The need to reform Kenya's law on street vending: from policing to facilitation

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Periodical article

Title:	The need to reform Kenya's law on street vending: from policing to facilitation
Author:	Sifuna, Nixon
Year:	2008
Periodical:	South African Journal on Human Rights
Volume:	24
Issue:	1
Pages:	157-179
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Kenya
Subjects:	market vendors informal sector legislation legal reform
External link:	https://doi.org/10.1080/19962126.2008.11864944
Abstract:	Kenya's existing legal framework fails to recognize street vending or hawking as a legitimate trade and an important source of livelihood, deserving of facilitation. Kenyan law adopts a policing approach, mainly proscribing the trade and treating street vendors as outlaws. The vendors' lack of legal identity as entrepreneurs has caused them to be viewed as a nuisance, rogues and criminals. The author surveys the prevailing situation of street vending in Kenya. He discusses the various conceptual perspectives on the trade (sociological, economic, human rights, legal), and examines the role that the law could play in its management. Then he examines the experiences in India and South Africa, and makes recommendations on the appropriate legal arrangements, on the premise that street vending is an important source of livelihood in developing countries such as Kenya, which are characterized by widespread poverty and unemployment. Notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract]