verdeil (Sciences Po CERI and Hybridelec project leader), Jamil Mouawad (AUB) and Pallavi Roy (SOAS University).

Read the Briefing paper: Ahmad, Ali, et al. « Models for tackiling Lebanon’s electricity crisis ». The Policy Practice/Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs, 2021, p. 1‑12.

To know more, read the working paper on Zahle’s model and Alix’ work:

Ali Ahmad, Neil McCulloch, Muzna Al-Masri, Marc Ayoub, From dysfunctional to functional corruption: The politics of reform in Lebanon’s electricity sector, Working Paper Anti-Corruption Evidence. Making Anti-Corruption Real. (2020) 1–55.

Chaplain, Alix. « L’émergence de mini-réseaux hybrides d’électricité au Liban : vers une différenciation territoriale des dispositifs de fourniture énergétique ». Billet. Les carnets de l’Ifpo (blog). En ligne: https://ifpo.hypotheses.org/10952.

Séminaire à l’AFD le 19/12/2019 : L’hybridation des systèmes électriques dans les espaces urbains et en voie d’intégration urbaine des pays émergents

Systèmes de production énergétique sur le toit d’une école à Beyrouth (Eric Verdeil, 2019)

Nous avons le plaisir de vous inviter à ce séminaire co-organisé avec l’AFD.

Les villes des pays émergents et en développement connaissent de lourds problèmes de fourniture en électricité que les réponses conventionnelles telles que l’extension du réseau ne parviennent pas à résoudre. C’est pourquoi on assiste au développement de solutions alternatives, individuelles ou collectives, tels que des réseaux décentralisés et hybrides. Appliquant le concept d’hybridation aux études socio-techniques, le projet de recherche Hybridelec se propose d’étudier ces nouvelles configurations, qui restent mal connues, et leurs impacts sur le futur du système électrique. Le programme Hybridelec est soutenu par l’ANR et L’AFD. 

19 décembre 2019 14h30 – AFD Paris, 5 rue Roland Barthes, Paris 12

 INSCRIPTION OBLIGATOIRE : ICI

Le but de cette session est de livrer une première série de résultats obtenus dans sept pays où se déroulent les enquêtes (Inde, Afrique du Sud, Nigéria, Bénin, Tanzanie, Sénégal, Liban) explorant la diversité et le foisonnement des assemblages sociotechniques que recouvre cette notion d’hybridation des systèmes électriques. Ces analyses interrogent les formes de régulations publiques mises en œuvre, qu’elles visent directement l’électrification, la transition énergétique ou qu’elles interagissent avec ces objectifs à partir d’autres enjeux (sociaux, économiques, politiques). La discussion entre chercheurs et experts de l’AFD a pour but de contribuer à l’identification de dynamiques d’électrification mal connues et des réfléchir aux enjeux de politiques publiques qu’elles soulèvent.

Programme :       

 14h30-14h45    Introduction par Eric Verdeil (CERI-Sciences Po)       

 14h45-15h15    Les mini-réseaux en Afrique Sub-saharienne et dans l’Inde rurale : logiques d’une électrification temporaire par Bérénice Girard (LATTS-Université Paris Est) et Emmanuelle Guillou (LATTS-Université Paris Est/Hydroconseil)        

15h15-15h45    La place des générateurs dans les systèmes électriques locaux: Liban, Nigéria, Indepar Elvan Arik, LATTS-Université Paris Est / Mélanie Rateau, LATTS-Université Paris Est / Eric Verdeil CERI Sciences Po        

Pause-café        

16h00-17h00    Le développement du solaire photovoltaïque pour les ménages et les entreprises : politiques publiques et dynamiques de marché (Afrique du Sud, Inde, Liban)par Sylvy Jaglin (LATTS-Université Paris Est) et Alain Dubresson (Univ. Paris Nanterre) RSA ; Bérénice Girard (LATTS-Université Paris Est) et Marie-Hélène Zérah (IRD/CPR Dehli) Inde ; Alix Chaplain (CERI-Sciences Po)) Liban        

17h00-17h30    Débat général

Un événement organisé dans le cadre du partenariat AFD-SciencesPo Paris

RGS-IBG panel: Hybrid electrical configurations: from heterogeneity to new conceptualization of energy transition in Southern countries?

