Emergence of Gated Communities in Hargeisa: Interpreting Rugsan Gardens Through Global Theory and Local Dynamics

Abstract

In recent years, gated communities have been on the rise across the African continent. In Somaliland, gated communities are a relatively new housing typology, and despite abundant research on gated communities in other contexts, there is a lack of study on the emergence of gated communities in Somali cities, particularly in Hargeisa, the capital of Somaliland. The thesis aims to fill that gap and studies the phenomenon of gated communities, focusing on the factors that have contributed to its development. Thus, the thesis adopted Watson’s (2014) theorization of speculative urbanism as its guiding theoretical framework, using it to examine how similar dynamics are unfolding in Hargeisa. The study conducted a qualitative case study on Rugsan Gardens, a gated community recently developed in Hargeisa. It used a combination of qualitative research methods, including media and document analysis, spatial observation of the site, and in-depth semi-structured interviews with Hargeisa local government officials, the developers, and residents of Rugsan Gardens. The study found that a coalition of profit-oriented property developers, a rising middle class, and an enabling planning environment is driving the emergence of gated communities in Hargeisa, similarly as Watson (2014) argued in other African cities.

In the context of Hargeisa, the developers are conglomerates many of whom started out as money transfer operators (MTOs), these actors have access to capital accumulated from diverse sectors. They find real estate a great place to invest and generate profit against the backdrop of declining remittance transfer operations. They borrow development models similar to those observed in cities like Nairobi and actively push them by branding gated communities as smart investments and desirable lifestyles. In doing so, they attract a consumer base that has long been embedded in Hargeisa’s property market, a significant portion of whom are diaspora or have experienced “global” urban lifestyles that resonate with the developers’ speculative narrative of modernity, lifestyle, and global aspirations. Together, they form a speculative coalition that drives the development of gated communities, further encouraged by a supportive planning environment that lacks the regulatory and policy frameworks to oversee them.

The study also found speculative gated developments are realized through mechanisms of housing financialization. Gated communities in Hargeisa represent spatial and cultural products of financial capital as much as they do of speculative urbanism. Diaspora capital and conglomerate investments, treating housing as a financial asset, provide the capital logics that drive these developments, while speculative urbanism captures the way this process is realized through coalitions, marketing narratives, and future-oriented imaginaries. Furthermore, the thesis finds that the ways both the capital and the speculative narratives land in Hargeisa reflect local dynamics of clan and social networks, and the hybrid system of governance that defines the urban character of the city.

The thesis finally argues that the financial speculative coalition finds the peripheries of Hargeisa as the spatial frontier where their logic materializes. For conglomerates, the peripheries provide large tracts of land to develop at scale and realize the standard and branded imaginaries of their developments. For consumers, the peripheries are marketed as peaceful, retirement-suited away from the crowdedness of the city. These conditions make the peripheries highly favorable for speculation. As a result, gated communities are emerging and concentrated in these areas, joining other speculative and peripheral processes under which Hargeisa’s rapid urbanization has unfolded. In turn, gated communities amplify existing inequalities on the peripheries, as gated communities access private infrastructure and services, while neighboring areas remain underserved, fragmented, and disconnected from municipal support.