UN-Habitat Lebanon & ESCWA State of Lebanese Cities 2021

The State of the Lebanese Cities Report presents primary and secondary data and analysis across themes relevant to sustainable development in Lebanon as an overwhelmingly urban country. Following decades of rapid and unplanned urban expansion resulting in dire inequalities in access to services and infrastructure within and between cities which have been exacerbated by the compound crisis emerging since 2019, the question is how inexorable urban growth can be harnessed as a force for sustainable development and for upholding human rights such as those to adequate housing, water and sanitation.

The report advocates for an urban bias to policy deliberations about crisis response and recovery in Lebanon. This would imply steps towards governance rescaling to whole-of-city level anchored on collaborating municipalities and city plan-making; and a functioning national spatial development framework. Together these city and national components would articulate the long-range direction for short-term responses. Such an institutional landscape would help catalyse localization of the 'urban' sustainable development goal (SDG) 11 and related SDGs and contribute to an increasingly inclusive and sustainable future for communities in Lebanon.