We are glad to invite you on Wednesday 28 August 2019, to attend the RGS-IBG Conference panel in London (Skempton Building, Room 163, Imperial College) where the first results of our research will be presented and discussed with other researchers.

Here is the panel’s programme:

Session 1 (09:00 – 10:40 ) Chair : Francesca Pilo’

What happens when grid supply improves? Insights on the evolutions of hybrid electrical configurations in the city of Bhagalpur (Bihar, India)

Berenice Girard (LATTS, Université Paris Est Marne la Vallée, France)
This paper will focus on Bhagalpur, the third largest city in the State of Bihar (India). Though for many years, grid supply was very erratic in the region, it improved in the last few years and most residents connected to the grid in Bhagalpur now get around 18 to 22 hours of electricity a day. Based on extensive fieldwork and interviews with local entrepreneurs who invested in alternative energy systems, such as mini-grid operators and solar panel retailers, this paper will try to decipher how the hybridization of energy systems in Bhagalpur has evolved with the improvement of grid supply. 

Looking at different technologies (batteries, diesel mini-grids, solar) and different markets (households, shops and market areas, public sector), we are able to identify different dynamics. Amongst collective solutions such as diesel mini-grids, while some disappear, others either remain beyond the reach of the grid or are able to adapt by becoming complementary to it. As regards individual systems, while the market for batteries is thriving, the market for solar home systems is slowing down. New perspectives are however emerging for big solar retailers, as government agencies, small entrepreneurs and very well-off urban dwellers are investing in large solar rooftops for different reasons ranging from decreasing the pressure on the grid to being more eco-responsible to reducing one’s electricity bill. Amongst other factors, which favour hybridization, we can underline a general distrust in the conventional network, the resilience of past practices and the social embeddedness of certain systems. Hybrid configurations thus appear as dynamic arrangements, continuously shaped by evolving local, regional and national socio-technical and political contexts.

Lebanon – the emergence of a complex landscape of hybrid electric connexions

Alix Chaplain (Sciences Po CERI, CNRS, France)
Eric Verdeil (Sciences Po, France)
Lebanon, a middle income country, has a devastating record for the performance of the electric grid, as a result from civil war damage but also paralysis of reconstruction plans for more than 25 years. Outages currently amount to more than 8 hours daily in most part of the country. This long lasting situation has given rise to the advent and gradual solidification of a landscape of alternative electric solutions. Mainly based on diesel generators, it also makes room, more recently, for more diversified technologies, conjugating renewable energies such as PV panels, batteries, connected to the grid and to the generators, at various operational scales (individual house, building, plants but also pilot solar villages). The notion of ‘hybrid solutions’ is currently employed by many of these actors, though not always with the same meaning.

While several works have already examined generators in residential contexts (Gabillet 2010; Abi Ghanem 2017; Verdeil 2016), this emerging hybrid landscape has not been documented yet. This paper intends to present the first findings, based on a several months of fieldwork in Lebanon. After summarizing Lebanon’s electricity sector political economy, it explains the recent policy initiatives that have helped to shape the more diverse landscape that is emerging, by focusing on the institutional work done by the Lebanese Center for Energy Conservation. Then it provides a first mapping of the hybrid projects already identified. Then, focusing on two cases with a political economy lens, we will raise questions about the legal and regulatory pending issues. In contrast to many accounts of heterogeneous infrastructure as precarious and always shifting, our contribution highlights infrastructural changes which have a potential of shaping alternative paths for the electric sector on the long run.

Following the panels: A bottom up lens to see urban changes in the peripheries of Delhi

Marie-Hélène Zerah (IRD/Université Paris Diderot, CESSMA (UMR 245), France)
This presentation is based on preliminary field investigations into the deployment of renewable energies, in particular solar energy, in the Southern part of Haryana. This ongoing research focuses on two aspects. The first one traces the genealogy of public policies that promote renewable energy in the State. The second one is based on a “follow solar panels” method that has been used in order to capture the diversity of users across spaces that have hybridized their sources of energy.

The presentation’s objective is three-fold. The first one is to advance a typology of rationales for adopting off-grid or grid-connected solar (ranging from ensuring better access, harnessing existing subsidies, peer behavior, rebound effect). The second one is to give attention to the manner in which the market is constructed. More specifically, it underlines the important role of small locally-based entrepreneurs that are at the forefront of promoting solar energy in the rural – urban frontier. Finally, the third objective is to open up a reflection on the manner in which variety of practices on the ground by users and market players tell us about the nature of the co-evolution of urban space transformation and energy transition in peripheries of large cities.

