Social Innovations in Urban Sanitation in India

This book discusses effective social innovation strategies facilitated by civil society organisations (CSOs) to tackle India's significant urban sanitation challenge. It presents the contours of an ecosystem that includes citizen participation and strengthening community-managed systems for improved sanitation and public health. The book analyses case studies of effective sanitation programmes as well as experiments with innovative ideas in different regional contexts by CSOs to meet the contextual needs of the community and to ensure access to safe sanitation, especially among the urban poor. It highlights the challenges and the need for active participation of communities for change in behaviour, increasing institutional capacities of municipalities for standardising and scaling up strategies which work. The authors highlight the need for designing low-cost solutions, organising informal sanitation workers, serving marginalised communities and building effective alliances between communities and institutions to influence public policy. Rich in empirical data, this book will be useful for scholars and researchers of urban studies, public policy, governance, political science, development studies and sociology as well as for CSOs and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) working on urban sanitation, urban planning and public policy.

Shubhagato Dasgupta is a Senior Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) and Director of the Scaling City Institutions for India (SCI-FI) Sanitation initiative, New Delhi, India. Kaustuv Kanti Bandyopadhyay is the Director at the Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), New Delhi, India. Anju Dwivedi is Associate Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR), New Delhi, India. Sumona Das Gupta is an Independent Researcher, New Delhi, India. Bharti is a Senior Research Associate at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR), New Delhi, India.

1. Urban Sanitation Landscape in India: Setting the Context 2. Social Innovation in Urban Sanitation: Experiences from India 3. Organisation Building for Urban Sanitation: Organizing the Unorganised 4. Sustainable Behaviour Change in the Community  5. Sanitation Work and Workers: Prioritising Issues of Rights, Dignity and Safety  6. Innovative Technology in Urban Sanitation: Connecting the Disconnect  7. Multistakeholder Capacity Building for Inclusive Urban Sanitation 8. Urban Sanitation: Policy Research and Advocacy