Honing in on local capacities and youthfulness in shifting towards a regenerative built environment in Cape Town

A World Cities Day blog by the ReBuilt Cape Town project team

In 2014, the United Nations designated 31 October as World Cities Day; an annual celebratory day that also promotes awareness on global urbanisation challenges and for concerted efforts towards sustainable urban development. The 10th anniversary of World Cities Day is being observed under the theme “Youth leading climate and local action for cities”, which is set against the background of a world that is not only rapidly urbanising but is also expected to see young people under 18 years constituting an estimated 60 percent of urban dwellers by 2030. It cannot be overemphasised why young people must be part of ongoing discussions on climate action and their role in imagining alternative futures. The ReBuilt Cape Town project gives young emerging scholars, practitioners and activists an opportunity to do just that.

The ReBuilt project, convened by Bauhaus Earth (BE) and the African Centre for Cities (ACC), aims to investigate a stakeholder-driven transition strategy that promotes a more regenerative future for the built environment in four countries around the world, namely Germany, Bhutan, Indonesia and South Africa. In South Africa, ReBuilt sits within Cape Town. The project’s efforts aim to mitigate the impacts of climate change resulting from carbon emissions associated with the built environment. The project proposes a materials transition, away from traditional materials such as cement, bricks, and steel, and instead, moving toward nature-based or bio-based “regenerative” building materials. These alternatives include cross-laminated timber (CLT), hempcrete, hemp bricks, aggregates derived from invasive species, straw, and rammed earth construction techniques.

WHAT IS REGENERATIVITY?

Regenerativity is becoming an increasingly relevant term in up-and-coming urban theory and practice. The term comes in stark contrast to the previous idea of ‘sustainability.’ A report by Fiona Woo for (2014) the World Future Council outlines “urban sustainable practice” as a movement that finds itself devoid of true meaning, serving as a catch-all term for positive impact. Regenerativity makes many promises – a paradigm shift from the linear transformation suggested by ‘sustainable development’ toward a “circular metabolism” for the urban fabric, as outlined by the same report. Scholars Thomson and Newman (2018) define the move as one marked by renewable energy systems, restored urban-ecological relationships and bio-based design being incorporated into urban realities, ideas that are present in ReBuilt’s framework. The rejection of linear thinking and welcoming of circular models is promising, and certainly necessary. However, a new framework does not make us immune to the capture of the regenerativity movement by the same actors that seized sustainability. In South Africa, the notion of sustainability is often associated with upper middle-class income brackets, and there is a lack of consideration for socio-spatial histories and injustices that are widespread in Southern cities like Cape Town. To move away from that is to centralise climate-positive and bio-based solutions in conversation with the socio-spatial and power dynamics at play in the urban environment.

Far from being a silver bullet, for us it made strategic sense to locate this project within the context of Cape Town’s housing struggles and to explore the ways in which this project can contribute to overcoming this challenge with the least significant climate impacts. This means targeting those neighbourhoods where the housing shortage is most acute.

Image created using Imagine Art AI using a prompt cohered by Mashego Molemane

The increasing popularity and (re)conceptualisation of the concept of regenerativity comes at a time when the earth’s climate system is at the brink of disaster (Ripple et al., 2024) and when cities are searching for innovative ways to reduce carbon emissions. Cape Town, with a population of 4.9 million people, is no different and there is no doubt that this project, and others like it, are needed in contributing to averting catastrophic climate change, the effects of which disproportionately affect vulnerable people across the world, especially global South. The inherent interplay between social and ecological factors calls for a regenerativity that challenges silo-thinking where social justice and climate action can’t walk side by side.

Yet, the geopolitical histories from which Southern cities like Cape Town have emerged from have compounded its ability to address the challenge of climate change– which is largely caused by the industrialisation of the global North countries– alongside equally pressing and interconnected urban challenges. Similarly, the different urban contexts that result from these variable geopolitical histories also mean that the form projects like ReBuilt take are not generalisable between different Cities, and in the case of Cape Town, within these cities too. In Cape Town, a city fraught with numerous socio-spatial challenges that we are all too-familiar with, the notion of a regenerative shift is particularly daunting. In the context of its challenges, it is easy to misplace the regenerative shift, both in terms of where it finds traction and how. Given the gravity of the climate crisis, there is little room to deny that a shift such as this one is absolutely necessary for a move towards carbon neutrality. What does remain in contention, however, is exactly where and how this regenerative shift manifests itself and who leads it. We opine on two possibilities to address this.