Distributed renewables and hybrid electrical configurations in South Africa: a bottom-up approach to energy transition processes

Sylvy Jaglin (Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée, France)
Since the electrical crisis in 2008 and its aftermath, and the wreckage of Eskom, a public monopoly company whose unbundling was announced by President Ramaphosa in February 2019, the South African energy landscape is changing. Three game changers are essential at the national level: the Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Program (REI4P) and a ‘regulatory decompression’ parallel to a ‘PV revolution’ that favors small independent producers.

At the local level, municipalities are struggling to adapt in order to preserve the foundations of their redistributive business model and to regulate processes of change that lead, de facto, to a growing heterogeneity of local electrical systems. Field surveys in the Western Cape Province show both the internal diversity of the emerging socio-technical configurations of electricity supply and the variety of situations from one city to another. Examining the hypothesis of a long-term hybridization, the communication suggests that, in this context, it is necessary to consider the energy transition first as a re-arrangement issue of this diversity rather than as an independent end. This, however, raises key questions in terms of the reorganization of the electricity landscape, of a re-invention of municipal electrical services as a common good and, more generally, of the governance of energy transition processes that are both rooted in local territories and aligned with national objectives.

On citizenship, off-grid: state agents of the post-network city

Jon Phillips (University of Cambridge, UK)

This presentation will explore the relationship between infrastructural change and state-society relations through analysis of hybrid electrical configurations in South African cities. For many African governments, universal electrification now means a combination of grid and off-grid technologies. While urban geographers have noted the significance of ‘networked citizenship’ – including solidarity through use collective use and subscription to collective services – the significance of off-grid technologies for relationships between state and citizen have received less critical attention. Yet, how citizenship is mediated through hybrid electrical configurations has profound implications for the effectiveness and equity of post-network cities. Taking a socially and spatially differentiated perspective, the paper explores what the diffusion of off-grid solar photovoltaics might mean for the infrastructural citizenship of high- and low-income residents in South African cities. It places municipal policy-makers at the centre of analysis, engaging the state as the state engages with the post-network city. Comparative analysis of Johannesburg and Cape Town reveals how municipal actors evoke different notions of citizenship in planning for technological and spatial change – including rights, responsibilities, freedom, entitlement, dependency, participation, empowerment, struggle and sacrifice. It is the interplay of these ideas with the interests of municipal governments that shape how and why the cities are planning for the post-network city in different ways. I argue that analysing how infrastructure can be constitutive of citizenship means recognising that the state is neither absent and impotent nor all-powerful and predatory, but a conflicted and contested set of agents and relations. The paper concludes by reflecting on the explanatory power of different analytical frameworks as they grapple with the relationship between decentralisation and democratisation of urban energy infrastructures.

Session 2 (11:10 – 12:50) – Chair : Marie-Hélène Zérah

Socio-electric lives in Gulu Town, Uganda

Paul Munro (University of New South Wales, Australia)
In this presentation, I build on recent political ecology scholarship relating to heterogeneous infrastructure configurations to examine the dynamic geographies of urban electricity access in the Global South. As a case study, I focus on hybrid electrical configurations in Gulu Town, northern Uganda. I tell the socio-electric stories of five Gulu Town residents, showing how electricity supply is derived from an eclectic range of sources that include the grid, photovoltaic modules, dry-cell batteries and diesel generators, and how access to these sources are negotiated through local socioeconomic dynamics and broader political economy processes. These stories suggest that key to understanding heterogenous electricties is recognising the active role of urban inhabitants in negotiating infrastructure through different movements and connectivities, often within conditions of precarity. As such I argue that the urban poor are best understood as electrical bricoleurs: people who make creative and resourceful use of whatever energy materials and social connectivities that are at hand to realise their electrical needs. And through their stories, nuanced insights can be drawn in terms of into how urban infrastructure, like electricity flows, are entangled with social lives.

Electrifying the urban-rural intermediate spaces in Senegal: a diversity of electricity access providing offers at the heart of market formation?

