In informal settlement communities, activities like profiling (rapid assessment of a settlement), enumeration (household level socio-economic surveys) and mapping create space for communities to: identify development priorities, organise leadership, expose and mediate grievances between segments of the community, and cohere around future planning.
Such activities serve as a platform for engaging government and other actors involved in planning and setting policy for development in urban centres. A key aspect of community planning activities is that communities own the information they collect. When they share the data with government, they are able to create new relationships — and even institutions — that make the poor integral role players in the decisions that affect their lives.