In Novem\u00adber 2025, Bri\u00adtish anthro\u00adpo\u00adlo\u00adgist Keith Hart died in Paris. He was 81 years old.<\/p>\n
Hart had many inte\u00adrests, but sin\u00adce it was him who intro\u00addu\u00adced the dimen\u00adsi\u00adon of eco\u00adno\u00admic \u201cinfor\u00adma\u00adli\u00adty\u201d into deve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment poli\u00adcy deba\u00adtes, my com\u00admen\u00adta\u00adry is a tri\u00adbu\u00adte to his ori\u00adgi\u00adnal con\u00adtri\u00adbu\u00adti\u00adon, loo\u00adking back six\u00adty years when a field cal\u00adled \u201cdeve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment eco\u00adno\u00admics\u201d was still in its for\u00adma\u00adti\u00adve years.<\/p>\n
1965, Gha\u00adna: Keith Hart, Ph.D. stu\u00addent of Cam\u00adbridge Uni\u00adver\u00adsi\u00adty, starts his PhD field rese\u00adarch on rural-urban migra\u00adti\u00adon. He spends two years, most\u00adly in Accra, and gets amp\u00adle oppor\u00adtu\u00adni\u00adties to stu\u00addy the eco\u00adno\u00admy of poor urban hou\u00adse\u00adholds.<\/p>\n
1971, Sus\u00adsex. Back in the U.K., Hart par\u00adti\u00adci\u00adpa\u00adtes at a deve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment con\u00adfe\u00adrence on \u201cUrban unem\u00adployment in Afri\u00adca\u201d at the \u201cInsti\u00adtu\u00adte of Deve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment Stu\u00addies\u201d. The\u00adse were times when migra\u00adti\u00adon to cities and urban unem\u00adployment was a big topic among deve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment eco\u00adno\u00admists.<\/p>\n
At the con\u00adfe\u00adrence, Hart deli\u00advers a paper on \u201cUrban employment and infor\u00admal inco\u00adme oppor\u00adtu\u00adni\u00adties\u201d, based on evi\u00addence from Gha\u00adna \u2013 instru\u00admen\u00adtal for the stu\u00addy of the \u201cinfor\u00admal sec\u00adtor\u201d. His aim is essen\u00adti\u00adal\u00adly to show that the urban poor are not unem\u00adployed \u2013 to the con\u00adtra\u00adry, they were con\u00adstant\u00adly loo\u00adking for infor\u00admal inco\u00adme oppor\u00adtu\u00adni\u00adties.<\/p>\n
The importance of this seems evi\u00addent now, but had remain\u00aded in the shadow of a then domi\u00adnant focus on \u201cunem\u00adployment\u201d. Hart never concei\u00adved of the infor\u00admal eco\u00adno\u00admic acti\u00advi\u00adties as a \u201csec\u00adtor\u201d \u2013 like manu\u00adfac\u00adtu\u00adring or agri\u00adcul\u00adtu\u00adre. He insi\u00adsted that for\u00admal and infor\u00admal dimen\u00adsi\u00adons of an eco\u00adno\u00admy always have to be stu\u00addi\u00aded tog\u00ade\u00adther.<\/p>\n
Today, \u201cinfor\u00adma\u00adli\u00adty\u201d and the infor\u00admal sphe\u00adre of the eco\u00adno\u00admy are still very pre\u00adsent in our deba\u00adtes, most recent\u00adly after the Covid-19-shocks that cau\u00adsed a dra\u00adstic reduc\u00adtion of for\u00admal employment in many eco\u00adno\u00admies.<\/p>\n
I have seen two ways, in which the con\u00adcept is put to work<\/p>\n
On the one hand, the infor\u00admal eco\u00adno\u00admy con\u00adtri\u00adbu\u00adtes to the liveli\u00adhoods of the poor \u2013 working with the resour\u00adces at your dis\u00adpo\u00adsal and respon\u00adding to the dearth of employment in the for\u00admal eco\u00adno\u00admy. This dimen\u00adsi\u00adon abso\u00adlut\u00ade\u00adly needs to enter into the frame\u00adworks of deve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment poli\u00adci\u00ades, and inde\u00aded it has infor\u00admed many of tho\u00adse poli\u00adci\u00ades over the last deca\u00addes.<\/p>\n
On the other hand, given the lack of regu\u00adla\u00adti\u00adon, social secu\u00adri\u00adty, work\u00adplace safe\u00adty in the infor\u00admal eco\u00adno\u00admy, poli\u00adcy-makers often cal\u00adled for regu\u00adla\u00adti\u00adon, effec\u00adtively a \u201cfor\u00adma\u00adlizati\u00adon\u201d of the infor\u00admal sphe\u00adre. This can refer to busi\u00adness per\u00admits, taxes, safe\u00adty at the work place, access to cre\u00addit, and many other things.<\/p>\n
Keith Hart has the last word.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had no ambi\u00adti\u00adon to coin a concept\u2026I meant my eth\u00adno\u00adgra\u00adphy to per\u00adsua\u00adde deve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment eco\u00adno\u00admists to aban\u00addon the unem\u00adployment model. More was going on in the grass\u00adroots eco\u00adno\u00admy than they ima\u00adgi\u00adned.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Refe\u00adren\u00adces<\/p>\n Hart, K.<\/p>\n 1973. Infor\u00admal inco\u00adme oppor\u00adtu\u00adni\u00adties and urban employment. Jour\u00adnal of Modern Afri\u00adcan Stu\u00addies<\/strong>. Pp. 61\u201389.<\/p>\n 2022. Self in the World. <\/strong>Con\u00adnec\u00adting Life\u2019s Extre\u00admes. New York: Berg\u00adhahn Books. Pp. 98\u2013100.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In Novem\u00adber 2025, Bri\u00adtish anthro\u00adpo\u00adlo\u00adgist Keith Hart died in Paris. He was 81 years old. Hart had many inte\u00adrests, but sin\u00adce it was him who intro\u00addu\u00adced the dimen\u00adsi\u00adon of eco\u00adno\u00admic \u201cinfor\u00adma\u00adli\u00adty\u201d into deve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment poli\u00adcy deba\u00adtes, my com\u00admen\u00adta\u00adry is a tri\u00adbu\u00adte to his ori\u00adgi\u00adnal con\u00adtri\u00adbu\u00adti\u00adon, loo\u00adking back six\u00adty years when a field cal\u00adled \u201cdeve\u00adlo\u00adp\u00adment eco\u00adno\u00admics\u201d was still in its for\u00adma\u00adti\u00adve years.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2143,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"both","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":301,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-586","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-allgemein","category-diversity"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=586"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":768,"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/586\/revisions\/768"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jurgschneider.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}