Governing Ourselves for Sustainability: Everyday Ingenuities in the Governance of Water Infrastructure in the Informal Settlements of Dar es Salaam Francis Dakyaga 1,2,3 & Abubakari Ahmed 4 & Mavis Lepiinlia Sillim 5,6 Accepted: 1 October 2020/ # Springer Nature B.V. 2020 Abstract Everyday ingenuities have gained hegemony in urban governance scholarship in the Global South, especially regarding the informal settlements of sub-Saharan Africa, where public water services are limited. Within the global commitment to sustainabil- ity, through the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), this article explores how non- state actors (water service providers) develop and sustain water infrastructure (provide, manage water systems for continued availability) in the informal settlements, through the lens of the everyday ingenuities and governance for sustainability framework, and a qualitative research approach. The study realized the involvement of individuals and group of actors in water infrastructure governance. The actors self-mobilized resources and develop low-cost water infrastructure systems. The actors engaged in a gamut of actions, transactions, clientelist (broker and clients’ relationships), and interactions (buying and selling of water, networking, production, cooperation, partnerships) to manage water infrastructure, the practices were guided by unwritten rules and regula- tions, and not independent of state actors’ interactions, but formed and developed through the relations between state and non-state water service providers. The findings suggest that water infrastructures in the informal settlements are developed and sustained through the everyday act of inventing, repetitive self-actions, ordering and disordering of the rules and mechanisms, among the inter-depending actors (producers and resellers of water), and their interactional relationship with the state water utility provider (DAWASA). Keywords Urban politics . Everyday practices . Urban sustainability . Self-governance . Informal settlements . Sub-Saharan Africa Urban Forum https://doi.org/10.1007/s12132-020-09412-6 * Francis Dakyaga francis.dakyaga@tu–dortmund.de; fdakyaga.fd@gmail.com Extended author information available on the last page of the article