Emmanuelle Guillou (LATTS, Université Paris Est Marne la Vallée, France)

In recent years, in sub-Saharan Africa, and more specifically in rural areas of Senegal, there has been a gradual electrification through a variety of electricity access offers ranging from connection to the conventional grid to the purchase of small individual solar devices, as well as autonomous collective electrification through diesel or hybrid mini-grids. These solutions are promoted by diverse economic actors through different socio-technical mechanisms. In Senegal, the government has set short and medium-term rural electrification targets, adopting various electrification strategies led by the Ministry of Oil and Energy and the Rural Electrification Agency, that influence the nature of the observed electric landscapes. Beside those top-down initiatives, many households opt for the purchase of photovoltaic solar panels of various sizes, prices and quality, sold by a diversity of private actors through various service relations with users.
The paper is based on field surveys conducted in Dakar and Kaolack region between 2018 and 2019, and analyzes how different electrification processes, involving a diversity of actors and socio-technical arrangements, shape the electricity landscape and participate in the
formation of a local electricity market in specific areas such as the intermediate urban-rural areas in Senegal. To what extent do users take over the diversity of electricity access modes? What is role of public action in the form of the electric landscape as it is shown?
Finally, to what extent does the electricity supply meet a heterogeneous and growing demand in these areas of diffuse urbanization?

Towards Urban Resilience? Coping with blackouts in Accra and Dar es Salaam

Joyce Angnayeli Eledi Kuusaana (TU Darmstadt, Germany)
The seamless and ubiquitous supply of infrastructure services such as electricity is usually seen as a critical backbone of modern urban societies. Yet, electricity supply in Accra and Dar es Salaam, like many other infrastructure services in cities in the global South, is commonly characterised as unreliable, unstable and unpredictable with power cuts being everyday occurrences. In both cities, major shortages in the generation of electricity have resulted in severe crises situations leading to a spatially uneven rationing of electricity supply. In the midst of such insecurities however, the criticality of such infrastructure services, and the shortfall thereof, is met with innovation, ingenious maneuvering and building of adaptive systems that allow cities to function. Based on debates on critical infrastructures and postcolonial urban studies, this paper seeks to understand the coping mechanisms of urban residents with electricity blackout situations in the cities of Accra and Dar es Salaam. It seeks to understand the criticality of electricity as a necessary component of the routines of different groups of urban dwellers and identifies the different energy constellations that function either complementary to or as alternatives to networked services. Pointing to the adaptive capacities that enable urban dwellers to prepare for power cuts but also to their unequal access to critical services, it argues for a more critical reassessment of debates on urban and infrastructural vulnerability and resilience.

Sociotechnical arrangements and delivery configurations for a multiscalar reading of a transition by hybridization?

Melanie Rateau (LATTS, Université Paris Est Marne la Vallée, France)

The presentation seeks to capture the impacts of the diversification of sociotechnical arrangements on inequalities of access to electricity in specific urban contexts. In Ibadan, Nigeria, access to electricity is characterized by failures of the conventional grid supply service. Households are equiping and organizing themselves to cope with uncertainty, while in Cotonou (Benin) the arrangements allow a « bricolé » connection to a network wich is too far away. From a fieldwork of more than eight months, in precarious, but also popular and favored neighborhoods of these two West African cities, the first objective is to look through what sociotechnical devices, households access to electricity, and what are the specific arrangements in each neighborhood and then, what are the characteristics of urban electrical configurations. The second objective is to propose a typology of socio-technical arrangements to better understand their impact on inequalities of access to electricity. And finally, it deals with questioning more generally the urban processes at work that seem to mark the electrical energy transition through diversification and increasing heterogeneity.

Call for papers at the RGS-IBG (28th-30th August 2019): Hybrid electrical configurations: from heterogeneity to reconceptualizing energy transition in Southern countries?

Solar panels on a school roof, Beirut (2019)

Royal Geography Society / Institute of British Geographers Annual Conference 28th-30th August 2019 (information here)

Panel Convenors: Eric Verdeil (Prof. of Geography and Urban Studies, Sciences Po-CERI, CNRS, Paris eric.verdeil@sciencespo.fr); Sylvy Jaglin (Prof. of Geography, Université Paris Est-Marne la Vallée, LATTS sylvy.jaglin@enpc)

This panel is sponsored by the Energy Geographies Research Group.

Session format: This double panel intends to gather 8-10 scholars enrolled in the French Research Agency funded Hybridelec, as well as other researchers from other countries investigating similar issues.

