Ev
E. van Tuijl
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5 records found
1
Platforms for the urban poor
Platform frugality in Mathare informal settlement
Limited attention has been paid to platforms in informal settlements, where residents face multiple, simultaneous resource constraints. We address this challenge by elucidating how informal settlement residents use platforms to address resource constraints and by identifying limitations to platform deployment. Conceptually, we combine literature on platforms and informal settlements with that on frugal innovation to distinguish various platform domains and introduce the concept of platform frugality to explain platform deployment. Based on an empirical case study of Mathare informal settlement, we reveal that platform frugality varies across domains. Social media and certain fintech platforms are more frugal than other platforms and are more widely deployed in informal settlements, addressing more resource constraints. More advanced fintech, gig, health, and utility platforms are rarely used in informal settlements. Generic limitations to platform deployment include costs and residents' lack of formal IDs.
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Limited attention has been paid to platforms in informal settlements, where residents face multiple, simultaneous resource constraints. We address this challenge by elucidating how informal settlement residents use platforms to address resource constraints and by identifying limitations to platform deployment. Conceptually, we combine literature on platforms and informal settlements with that on frugal innovation to distinguish various platform domains and introduce the concept of platform frugality to explain platform deployment. Based on an empirical case study of Mathare informal settlement, we reveal that platform frugality varies across domains. Social media and certain fintech platforms are more frugal than other platforms and are more widely deployed in informal settlements, addressing more resource constraints. More advanced fintech, gig, health, and utility platforms are rarely used in informal settlements. Generic limitations to platform deployment include costs and residents' lack of formal IDs.
Informal smart urbanism
A case study of digital resilience in Mathare informal settlement
Journal article
(2026)
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Jan Fransen, Erwin van Tuijl, Harrison Kioko Simon, Stephen Ochieng Nyagaya, Samuel Kiriro
Informal smart urbanism is an emerging field that explores how digital technologies shape urban development in contexts marked by informality. We understand informality as a dynamic set of interactions that arise when formal regulations fail to meet people’s needs. Our study analyses digital resilience practices—the everyday ways households respond to shocks through digital technologies. These practices are widespread but often overlooked, especially given the vulnerabilities inherent in informal settings. We explore how repetitive digital practices form extra-legal rules. In Mathare, Kenya, four forms of digital resilience practices emerge: (1) belt tightening: households with low resilience use digital networks to receive digital gifts, replacing non-digital support; (2) maladaptive: digital tools are used in ways that undermine community resilience; (3) adaptive: digital platforms are used to strengthen household resilience in the short term; and (4) transformative: digital technologies systemically improve household resilience in the long term.
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Informal smart urbanism is an emerging field that explores how digital technologies shape urban development in contexts marked by informality. We understand informality as a dynamic set of interactions that arise when formal regulations fail to meet people’s needs. Our study analyses digital resilience practices—the everyday ways households respond to shocks through digital technologies. These practices are widespread but often overlooked, especially given the vulnerabilities inherent in informal settings. We explore how repetitive digital practices form extra-legal rules. In Mathare, Kenya, four forms of digital resilience practices emerge: (1) belt tightening: households with low resilience use digital networks to receive digital gifts, replacing non-digital support; (2) maladaptive: digital tools are used in ways that undermine community resilience; (3) adaptive: digital platforms are used to strengthen household resilience in the short term; and (4) transformative: digital technologies systemically improve household resilience in the long term.
Invisible hands in energy transitions
Installers in the European post-industrial cities of Gothenburg and Rotterdam
Journal article
(2025)
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Erwin van Tuijl, Martin de Jong, Peter Knorringa, Emma Björner, Sara Brorström
This paper focuses on the specific role of installers, a category of often overlooked diffusion intermediaries doing the actual implementation of energy transitions. We adopt an ecosystems perspective and aim to provide new knowledge on the installers' role in energy transitions, possible changes in this role, and the challenges installers face. Based on evidence from case studies in Gothenburg and Rotterdam, we first show how installers make or break energy transitions. They differ from other intermediaries in their long-term trust relations with customers, their deep contextual knowledge, and involvement in post-technology deployment. We unveil new nuances regarding downstream (installers deploy strategies to include budget-constrained customers in energy transitions) and upstream actors (installers face manufacturers' lock-ins and are trained by wholesalers and manufacturers). Secondly, we show challenges installers face caused by regulatory, market and technological dynamics in transitions, and identify new roles for them as IT-specialists, manufacturers and holistic advisors.
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This paper focuses on the specific role of installers, a category of often overlooked diffusion intermediaries doing the actual implementation of energy transitions. We adopt an ecosystems perspective and aim to provide new knowledge on the installers' role in energy transitions, possible changes in this role, and the challenges installers face. Based on evidence from case studies in Gothenburg and Rotterdam, we first show how installers make or break energy transitions. They differ from other intermediaries in their long-term trust relations with customers, their deep contextual knowledge, and involvement in post-technology deployment. We unveil new nuances regarding downstream (installers deploy strategies to include budget-constrained customers in energy transitions) and upstream actors (installers face manufacturers' lock-ins and are trained by wholesalers and manufacturers). Secondly, we show challenges installers face caused by regulatory, market and technological dynamics in transitions, and identify new roles for them as IT-specialists, manufacturers and holistic advisors.
M-PESA is often cited as a landmark example of frugal innovation in the digital era. This fintech platform created an alternative banking infrastructure for people in informal economies who previously lacked access to formal banking. While M-PESA has significantly advanced financial inclusion, it has also been criticised for deepening inequalities between those who have and those who lack access, as well as enabling its operators to extract value from vulnerable users in informal settlements [i]. This case highlights an important nuance: frugal innovation should not only be understood as delivering low-cost and simple solutions, but through a more holistic lens that embeds social and political dimensions to actively tackle exclusion and inequality [ii]. This broader framing pushes us to critically examine how digital platforms do more than just lower entry barriers, they shape who ultimately benefits and who remains excluded. [...]
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M-PESA is often cited as a landmark example of frugal innovation in the digital era. This fintech platform created an alternative banking infrastructure for people in informal economies who previously lacked access to formal banking. While M-PESA has significantly advanced financial inclusion, it has also been criticised for deepening inequalities between those who have and those who lack access, as well as enabling its operators to extract value from vulnerable users in informal settlements [i]. This case highlights an important nuance: frugal innovation should not only be understood as delivering low-cost and simple solutions, but through a more holistic lens that embeds social and political dimensions to actively tackle exclusion and inequality [ii]. This broader framing pushes us to critically examine how digital platforms do more than just lower entry barriers, they shape who ultimately benefits and who remains excluded. [...]