Capacity of urban management in the empowerment process of informal settlements: A case study of five Iranian cities

Empowerment of informal settlements has been always faced with two challenges. Firtly, Lack of necessary capacity to implement and unfamiliarity of urban management with the nature of empowerment plan to increase these capacities. Secondly, distrust of the residents of these textures to urban management and consequently the challenge of attracting their participation. This study aims by focusing on the first challenge as a research problem, with analytical- descriptive approach to evaluate and compare the existing capacity of urban management in order to empower informal settlements in five cities, so that the shortcomings of the urban managment regarding this issue to be determined. In this regard, according to documents and library resources, indicators of urban management capacity has been developed in many aspects. Furthermore, in order to quantify and collect data needed for each indicator, according to experts, using in-depth interviews and avialable information in the empowerment plan of informal settlements of theses cities has been considered. To analyze the data and evaluate the final number of available capacity of urban management of each of the surveyed cities in order to empower informal settlements of each city, the FUZZY-ANP model, and for weighting of indicators in this model, professionals, city administrators and researchers were surveyed. Ranking results of the management of the cities in order to empower informal settlements from highest to lowest capacity were 1- Shiraz, 2- Marvdasht, 3- Yasouj, 4-Zabol, and 5-Iranshahr respectively. Moreover, the indiocators of 1- using participatory planning method, 2- meetings and workshops related to issues of informal settlements, and 3- the stability of income respectively had the highest significance in this ranking.