The editors of International Development Planning Review have selected ‘Contesting socialist state visions for modern mobilities: informal motorbike taxi drivers’ struggles and strategies on Hanoi’s streets, Vietnam’ by Sarah Turner and  Ngô Thúy Hạnh as the Featured Article for IDPR 41.1.

The paper will be free to access for a limited time here.

When asked to describe the paper, and highlight its importance, Sarah Turner stated the following:

This paper came about because I had been working with street vendors in Hanoi, the capital city of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, for over a decade, and I was becoming increasingly concerned that restrictive and punitive measures being applied to these vendors by municipal officials, might be hampering the livelihoods of other informal economy workers who utilize the city’s streets as their workplace. Hanoi’s municipal authorities, with strong backing from the central government, are conceiving an urban space replete with security, orderliness, and modernity. This is resulting in rapid changes to the city’s urban form and access to infrastructure and amenities, while informal economy workers are being sidelined from official narratives of the city’s future.

And then came the city’s proposal to ban motorbikes by 2030. I immediately wondered how xe ôm drivers – informal motorbike taxi drivers – were going to cope. Moreover, I had witnessed the rapid rise in numbers of blue (UberMoto) and green (GrabBike) jacketed app-based drivers weaving through the city’s streets. My regular ‘traditional’ xe ôm driver, Hoà, often shook his head at these younger drivers’ inability to know where to go without their trusty GPS, and made rather disparaging comments about their lack of knowledge of the fastest routes…

Hence this project was born, with the aim of investigating the mobile livelihoods and everyday politics of xe ôm drivers in Hanoi. It would not have been possible without the help of Ngô Thúy Hạnh, my Hanoi-based research assistant and good friend, who goes out of her way to support my research endeavors, and those of my students, even when it means working long hours to complete our interviews alongside her regular job. Hạnh has a natural ability to put people at ease and gaining interviewees’ trust to learn about their livelihoods and concerns beyond the ‘public transcript’. Hạnh also actively introduces new questions and elements into our research endeavors. For example, she recently noticed that traditional xe ôm drivers are now buying green GrabBike jackets and helmets to mimic the new competitors. Moreover, now that GrabBike has bought out Uber and has little competition to keep prices in check, traditional xe ôm are gaining back customers. These customers are disgruntled at the price hikes GrabBike now places on evenings and weekends. As the ban inches closer, and the competition changes in nature, our research and rides continue…