Slums, Squatters and Urban Redevelopment Schemes in Bombay, Hong Kong, and Singapore, 1894-1960
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Authors
Sugarman, Michael William
Advisors
Harper, Tim
Date
2018-07-20Awarding Institution
University of Cambridge
Author Affiliation
History
Qualification
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Language
English
Type
Thesis
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Sugarman, M. W. (2018). Slums, Squatters and Urban Redevelopment Schemes in Bombay, Hong Kong, and Singapore, 1894-1960 (Doctoral thesis). https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.24186
Abstract
My research examines the interconnected histories of urbanism and urban development in port cities across South and Southeast Asia. Chapter one examines the effects of the third plague pandemic on the quotidian livelihoods and the built environments of the urban poor across Bombay, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Considering corporeal measures to inspect the bodies and homes of the urban poor and measures to introduce urban ‘improvement’ schemes, this chapter argues that plague sparked a sustained interest in the urban conditions of the poor across British South and Southeast Asia. Chapter two considers the works of the Bombay Improvement Trust, Rangoon Development Trust, and Singapore Improvement Trust through the early decades of the twentieth century and analyses how an imperial urbanism based on a ‘Bombay model’ translated to Singapore and other port cities across the Indian Ocean world. Chapter three considers the consequences of the second wave of ‘indirect’ attacks on urban slums on an evolving imperial urbanism in Bombay, Rangoon, and Singapore. While previous chapters examined the emergence of an imperial urbanism centred on Bombay’s example, chapter four considers the extent to which Bombay remained central to this urbanism during the late 1930s and Second World War. Analysing the divergent consequences of patterns of urban growth in Bombay, Hong Kong, and Singapore throughout the late-1930s, this chapter considers late-colonial efforts to house the urban poor as well as the extent to which the war recast the post-war housing situation. Chapter five contextualises post-war rhetoric of economic and urban development in Hong Kong and Singapore within narratives of pre-war urban ‘improvement’. In connecting pre-war and post-war approaches to accommodating the urban poor, the final chapter considers the reorientation of earlier circulations of knowledge around urban poverty in port cities and its implications for emerging post-colonial regional, national and urban identities.
Keywords
History, South Asia, Southeast Asia, East Asia, Urban History, Bombay, Hong Kong, Singapore, Rangoon, Mumbai, Yangon, Housing, India, Burma, Myanmar, Urban planning, Urban poverty, Urban development
Sponsorship
Cambridge Trusts, Smuts Memorial Fund, Magdalene College, The Centre for History and Economics (Cambridge), The Center for History and Economics (Harvard)/The History Project/The Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET)
Identifiers
This record's DOI: https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.24186
Rights
All rights reserved, Figure 1 - © The British Library Board, MFR/1436 *1590*, Report on the Sanitary Conditions of Singapore (permission granted for publication in thesis 31 Oct. 2017)
Figure 2 - © The British Library Board, India Office Records, V/24/2791, Administration Report of the Bombay Improvement Trust for the year ending in 31st March 1899 (permission granted for publication in thesis 19 Oct. 2017)
Figure 3 - © The British Library Board, Asia, Pacific and Africa Collections, W 5281, Density of Population in Bombay (permission granted for publication in thesis 19 Oct. 2017)
Figure 4 - © The British Library Board, IOR/V/26/780/12, Map 2 (permission granted for publication in thesis 19 Oct. 2017)
Figure 5 - © The British Library Board, IOR/V/24/2963 (permission granted for publication in thesis 19 Oct. 2017)
Figure 6 - © The British Library Board, IOR/V/24/821, Type Design for R.C. Chawl (permission granted for publication in thesis 13 Oct. 2017)
Figure 7 - © The British Library Board, IOR/V/24/821, Directorate chawls at Worli showing the open space left between each block (permission granted for publication in thesis 13 Oct. 2017)
Figure 8 - © The British Library Board, The Work of the Singapore Improvement Trust, 1927-1947, Map of Balestier Estate (permission granted for publication in thesis 13 Oct. 2017)
Figure 9 - Courtesy of National Archives of Singapore (permission granted for publication in thesis 17 Oct. 2017)
Figure 10 - M Masson Collection, courtesy of National Archives of Singapore (permission granted for publication in thesis 17 Oct. 2017)
Figure 11 - © The British Library Board, Report of the Singapore Housing Committee, 1947, Map of Preliminary Development (permission granted for publication in thesis 13 Oct. 2017)
Figure 12 - Source: The Straits Times © Singapore Press Holdings Limited. Reprinted with permission (permission granted for publication in thesis 30 June 2017)