Protest in South Africa : Rejection, Reassertion, Reclamation / edited by Heidi Brooks, Rekgotsofetse Chikane and Shauna Mottiar.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Chikane

Contributor:

Chikane, Rekgotsofetse, editor.

Brooks, Heidi, editor.

Mottiar, Shauna, editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Demonstrations--South Africa.

Demonstrations.

Civil rights--South Africa.

Civil rights.

Protest movements--South Africa.

Protest movements.

South Africa--Politics and government--1994-.

South Africa.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (402 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

The Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection (MISTRA) 2023

Johannesburg, South Africa : Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection (MISTRA), [2023]

Summary:

Popular protest has become a regular feature of post-1994 South Africa. As a young democracy born out of resistance, we may understand the contemporary manifestations of protest as extensions of this broader history. However, it is notably in the context of formal democratic institutions that popular protest has become an increasingly normalised mode of influencing policy, demanding service delivery and forcing change. Protest is constitutive of South Africa's democratic politics, but also reflective of it. Protest in South Africa: Rejection, reassertion, reclamation explores the underpinnings of contemporary protest and both its short-term causes and structural drivers. Focusing on the surge of protest from the mid-2000s, this edited volume provides an overview of the complexity of protest action, the diversity of protest spaces and actors, and responses to protest from both citizens and state. The volume situates its analysis against the backdrop of the global wave of protest witnessed since the turn of the 21 century, while examining protest in South Africa's local and historical contexts. Contributors to the volume examine protests in relation to, among other factors, provision of infrastructure and services, contestations around socio-economic development, issues of citizenship, and demands for inclusive democratic governance. Chapters also examine the role of women in protest action, the policing of protest, and the intersection of protest action with spaces of formal politics. The volume also alerts us to the darker side of protest, and the destruction and division it may foment. It thus considers the prospects of South Africa's evolving, sometimes violent, protest terrain for social and state stability and democratic progress. In the diversity of spaces, sectors and communities of interests in which collective action has emerged, Protest in South Africa: Rejection, reassertion, reclamation shows how protest is underpinned by a rejection of the status quo, a reassertion of interests, and a reclaiming of the political and democratic space.

Contents:

Cover

Title page

Copyright page

Contents

Acknowledgement of funders

Acronyms and abbreviations

Contributors

Preface

ONE - The architecture of protest in South Africa: Contexts and underpinnings

WHY PROTEST, WHY NOW?

SOUTH AFRICA IN AN ERA OF PROTEST

SOUTH AFRICA'S PROTEST ARCHITECTURE

RESPONSES TO PROTEST ACTIVITY

CHAPTER CONTRIBUTIONS

REFERENCES

Part One. Complex causes in protest trends and dynamics

TWO - Protest in an age of contention: South Africa's resonances with the Global South and beyond

INTRODUCTION

CONTENTIOUS POLITICS AND PROTEST STATES

CONTESTING EXCLUSION: UNDERPINNING THEMES IN PROTEST ACTION

CONCLUSION

THREE - The nexus of citizen, party and state in accumulating protest repertoires in South Africa

INTRODUCTION AND THE PROTEST BENCHMARKS OF 2021-2022

THE CHANGING CITIZEN-PARTY-STATE NEXUS LEVERAGING 2021-2022 PROTEST

RACE, CLASS, SOCIETY AND STATE AMID INCREASING PROTEST

CONCEPTUALISING AND MAPPING THE CHANGING NEXUS

ACCUMULATING PROTEST REPERTOIRES IN SOUTH AFRICA: ESTABLISHING AN ORDINAL-LEVEL TYPOLOGY

CONCLUSION: THE EVOLVING NEXUS

FOUR - Protest apathy in South Africa

PROTESTS AND PROTEST APATHY

PROTEST APATHY AS MAINTAINING THE STATUS QUO

DATA AND METHOD

RESULTS

ROBUSTNESS TEST

APPENDIX

Part Two - The architecture of protest

FIVE - Gendering protests: Mapping women's participation in community protests in Duncan Village, Eastern Cape

POSITIONING OMAMA BOMANYANO IN COMMUNITY PROTESTS

METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH

THEORETICAL REFLECTIONS

GENDERING PROTESTS

CASE STUDY ANALYSIS

BLACK SUNDAY AND THE BANTU SQUARE MASSACRE (1952)

THE DUNCAN VILLAGE MASSACRE (1985)

REESTON 87 PROTEST (2014).

