Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction : the changing politics of informality : collective org anizing, alliances and scales of engagement / Ilda Lindell -- Seen but not heard : urban voice and citizenship for street traders / Alison Bro wn and Michal Lyons -- The politics of vulnerability : exit, voice and capture in three Nigerian informal manufacturing clusters / Kate Meaghe r -- Women leaders and the sense of power : clientelism and citizenship at the Dantokpa market in Cotonou, Benin / Ebbe Prag -- Alliances acro ss the formal-informal divide : South African debates and Nigerian expe riences / Gunilla Andrae and Bjèorn Beckman -- Self-organized informal workers and trade union initiatives in Malawi : organizing the informal economy / Ignasio Malizani Jimu -- Moments of resistance : the struggl e against informalization in Cape Town / David Christoffer Jordhus-Lier -- The possibilities for collective organization of informal port work ers in Tema, Ghana / Owusu Boampong -- The 'China challenge' : the glob al dimensions of activism and the informal economy in Dakar / Suzanne S cheld -- Passport, please : the Cross-Border Traders Association in Zam bia / Wilma S. Nchito and Karen Tranberg Hansen -- Informal workers in Kenya and transnational organizing : networking and leveraging resource s / Winnie V. Mitullah.