LOCAL ACTION FOR CLIMATE IN THE CONTEXT OF CAPE TOWN

Far from being a silver bullet, for us it made strategic sense to locate this project within the context of Cape Town’s housing struggles and to explore the ways in which this project can contribute to overcoming this challenge with the least significant climate impacts. This means targeting those neighbourhoods where the housing shortage is most acute. While this does not preclude more affluent areas— many of whom have the resources to do much more in this regard but do not— the greatest value of and opportunities for this regenerative shift lies in those areas where it is most needed. The value of regenerativity, here, sits in its capacity to be engaged critically, and reimagine climate impact in urban environments to be socially just and inclusive.

Methodologically, incorporating regenerativity meant taking into account the heterogeneous nature of Cape Town’s socio-spatial context, by recognising that no two places in Cape Town are the same. Hence, the way this is implemented in Sea Point would be dissimilar from its implementation in Dunoon or Athlone, for example. In these latter neighbourhoods where financial resources may be low, but ingenuity and ‘MacGyvering’ strong, we call for a honing in on circular economy practises that residents in these neighbourhoods have for decades been engaging in. These include practices of autoconstruction (Caldeira 2017) that many residents have already engaged in as a means of building and maintaining the places they call home. Embedded within these practices are not only a unique sense of ingenuity and ‘MacGyvering’, but also a strong sense of resilience, relationality and a culture of “make do”. This is often expressed in sentiments such as “‘n boer maak ‘n plan” [a farmer makes a plan] or the more decolonial equivalent, “‘n kleurling het ‘n plan” [a coloured has a plan]. What these sayings all express is that in times of trouble, people come together in unique constellations to realise a particular goal. This relational practice of people coming together to find unique solutions to their problems displays both a profound resilience, but also an uncanny level of creativity and innovation. It is this culture of ‘MacGyvering’, and the relational infrastructures of people (Simone, 2021) underpinning it, that stimulates local action and provides this regenerative shift with an opportunity to succeed notwithstanding the many challenges.

The incorporation of youth voices in the socio-ecological regeneration of our cities is not just helpful; but crucial.

THE CENTRALITY OF YOUTH VOICES

Methodologically, incorporating regenerativity meant taking into account the heterogeneous nature of Cape Town’s socio-spatial context, by recognising that no two places in Cape Town are the same. Hence, the way this is implemented in Sea Point would be dissimilar from its implementation in Dunoon or Athlone, for example. In these latter neighbourhoods where financial resources may be low, but ingenuity and ‘MacGyvering’ strong, we call for a honing in on circular economy practises that residents in these neighbourhoods have for decades been engaging in. These include practices of autoconstruction (Caldeira 2017) that many residents have already engaged in as a means of building and maintaining the places they call home. Embedded within these practices are not only a unique sense of ingenuity and ‘MacGyvering’, but also a strong sense of resilience, relationality and a culture of “make do”. This is often expressed in sentiments such as “‘n boer maak ‘n plan” [a farmer makes a plan] or the more decolonial equivalent, “‘n kleurling het ‘n plan” [a coloured has a plan]. What these sayings all express is that in times of trouble, people come together in unique constellations to realise a particular goal. This relational practice of people coming together to find unique solutions to their problems displays both a profound resilience, but also an uncanny level of creativity and innovation. It is this culture of ‘MacGyvering’, and the relational infrastructures of people (Simone, 2021) underpinning it, that stimulates local action and provides this regenerative shift with an opportunity to succeed notwithstanding the many challenges.

ReBuilt’s Research Assistants. From left: Aidan Africa, Raíra Fróes and Mashego Molemane

As research assistants, what we noticed during ReBuilt’s events is that many of our discussions have focused on practicality, scalability, and how these ideas fit into the existing professional built environment landscape of Cape Town. Questions like “So what do we do with this research?” and “What are the next steps?” arise often. While considering these factors is important, overemphasising conventional frameworks limits the potentials of creativity and imagination that could arise from youth voices. Understanding what could make this conversation compelling to our intended target ‘audience’ has become a new focus of our efforts. The incorporation of youth voices in the socio-ecological regeneration of our cities is not just helpful; but crucial. New questions emerge for the development of regenerative urban practice – how do we engage the youth? And – how are existing spaces and conversations limiting our creativity?

In November, ReBuilt will host a student/youth symposium where alternative theories, ideas and imaginations will be shared between the research team and young emerging scholars. Our hope is that through workshopping the concept of regenerativity with young and engaged individuals, we may be speculative in our (re)imagining of what this shift may look like for Cape Town, thus enabling a forward-thinking, fluid and creative approach to shifting towards a carbon neutral built environment. The centrality of youth and local communities in climate action for cities becomes a key entry point for this collaboration, and one that aligns with the themes under reflection for World Cities Day this year.

Aidan Africa, Raíra Fróes and Mashego Molemane are research assistants on the ReBuilt Cape Town project.

This article was originally published in Cape Argus and Daily News.