1.1 INTRODUCING THE SERVICE DELIVERY AND CITIZEN PARTICIPATION CONUNDRUM IN KHAYELITSHA
This study presents an assessment of connections between service delivery – water services in particular – and participatory strategies adopted by different communities. This study was thought-out within a context of heightened militancy in local government as exemplified by the widespread and so called service delivery protests in 2005-2006. A large body of literature (e.g. Benit-Gbaffou 2008a, 2008b, Piper and Nadvi 2010, Tapscott 2010, 2005, Ballard et al 2006, Miraftab 2006, and Zeurn 2001) already exists on the state-civil society nexus in the post apartheid era. A majority of these studies point to the failure of the institutionalised participatory system of governance such as ward committees and integrated development planning. Such failures of the mainstream participatory channels have inevitably set in motion the shifts towards unconventional methods such as protests and court action, which have been relatively more successful in attracting an audience and making voices heard.
Protest itself though is not a novel phenomenon in South Africa, as protest formed a key component of the anti-apartheid struggle. Yet there is a crucial distinction. In the colonial and apartheid eras, black peoples’ participation in governance was circumscribed through a host of laws directed at alienating their South African citizenship. This teeming obsession with and desire to subjugate the African to a permanent underclass in all their existence outside the homeland did not dissuade the black Africans from migrating into ‘white’ urban South Africa. Migration in search of job opportunities mainly in urban areas and mining compounds was a means of ...
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... able to extract compromises from the state through their ability to harness resources required to engage in intricate disputes by utilising various spaces such as mass media, the internet, and enlisting the courts.
In urban areas, transformation of citizenship requires the removal of race as the central basis of planning. While the ongoing transformation has resulted in legal exclusion of foundations of apartheid and the emergence of class as the central cleavage, the quality of urban services and socio-economic access arguably retains roots of the old. For many of the poor, the huge inequalities between their lot and rich and overwhelmingly white population of which the ‘Boers are the avowed nemesis, centres around the quality of houses and associated services at the disposal of the privileged class, and forms the basis on which to measure full citizenship.
The loss of public housing and the expanse of the wealth gap throughout the state of Rhode Island has been a rising issue between the critics and supporters of gentrification, in both urban areas such as Providence and wealthy areas such as the island of Newport, among other examples. With the cities under a monopoly headed by the wealth of each neighborhood, one is left to wonder how such a system is fair to all groups. Relatively speaking, it isn’t, and the only ones who benefit from such a system are white-skinned. With the deterioration of the economic status of Rhode Island, and especially in the city of Providence, more and more educated Caucasians are leaving to seek a more fertile economic environment.
Jeff Chang, a music critic and journalist, addresses racial unrest on college campuses across the country in the essay “What A Time To Be Alive” in his most recent book We Gon’ Be Alright. Chang starts off the essay with the University of Missouri situation between former President Tim Wolfe, and graduate student Jonathan Butler, as a specific example of racial protests on college campuses. To continue he begins to address the public’s reactions to these protests as some said students were a threat to free speech. In the important study Chang adds a historical reference talking about the end of the apartheid in South Africa. The apartheid was a policy of segregation on grounds of race during the years of 1948-1991. “Roelf Meyer served as the National Party’s vice minister of police from 1985-1988. His job was to stop demonstrations in Black townships by any means. Throughout his work he began to
Shaskolsky, Leon. “The Negro Protest Movement- Revolt or Reform?.” Phylon 29 (1963): 156-166. JSTOR. U of Illinois Lib., Urbana. 11 Apr. 2004 .
Political protesting within today’s society is often relegated to mass marches, social media usage, and other large acts. Unfortunately, small and simple everyday acts of protest are often overlooked or deemed useless in the long run. Sadly, this diminishes most of the protests that take place within America. However, this is not a new trend, but one that can be seen throughout American history, specifically within Jim Crow laws and segregation Deep South during World War II. Within Robin Kelley’s “Congested Terrain,” the way lower and middle-class black citizens fought for their rights to the public spaces within Birmingham Alabama are explored. Because the space in buses was much less defined that other public, segregated spaces, black
“gentrification as an ugly product of greed”. Yet these perspectives miss the point. Gentrification is a byproduct of mankind's continuing interest in advancing the notion that one group is more superior to another and worthy of capitalistic consumption with little regard to social consciousness. It is elitism with the utmost and exclusionary politics to the core. This has been a constant theme of mankind taking or depleting space for personal gain.
Wilson, W.J. (1996). From Instituional to Jobless Ghettos. In R.T. Legates, & F. Stout (Eds.). The City Reader (pp. 110-119). New York, NY: Routledge.
