Sustainable Development and the Informal Sector: An Uneasy Relationship?
- 1 September 1999
- journal article
- Published by SAGE Publications in The Journal of Environment & Development
- Vol. 8 (3), 213-237
- https://doi.org/10.1177/107049659900800302
Abstract
This article offers a preliminary analysis of the influence of informal activities on the sustainability of development, as well as their policy and planning implications. Most sustainable development policies are directed toward the formal sector—activities that are regulated by the state. The role of informal activities has not been recognized, although the literature shows that informal activities are pervasive and influence significantly socioeconomic and spatial development in both developed and developing countries. The article presents the principal characteristics of informal activities based on a review of the international literature, then examines how informal activities impinge on the three criteria/objectives of sustainability: environmental protection, social equity, and economic efficiency. Various examples of informal activities are used, and their influence on sustainable development is sketched. Finally, the implications of this analysis for sustainable development policy making and planning are examined. Potential avenues to overcome the problems identified are outlined.Keywords
This publication has 27 references indexed in Scilit:
- Formalizing the Informal? The Transformation of Cairo's Refuse Collection SystemJournal of Planning Education and Research, 1996
- The informal food economy in a peripheral urban district: The case of bandim district, BissauHabitat International, 1995
- Limits to and Development Strategies for the Informal Sector. A Case Study About Informal Woodworking Entrepreneurs in Trujillo/PeruInternational Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 1995
- Spatial Variations in the Informal Sector: A Review of Evidence from the European UnionRegional Studies, 1994
- An Impossible Dream? Sustainable Regional Economic and Environmental DevelopmentRegional Studies, 1994
- Informal Economy and Family StrategiesInternational Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 1994
- Agricultural Settlement and Ecological Crisis in the Ecuadorian Amazon Frontier. A Discussion of the Policy EnvironmentPolicy Studies Journal, 1992
- Towards an ecological economics of sustainabilityEcological Economics, 1992
- Family life cycle and the informal economy in central ItalyInternational Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 1985
- Anthropological Perspectives on the Concepts of Dualism, the Informal Sector, and Marginality in Developing Urban EconomiesInternational Regional Science Review, 1980