罗伯特·巴克利（Robert Buckley）介绍了他的研究，世界上最大的城市如何为他们的第一个下水道系统提供资金。历史经验并不能为撒哈拉以南非洲城市面临的问题提供前传。但是，对历史经历的回顾确实提出了一些感兴趣的话题。特别是，本文解决了有关投资如何资助的历史辩论。也就是说，是某些人声称的直接受益人所支付的投资还是外部财务？本文还讨论了投资对卫生和市政府机构转型的影响。最后，考虑到两个时期之间的相似之处和差异，它表明需要更加紧迫地解决许多撒哈拉以南城市的城市卫生问题。

鲍勃·巴克利（Bob Buckley）是城市学院的附属学者。  Between 2008 and 2016 he was the Julian Studley Fellow at the New School and Managing Director at the Rockefeller Foundation. Prior to that he was an Advisor and Principal Economist at the World Bank, and Deputy Assistant Secretary and Chief Economist at the U.S. Dept of Housing and Urban Development. He has also taught at NYU Abu Dhabi, Johns Hopkins, and the University of Pennsylvania. He has written widely on urbanization and development in both the popular press — The Financial Times, New York Times, Nature, and academic journals — Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Economic Development and Cultural Change, and The European Journal of Law and Economics. He has also helped support Bank and Foundation projects in a variety of places.