RECASTING WOMEN AT THE PICKET LINE

CONCLUDING REMARKS

SIX - Rural protests against imposed development processes and environmental damage: Fishing communities in the Eastern Cape's Wild Coast

HISTORY AND CAUSES OF RURAL PROTESTS IN SOUTH AFRICA

GAS AND OIL EXPLORATION IN THE WILD COAST: A CASE OF CONTINUITIES IN THE IMPOSITION OF DEVELOPMENT

SHELL'S INTEREST IN THE WILD COAST AND THE RESPONSE OF THE AFFECTED COASTAL COMMUNITIES

SEVEN - Dying to drink: Water tenderpreneurs, community agency and protest in Mothutlung, North West

PROTEST AS SEEKING RECOURSE, ASSERTING AGENCY AND MORE

GRIEVANCES DRIVING WATER AND SANITATION PROTESTS IN SOUTH AFRICA

WATER INTERRUPTIONS AND TENDERPRENEURS IN MADIBENG LOCAL MUNICIPALITY

LOCAL GOVERNANCE, COMMUNITY AGENCY AND SOCIO-POLITICAL CHANGE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

EIGHT - Electricity contestations and infrastructural citizenship: Protest in Lamontville, Durban

THE PROTEST-ELECTRICITY TERRAIN

INFRASTRUCTURE AND CITIZENSHIP

METHODS AND STUDY AREA

FRAGMENTATION THROUGH INFRASTRUCTURE

GUARDING AND CLAIMING INFRASTRUCTURE

INFRASTRUCTURE AS CITIZEN MODIFICATION

NINE - Weaponising grassroots democracy: Operation Dudula's right-wing populism and the need for a countermovement

'WEAPONISATION' OF EVERYTHING

WEAPONISATION OF ACTIVE CITIZENSHIP AND GRASSROOTS DEMOCRACY

METHODOLOGY: PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEARCH

THE STORY OF DUDULA

CRITIQUES OF DUDULA FROM AN ANTI-CAPITALIST PERSPECTIVE: KOPANANG USING 'VOICE' TO CHALLENGE STRUCTURAL OPPRESSION

TEN - Beyond protest: Violence, looting and anarchy in July 2021

METHODOLOGY

THE CONTEXTUAL DYNAMICS OF KZN.

THE ARREST OF ZUMA AND ITS AFTERMATH: DESTRUCTION AND LOOTING UNLEASHED

COUNTING THE COST OF WHAT HAPPENED IN JULY 2021

WHERE WERE THE SECURITY SERVICES? MORE QUESTIONS THAN ANSWERS

Part Three. Responses and repercussions

ELEVEN - Transactional activism: Effect of the engagement practices of protest leaders on community protests in South Africa

COMMUNITY LEADERSHIP AND THE DYNAMICS OF INFORMAL REPRESENTATION IN SOUTH AFRICA

APPLICATION OF TRANSACTIONAL ACTIVISM TO COMMUNITY PROTESTS IN SOUTH AFRICA

THE CASE STUDIES AND METHODOLOGY

EXPERIENCES AND PERCEPTIONS OF CIVIC GROUP LEADERSHIP

LOCAL PERSPECTIVES ABOUT ORGANISING GROUP LEADERSHIP

PERCEIVED CHALLENGES OF TRANSACTIONAL ACTIVISM FOR COMMUNITY ORGANISING

EXTERNAL ACTOR INTERACTION: THE DEMISE OF AUTONOMOUS CIVIC GROUPS

TWELVE - Changing influences on the policing of public order in South Africa and the Global South

DEFINING THE HISTORY OF PUBLIC ORDER POLICING IN SOUTH AFRICA AND THE GLOBAL SOUTH

WHAT GOOD PUBLIC ORDER POLICING IS AND IS NOT

MAPPING THE ROUTES OF TRANSFERS OF POLICE POWER

POLICE POWER ALWAYS FINDS NEW TARGETS

THIRTEEN - Crime and punishment: Crime and policing-related protest in South Africa

CRIME AND POLICING-RELATED PROTESTS

FREQUENCY OF VIOLENCE IN CPPs

ANTI-CRIME PROTESTS AND VIGILANTISM

THE IMPACT OF POLICING ON PROTEST

FOURTEEN - Rejection, reassertion, reclamation: The underpinning sof protest in South Africa

PROTEST UNDERPINNED BY SOUTH AFRICA'S TRIPLE HELIX

LIMITATIONS OF FORMAL MECHANISMS AND ABSENCE OF SUBSTANTIVE OUTCOMES

REJECTION, REASSERTION, RECLAMATION

ERASURES IN PROTEST ACTION

BLURRED BOUNDARIES OF 'PROTEST'

CONCLUSION.

REFERENCES

Index

Back cover.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781920690380

1920690387

1-920690-38-7