Removing Unfreedoms - Citizens as the Agents of Change was launched as a discussion paper at the UN-World Habitat Day in Brussels 2002. Portions of the text appear on this web site. The author, UN advisor Romi Khosla, with contributions by Jane Samuels, Sikandar Hasan and Budhi Mulyawan proposed a Five Freedom development framework for new governance charters. The proposal suggested the need not only to modify current urban policy frameworks and evaluations that deal with development, but also to share them across the globe. The development initiative was titled "Removing Unfreedoms" as these are the vital concerns emphasised by Amartya Sen.

In April 2003 further consultations took place with selected urban development experts.

In May 2003 a workshop was facilitated with the National Slum Dwellers Federation in Mumbai India in order to explore whether these ideas made any sense to them.

In July 2003 DFID and the London School of Economics organised a one day international colloquium were the work was further discussed with a diverse group of experts in the Urban development world including NGOs, donors, academics and institutions. The key respondents included Professor Amartya Sen, Lord Meghnad Desai and Antonio Vigilante from the UNDP office in Cairo, and senior advisors to the UK Department for International Development.

In January 2004 Jane Samuels was awarded a contract for a DFID funded book to lay the basis for the adoption of Removing Unfreedoms to project design and implementation.

October 2004 the pre-publication book is launched with Jane Samuels, UK DFID at the World Urban Forum in Barcelona and UN-Habitat plenary localising the Millennium Development Goals partnership.i

February 2005 the book Removing Unfreedoms Citizens as Agents of Change in Urban Development was published and presented by Jane Samuels at a plenary session of the Office of the Deputy Prime Ministers Sustainable Cities Summit in Manchester where Amartya Sen was a key speaker.

February 2005 Jane Samuels was invited by the UNDP Egypt to explore practical application to both urban and rural settings.

May 2005 the UK ODPM New Deals for Community at Preston Road Hull contracted Jane Samuels to began an exploration of current delivery plan with recommendations and observations in light of the work of Amartya Sen.

June 2005 UNDP Egypt contracted Jane Samuels for two missions to produce a proposed a guideline and tool kit designed in preparation for a learning retreat that would lead to implementing the pilot programme.

September 2005 Preston Road --the UK New Deals for Communities in Hull --funded by the Office of the Deputy Prime Ministers Neighborhood renewal unit set out a participation day with Jane Samuels to review the Removing Unfreedoms projects evaluation and future proposals of the housing programme and delivery plan.

October 2005 UNDP Egypt invited Jane Samuels to host a two learning retreat for 40 experts and consultants across Egypt. Removing Unfreedoms a Vision for Egypt. The learning retreat set out objectives and implementation strategies for a wide range of stakeholders, including urban planners evaluators, NGO's and academic institutions.

October 2005 Politics of Place Course on Urbanism for HRH the Prince of Wales’s Foundation of the Built Environment with Jane Samuels

January 2006. Project review and 6 month consultation and training begins with the UK Shoreditch Trust Housing programme in the city of London.

April 2006. UNDP final draft of Removing Unfreedoms A Vision for Egypt Guidelines and decentralized governance tool kit completed.

April 2006. UN-Habitat Slum Up-grading Facility intends to work with Removing Unfreedoms for implementing programme frameworks to monitoring and evaluation pilot in five countries.

May 2006 UK Shoreditch Trust Housing prgramme City of London.
Evaluation of five year housing delivery plan. Training day for all consultants on implementation of Removing Unfreedoms tool kit and governance policy and indicators.

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