Argument: While emerging and developing countries account for 95% of the expected global urban growth by 2050, many of them are experiencing major electrical supply problems. They result from an inadequate coverage by the grid (such as in low-income Sub-Saharan African countries), from a rationed supply, power cuts and load shedding (as in major cities with growing demand), and from disconnections related to sharp increases in prices. These failures have rising socio-economic and political costs and public authorities’ priority is to increase electricity generation capacity and secure distribution. But, in many countries, results are lagging behind targets in terms of grid connection and they remain insufficient to meet demand.

Therefore, alternative responses are emerging at different scales. They are collective (eg decentralized production and isolated mini-grids) and individual (eg diverse off-grid electrification and grid-tied solar solutions); they are driven by a multiplicity of actors (cooperatives, NGOs, large and small private operators, manufacturers and entrepreneurs, households); they rely on a variety of technologies and sources, the market of diesel generators growing at the same time as the use of renewable primary energy. To reflect the multiplicity of socio-technical arrangements and forms of organization that, all together, contribute to providing electrical services in urban areas, we analyze them in terms of “hybrid electrical configurations”.

Questions:

These hybrid configurations raise important questions. How are new socio-technical arrangements actually initiated and organized in practice to supply electricity? In which urban spaces are they to play a sustainable role and in what relation with the conventional network (complementarity, competition, substitution)? To what extent can this supply be sustained, expanded and scaled up to meet the diversity of users’ demands? What are their consequences for energy transition goals?

This panel has two main goals. First, to gather papers documenting the diversity of electric configurations that are emerging, not only by stressing their technological content but also their geographical and social embeddedness and effects, as well as the political struggles they face to sustain themselves. Secondly, to conceptualize this diversity and its role in the transformations of electrical systems and in energy transition trajectories in the South. Beyond the various local configurations, can we identify common trends? And if so, what is the value of the main frameworks used in socio-technical studies (such as splintering urbanism, post network cities, urban political ecology) to analyze the processes of emergence and the effects of these hybrid configurations, and what are their limits?

Interested scholars must send a 200-300 words abstract with title, author, affiliation and email address to Eric Verdeil (eric.verdeil_at_sciencespo.fr) and Sylvy Jaglin (sylvy.jaglin_at_enpc.fr) by the 10th of February at the latest.

Emerging forms of hybrid energy systems in cities of the global South: Summary of the Delhi Roundtable

Summary of Roundtable on « Emerging forms of hybrid energy systems in cities of the global South »
Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, 30th October 2018

Summary by Federico de Lorenzo and Bérénice Girard

Videos of the presentations are inserted below after the summary of each panel

Organizers and moderators: Marie-Hélène Zérah (IRD and Centre for Policy Research), Ankit Bhardwaj (Centre for Policy Research), Federico De Lorenzo (Sciences Po Paris), Augustin Delisle (Agence Française de Développement)
Speakers : Eric Verdeil (Centre for International Studies, Sciences Po Paris), Rémi de Bercegol (PRODIG, CNRS, Paris), Ankit Bhardwaj (Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi), Gaurang Sethi (Azure Power, India), Santosh Kumar Thakur (Energy Efficiency Services Limited, India)

Organized jointly by the Agence Française de Développement (AFD), the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) and the Centre de Recherches Internationales (CERI, Sciences Po) and hosted by the CPR, this roundtable brought together around 30 stakeholders from urban studies and the energy sector to discuss the coevolution of electricity supply systems and urban change in the Global South and understand how the imperative of energy transition translates in cities. The roundtable gathered researchers and academics from Indian and French institutions (such as TISS, CEER, CNRS), representatives from NGOs (Centre for Science and Environment, Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation), private and public companies (such as Oracle Utilities, Maxop Engineering, India Smart Grid Forum), and international organizations (such as World Bank, International Solar Alliance, European Investment Bank and the German Developement Bank -KfW).

