Urban fire resilience and the right to the city: Structural pathways in Ghanaian markets and settlements

Fire outbreaks have become a recurrent urban disaster undermining the Right to the City —understood here as the collective right to safe, inclusive, and participatory urban spaces—in Ghana's rapidly urbanising centres. Despite policy commitments to inclusive and sustainable cities, repeated fires in markets and informal settlements revealed persistent structural vulnerabilities and governance breakdowns. This study examined the structural vulnerabilities through which spatial configurations, socio-economic inequalities, and institutional practices perpetuate urban fire risk in Accra and Kumasi. Using a mixed-methods approach combining geospatial analysis, household surveys, key informant interviews, and policy review, the study identified market-level fire risk patterns and traced how inadequate infrastructure, weak regulatory enforcement, and fragmented governance systems translated into heightened exposure and unequal losses. Results demonstrated clear pathways linking poor spatial planning and limited fire safety provision to recurrent fire incidents, particularly among informal traders and low-income households. It further showed that urban fire governance remained largely reactive, with minimal integration of preventive, community-led resilience practices. Grounded in the Right to the City and urban resilience frameworks, the study advanced a context-specific Fire Resilience Framework that integrated spatial planning reform, participatory governance, and low-cost technological support. It concluded that strengthening these structural pathways is critical not only for reducing fire risk, but also for advancing equitable, inclusive, and sustainable urban development in Ghana and comparable Sub-Saharan African contexts.