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Asia-Pacific Social Science Review

Abstract

This paper presents the possible merits of a local capacity development framework for the Roxas Night Market in Davao City, Philippines. As a make-shift economic space built in a section of Roxas Avenue, its presence brings to the fore issues revolving around inclusive space, freedoms for street vendors, and power of the local government unit (LGU). These concerns gain extra premium in the night market where space access and use are confined and limited, where vendors struggle to find permanent vending sites, and where the LGU is forced and challenged to do something about the growing number of street vendors. With these concerns, the proposed local capacity development framework underscores the need to re-think inclusivity in the language of space, freedoms, and power. Concerning space, a night market is inclusive when it occasions the productive overlap between the history of vendors and their plans for the future (lived space), the way vendors use their actual and confined space (space as practiced), and the rules of LGU being the planner of the night market (conceived space). About freedoms (Sen), the framework acknowledges the synergy of freedom in terms of economic options, political support, transparency mechanisms, social-welfare opportunities, and protective security. Concerning power (Foucault), the night market can be inclusive if it allows both vendors and the LGU to dialogue in the exercise of their agency.

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