Eviction and homelessness: the impact on African children

The author examines the effect of forced evictions and homelessness on children, in the long and short-term, psychologically and physically. Housing, land, and legal rights fail to protect children, she argues, and poor people need greater access to legal advice on how evictions can be resisted. There is rarely coherent policy about the status of street children, resulting in their further marginalisation and criminalisation. Slums and squatter camps are symptomatic of urban development and acknowledging this is the first step towards providing the infrastructure necessary to prevent damaging millions of children and their families in sub-Saharan Africa.