The roundtable started with a presentation of the ANR funded Hybridelec project by É. Verdeil. As cities of the Global South are experiencing fast economic and population growth, their electricity supply systems often lag behind (cuts, load-shedding, high prices, inadequate coverage…). In this context, public policy has mostly been focused on extending the grid and augmenting supply. However, this development is often not going fast enough and alternative responses emerge both in cities and in the intermediate spaces between them (generators, solar panels, batteries – different technologies bringing new opportunities and often transformed to suit the local needs). In this context, the Hybridelec project aims at thinking together local electric supply systems and urban change by focusing more specifically on the collective solutions, often socially more structuring and technically more complex, than conventional grid provision. How are these alternatives initiated, organized and regulated? How do they sustain and extend? What are the implications for the electrical system and the objectives of energy transition? Making the hypothesis of an increased heterogeneity of these systems rather than that of a convergence, the Hybridelec project wishes to go beyond the idea of delivery palliatives and uses the concept of hybridization to look at the long-lasting process of electrification and to understand the complex assemblages of actors, technical objects and institutions contributing to changing energy systems on the ground.
R. de Bercegol then presented his work on slum electrification in Nairobi, Kenya. Though, officially, the Kibera slum does not have electricity (due to unidentified land tenure), it is electrified, as cartels provide electricity by poaching it from the conventional network. In 2014, a new electrification project was launched in Kibera by the Kenya Power Corporation, justified by the publicly-declared goal of 100% electrification by 2030 and the technical, security and financial problems the illegal poaching leads to. Though there have been tensions in the past between engineers and slum dwellers, the situation seems to have improved in recent years as the power corporation resorted to different means of ensuring the sustainability of the grid connections: involvement of cartel members in the programme ; installation of prepaid and locked meters to avoid unpaid bills and tempering ; use of aluminium instead of copper for the wires to avoid theft, etc. R. de Bercegol then turned to the societal meaning of slum electrification, by showing how prepaid meters act as a depoliticization tool in a long-lasting power struggle, but also as an instrument to formalize poor consumers. Indeed, though they take part in the regularization of slum dwellers by acknowledging their right to live in the city, they also act as disciplining and punishing tools for the poorest consumers, who are not able to afford the conventional network’s electricity. The paradoxical consequences of the arrival of the grid were also underlined, such as changes in daily practices (households going back to charcoal to cook), rapid tempering of these same meters and continued predominance of the informal system of provision.

The two papers were followed by a rich discussion which mainly focused on how to reconcile two policy paradigms often seen as contradictory, namely centralized versus decentralized energy production. Several participants called for a change of perspective, as mini-grids are often seen by distribution companies as sources of potential loss of revenue and influence, and renewable energies are mostly developed in a centralized manner. In this context, how can we ensure a change of perspective from “centralized or decentralized” to “centralized and decentralized”? Taking the case of Beirut, É. Verdeil underlined how, as solutions first seen as temporary become more and more embedded in the conventional network, we observe a shift in representations amongst NGOs, international funding agencies and even ministries. Only the national or regional utilities in charge of production and distribution are still reluctant to promote these systems. However, one can hope that as more sustainable technologies develop on the ground these same utilities will get on board. Innovative solutions to provide electricity to Kibera were also discussed, such as user group connections, solar panels bought in bulk or batteries.
Based on a joint ongoing research with F. De Lorenzo and M.H. Zérah, A. Bhardwaj’s presentation focused on Indian Smart Cities. Even if energy is not generally framed as an urban issue, the Smart Cities Mission (SCM) seems to leave scope for cities to actively shape their energy systems. Findings from the analysis of the Smart Cities proposals offer some interesting insight in what energy management in the Indian Smart City would look like. Although in the proposals cities focused mostly on basic energy infrastructures (expansion of the power network, increasing energy production, etc.), there is considerable room for low-carbon technological improvement as well. In particular, the Smart Cities will direct their efforts towards four low-carbon technologies: solar (mostly rooftop), energy-efficient street lighting, E-mobility, and waste-to-energy. Smart meters receive surprisingly small investment. However, notwithstanding the significant budget planned for the four sectors overall, most of the cities do not seem to have envisioned a global low-carbon strategy, but rather each city seems to have selected some specific area(s) of action.
Head of Business and Project Development at Azure Power, G. Sethi presented the potential and challenges of the solar rooftop sector in India from a private company perspective. He first underlined the current favourable context for solar rooftop development in India: an ambitious programme launched by the Ministry for New and Renewable Energy for the installation of 40 GW of solar projects by 2022; an estimated 124GW solar rooftop potential in India; a supportive regulation and policy framework and a growing demand, mostly coming from the government sector but also from the industrial, commercial and, to a lesser extent, from the residential sectors. He underlined the important role the government sector plays as an initiator in the market, as well as the reduction in solar power tariffs over the last few years. He then turned to challenges the sector is currently facing: a focus which remains mostly on large solar utility; limitations regarding capacity installation, as discoms do not wish to see building owners become producers of energy; a lack of coordination between Central and State governments ; different requirements and regulations from State to State, but also the existence of unfavourable charges for supply through open access and the small number of tenders released by discoms to buy solar-produced energy.
S. K. Thakur offered an overview of EESL’s action as its General Manager of the street lighting division. EESL is a joint venture of four public companies which facilitates and provides support for the implementation of energy-efficient lighting projects in India. Availability of funding to start LED projects is the main challenge that urban local bodies are faced with. EESL can take on the initial investment for them. Moreover, it has been able to bring prices of LED down dramatically through demand aggregation and bulk procurement. The Street Lighting National Programme (SLNP) is one of the most successful initiatives undertook by EESL. Its target is to replace 13.4 million street lights with LED lighting in Indian towns and save 1,500 MW of energy. Drawing on its experience, EESL has adapted its business model to specific capacities of the urban local bodies and technical constraints. The agreement between EESL and local bodies includes support by the former for supply, installation, and maintenance (tasks delegated to different agencies) of the street lighting assets, other than financement. Poor infrastructures and repayment capacity of urban bodies are amongst the most common challenges the SLNP is faced with.