In the second chapter of the book "Planet of Slums," Mike Davis seeks to answer what characteristics and types of slums are prevalent in different parts of the world. Davis continues his startled, alarmed, disgruntled and depressing tone from the previous chapter. Overall, the chapter is divided into two parts. The first part attempts to explore and examine the global slum census, and the other part describes the various slum typologies
Social Protest Cry the Beloved Country was a book written to bring about change. Through out the book Alan Paton reveal the social injustices of South Africa. This whole book, although a fictional stories, is to protest of the ways of South Africa. Paton brings up the inequity of the natives’ verses the whites; he makes points about education, superiority, and separation. Paton clearly showed that the white man is superiority to the black, he gives numerous examples throughout the novel. The white man had more money, a better job, a nicer house… With James Jarvis, Paton showed that he was superior by making him live on high place, because he was so much superior than the natives that lived below him. At the end of the book James Jarvis (even though he had changed) could not get off his horse to talk to Steven Kumalo. He could have easily gotten off but "such a thing is not lightly done" (307). Paton includes this part in the novel to show that the white man can be amicable with the natives, but they will always have to come out on top. The whites needed to feel like they were on a higher level than the natives. If this country ever wants to be as one the whites are going to have to give up there need for superiority. Many times in the novel Paton showed there was a problem without even saying it. One of the major examples of that would be when he gave the scene of people asking "Have you a room to let?" and the response would always be "no I have no room to let"(85). Paton dosent outright say that its horrible that there is not even enough housing for the natives and they have to cram together in shared houses with no privicy at all. He just tells us the story and the reader recognize that there is a problem. Paton offten leves it up to the reader to figure out the social injustices of South Africa. When Kumalo was talking about his son Absolam he said "he is in prison for the most terrible deed a man can do, He killed a white man" (144). Here Paton shows, again, how whites were considered to be superior to blacks. It could have been said the worst thing to do is kill a man, but in South Africa’s society it was not the same if a black man was murdered as compared to a white man.
South Africa had always have youth leaders with similar ideology in transforming the country into a non-racial and multicultural community. In addition to that, people like Nelson Mandela “African National Congress” (ANC), Steve Biko “Black Consciousness Movement, play important role on transf...
Charlick, R. (2000) "Popular participation and Local Government Reforms" Africa Notes, New York: Cornell University, (April) pp1-5
South Africa remains one of the most unequal societies in the world, but the constitution’s transformative nature aims to eradicate this inequality. The constitution supports substantive equality with the focus on social reconstruction. Substantive equality takes into account that some groups have previously experienced disadvantage, and that measures should be put in place to right the wrongs of the past by bringing these groups on t...
...rry their pass books (“Black’s resistance to Apartheid”). “During 1980 there were 304 major incidents concerning struggle with apartheid including arrests, tear gas violence, stoning, and strikes (“Black’s resistance to Apartheid”). In 1986 violent conflict forced the government to assert a national state of emergency (Wright, 68). The Public Safety Act increased penalties such as fining, imprisonment, and whippings for protesting the law (“History of South Africa in the apartheid era”).
South Africa has a conflicted variety of capitalism as it displays a range of CME-like labour regulations and neo-patrimonialism but it is in conflict with the more liberal economic environment that is claims to have. These adversarial labour relations resulted in the class compromise which contributed to the violence of the Marikana Massacre. This Marikana saga has had a huge effect on the economy, stalling foreign investments and the loss of countless millions of rands. Despite this wake-up call for South African executives, nothing has really changed this protectionist relationship that the state has with capital. There seems to be no immediate prospects for a more co-ordinated, social democratic variety of capitalism on South Africa’s horizon.
The polarization of the social and cultural landscape is reflected in the complex political machinations behind the provision of water resources. Municipal Corporation of the Greater Mumbai (MCGM), the municipal government of Mumbai, is responsible for distributing and allocating water resources in the city. The centralized nature of this governing body and the ongoing water crisis lends itself to corruption, misallocation, and preferential treatment of favored parties. With limited political representation, residents of informal settlements are consistently and systematically denied adequate access to water resources and sanitation. The MCGM for example, officially offers slum dwellers 45 liters per person per day of water, a mere 30% of the amount allocated to a citizens living in...
Dr. Alex Borraine once said, “ I still believe that goodness and beauty, compassion and new beginnings, can triumph over the evil which seems to be all-persuasive.” Archbishop Desmond Tutu is an incredibly controversial man, with this being said his speech at Stellenbosch in August 2011 made headlines around the world. His speech was about the fact that the white population, being the beneficiaries of the apartheid system, should pay a “wealth tax”. This caused heavy debate within our country and therefore the main topic that will be addressed in this essay. Specific reference will be made to transformative constitutionalism and whether this “wealth tax” would be constitutional within our country.