Throughout the second Q&A session, the debate focused on the role of urban authorities in shaping energy transitions in India, on the importance of access to accurate data, and on standards of quality of technologies. First, the view that the SCM represents an opportunity for local bodies to be leading actors of the urban energy transition, is challenged by a first-hand insight in the solar rooftop sector which shows that growth here has been primarily driven by tendering opportunities released by State and Central authorities. Second, data on the technical features of the places of transition are necessary both for authorities to set realistic targets and for implementing bodies. In particular, collection of reliable data on government buildings, along with the necessity to obtain several authorisations from the concerned bodies, represents a crucial question for Azure and the private sector in general. The complexity which Azure is faced with in implementation contrasts with EESL’s less-stringent requirement to have its agreement signed by the sole municipal commissioner. Last, while EESL’s primary concern is to expand the lighting network than meeting quality standards, in a PPA/RESCO business model (used by Azure), it is in the best interest of the developer to deliver high-quality technologies because they own the assets.

In conclusion, this roundtable showed the diversity and complexity of the possible pathways to energy transition in urban contexts. In the case of India, though use of REs is growing fast thanks to ambitious national schemes, decentralized energy production systems are facing many challenges such as a lack of capacity at the local and regional levels and paradoxical regulations and policies at the different stages of decision-making. The roundtable thus confirmed the necessity of in-depth fieldwork and continued discussions between policy-makers, stakeholders and academics to confront the mismatches between the declared ambitious objectives of energy transition and the local and technical constraints.

Round Table Emerging Forms of Hybrid Energy Systems in Cities of the Global South at CPR, Dehli

CPR, in partnership with AFD and CERI-Sciences Po, has organised this round table on Emerging forms of hybrid energy systems in cities of the global South
Moderator:
Ankit Bhardwaj, Centre for Policy Research
Marie-Hélène Zérah, IRD and Centre for Policy Research

Speakers:
Eric Verdeil, Centre for International Studies, Sciences Po Paris
Rémi de Bercegol, PRODIG, CNRS, Paris
Santosh Kumar Thakur,General Manager, Street Lighting division, EESL (Energy Efficiency Services Limite)
Gaurang Sethi, Head Business Development, Azure PowerTuesday, 30 October 2018, 9:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
Conference Hall, Centre for Policy Research
Continuer la lecture de « Round Table Emerging Forms of Hybrid Energy Systems in Cities of the Global South at CPR, Dehli »

Marie-Hélène Zérah soutient son HDR : Penser la diversité urbaine : une analyse par les services essentiels en Inde

Marie-Hélène Zérah, participante au projet Hybridelec, soutient son HDR intitulée Penser la diversité urbaine : une analyse par les services essentiels en Inde le 9 février à 14 h à l’Université Paris-Est / Marne la Vallée.

Bâtiment Bienvenüe (IFFSTAR) 14-20 Boulevard Newton

Cité Descartes 77420 Champs-sur-Marne

Salle mlv-11b021/mlv-12b023

Le jury se compose de:

Mme Sylvie Fol, Professeur des Universités (Aménagement de l’espace, Urbanisme), Université Paris I, Panthéon Sorbonne (rapporteure)

Patrick Heller, Professor, Department of Sociology and Watson Institute, Brown University

Mme Sylvy Jaglin, Professeur des Universités (Aménagement de l’espace, Urbanisme), Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée (garante)

Mme Loraine Kennedy, Directrice de Recherche CNRS, CEIAS (Centre d’Études de l’Inde et de l’Asie du Sud)

Mme Jennifer Robinson, Professor, Department of Geography, University College London (rapporteure)

Eric Verdeil, Professeur des Universités (Géographie et Etudes Urbaines), Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris (rapporteur)

Résumé

Cet essai contribue à une réflexion générale sur la diversité des mondes urbains à partir d’une analyse centrée sur la variété des arrangements dans la production et la gestion des services essentiels (eau, assainissement et électricité) en Inde. Il a trois ambitions principales.
La première est de saisir, au prisme des services urbains, les multiples facettes du processus d’urbanisation, depuis le début des années 1990, du pays abritant la deuxième plus grande population urbaine au monde. Dans la mouvance du renouveau des études urbaines porté par les chercheurs travaillant sur les « Suds », ce texte suit une démarche comparative. Il est
mené sur la base d’une analyse résolument empirique et ancrée dans la profondeur des territoires. Cette exploration au sein de la diversité des espaces urbains, dans un gradient allant de la grande métropole aux gros bourgs ruraux urbanisés, démontre que le biais métropolitain donne à voir une vision amputée et erronée de l’urbanisation indienne. La comparaison à l’échelle nationale permet une lecture plus riche et complexe des transformations sociales, des mutations démographiques et économiques, des formes de l’urbanisation, de l’impact des réformes néolibérales et des formes d’insertion des villes, et donc de l’Inde, dans la mondialisation.
La seconde ambition est de mettre au jour les soubassements et les caractéristiques de cette diversité, dans ses lieux, ses formes et ses dynamiques. Cet essai défend l’idée que les mutations observées sont imputables à des articulations variées, localisées et contingentes
entre différents régimes explicatifs ce que l’analyse par les services essentiels aide à décrypter.
Cette démonstration est faite en combinant des résultats sur (i) l’hybridation des discours et des modalités de l’action publique sous l’influence des modèles internationaux ; (ii) les ressorts et les régimes de justification de l’émergence et de la variété des formes de
capitalismes urbains ; et, (iii) sur les pratiques ordinaires et les mobilisations collectives des usagers pour accéder et défendre leur droit aux services urbains, en s’intéressant à ce que l’expression de ces pratiques révèle des fractures sociales qui traversent la société urbaine.
Cette démarche multidimensionnelle, qui emprunte à plusieurs corpus, permet de dépasser des explications univoques et normatives sur les liens entre transition urbaine et néolibéralisme en insistant sur la variété des trajectoires.
La troisième ambition vise à engager un dialogue constructif avec certains travaux menés en géographie urbaine critique, à en nuancer les résultats et à apporter un nouvel éclairage. D’une part, ce texte discute les apports de la « Southern theory » dont l’objectif est de décentrer les études urbaines menées au Nord en prônant une nouvelle forme d’urbanisme comparatif. Il démontre qu’en privilégiant les comparaisons entre grandes villes (comparaisons Nord/Sud et plus récemment Sud/Sud), l’urbanisme comparatif n’embrasse pas l’ensemble des mutations en cours et ne prend pas la mesure des transformations et des innovations localisées hors des métropoles. D’autre part, il questionne les propositions récentes autour d’une planétarisation de l’urbanisation qui rendrait caduques les frontières
entre le rural et l’urbain. Cet essai rejoint certaines conclusions relatives à l’effacement des frontières et à l’expansion de l’urbanisation. Néanmoins, il souligne la contingence et l’autonomie de logiques locales qui font la ville, à contre-courant d’une analyse mettant en avant la dépendance des espaces en voie d’urbanisation au phénomène d’agglomération. Face à ces deux paradigmes dominants, le cas de l’Inde offre une hétérogénéité de situations démontrant que, dans les limites actuelles des recherches qu’elles suscitent, les voies tracées par ces courants de pensée sont des sources d’inspiration encore insuffisantes pour penser le fait urbain dans sa diversité.