Laurence Piper | University West, Sweden (original) (raw)

Books by Laurence Piper

Rick Turner's Politics as The Art of the Impossible, 2024

Rick Turner was a South African academic and activist who rebelled against apartheid at the heigh... more Rick Turner was a South African academic and activist who rebelled against apartheid at the height of its power. This volume engages critically with his work on race relations, his relationship with Steve Biko, his views on religion, education and gender oppression, his model of participatory democracy, and critique of economic inequality.

Rick Turner was a South African academic and activist who rebelled against apartheid at the height of its power and was assassinated in 1978 when he was 32 years old, but his life and work are testimony to the power of philosophical thinking for humans everywhere. Turner chose to live freely in an unfree time and argued for a non-racial, socialist future in a context where this seemed unimaginable.

This book considers Rick Turner’s challenge that political theorising requires thinking in a utopian way. Turner’s seminal book The Eye of the Needle: Towards a Participatory Democracy in South Africa laid out potent ideas on a radically different political and economic system. His demand was that we work to escape the limiting ideas of the present, carefully design a just future based on shared human values, and act to make it a reality, both politically and in our daily lives.

The contributors to this volume engage critically with Turner’s work on race relations, his relationship with Steve Biko, his views on religion, education and gender oppression, his model of participatory democracy, and his critique of poverty and economic inequality. It’s an important contribution to contemporary thinking and activism.

Edited by Bettina von Lieres and Laurence Piper, this book sets out to answer what appears to be ... more Edited by Bettina von Lieres and Laurence Piper, this book sets out to answer what appears to be a deceptively simple question: How do poor and marginalized citizens engage the state in the Global South? Drawing on twelve case studies from around the world, this book explore the politics of ‘mediated citizenship’ in which citizens are represented to the state through third-party intermediaries who ‘speak for’ the people they represent. These intermediaries include political parties, non-governmental organisations, community-based organisations, social movements, armed non-state actors, networks or individuals. Collectively, the cases show that mediation is both widely practiced and multi-directional in relations between states and key groups of citizens in the Global South. Furthermore, they show how mediated forms of representation may have an important role to play in deepening democracy in the Global South.

Papers by Laurence Piper

Evidence & Policy, 2024

Background: The article analyses the policy engagement component of a research project on climate... more Background: The article analyses the policy engagement component of a research project on climate resilience in vulnerable communities that took place in Cape Town, South Africa. Conducted in 2022, the engagement included community and stakeholder events in three research sites, and a cross-cutting policy event with municipal officials, held at the end of the project. Importantly, this policy engagement process occurred in a context of political marginalisation, that is, one characterised by low trust, and little meaningful representation or even communication between these vulnerable communities and the city.
Aims and objectives: This article examines the impact of policy engagement on political relations between local government and vulnerable communities.
Methods: The overall methodology of the article is qualitative, using an illustrative case-study research design to unpack the subjective experiences of both government officials and residents of vulnerable communities. Primary data included many primary documents, direct observation of the engagements and post-event interviews.
Findings: First, the engagement process created new ‘invented’ spaces for the representation of community perspectives to the city, and also the city’s perspective to the community. Second, the engagement facilitated community self-representation through educating community members to advocate for their own ideas in these new invented spaces. Thirdly, this engagement tended to be more constructive and deliberative than polarising and confrontational.
Discussion and conclusions: Drawing on the theoretical framework of ‘political mediation’, the policy engagement process is characterised as a positive instance of democratic mediation through ‘empowered representation’, with some specified limitations.

Keywords: climate resilience, participatory research, representation, democratic mediation

This book is the first in a series entitled 'Rethinking World Politics'. The intention of... more This book is the first in a series entitled 'Rethinking World Politics'. The intention of the series is 'to address the big issues in world politics in an accessible but original manner', and 'to transcend the intellectual and disciplinary boundaries which have so often served to limit rather than enhance our understanding of the modern world' (flyleaf). To my mind Guelke succeeds admirably in the first of these objectives, but less so with the second. This book is an excellent introduction to most of the key debates around apartheid history. Guelke covers a remarkable range of debates, arranged mostly in chronological order and including: whether racial policy was imperial in origin or due to frontier prejudice; whether segregation was imported or home-grown; whether apartheid had a blue-print; whether Grand Apartheid modernised apartheid; whether the negotiated settlement of the 1990s was a choice or a necessity; whether the transition was 'miraculous&#...

Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies, 2023

While long part of vocational and professional training, forms of practice-based education like W... more While long part of vocational and professional training, forms of practice-based education like Work-integrated learning (WIL) are now spreading to academic disciplines like Political Science. The pedagogical entailed in WIL is that student learning requires the theoretical knowledge and practice of both the classroom and the workplace, and therefore pledges better employability for graduates. At the same time, this promise entails a potential threat to disciplines that may call into question the assumptions of market and state relations. The question thus emerges: is it possible to do critical WIL, and what would it look like? This paper makes a normative case that a critical WIL is both desirable and possible by turning to Hanna Arendt and Richard Turner to differentiate ‘banal’ from ‘critical’ education. It further argues that any ‘critical’ educational programme must be based on three principles. First, students must learn about how social systems work and how to be successful in them, but they must also learn to critically reflect on the systems themselves, and to do so in normative terms linked to ending domination. Second, are students required to develop both the dispositions and attributes required for working life, and those required for acting to end domination. Finally, there must be sufficient institutional independence of the programme from its partner institutions to protect the critical WIL agenda. These claims are illustrated through reference to a real-world attempt to institutionalise WIL in a Political Studies Masters programme in Sweden.

Cogent Education, 2023

The article develops a model for how an academic discipline like Political Studies can embrace wo... more The article develops a model for how an academic discipline like Political Studies can embrace work-integrated learning (WIL) to the benefit of students, the discipline, and wider society by interpreting WIL in relation to discipline-specific forms of knowledge and knower. The model is of a new Master’s in WIL in Political Studies (WIPS) at University West, Sweden, an institution that is experimenting with the idea of WIL as a discipline beyond the mainstream framing of WIL as pedagogy only. In this innovative context, three ideas are central to WIPS. First, the content of WIPS is about research knowledge, rather than Political Studies knowledge. Second,drawing on political philosophy, the important relationship between theory or science (episteme) and practice (techne) is framed in terms of an additional concept of practical knowledge (phronesis) regarding the particulars of political action to equitable ends and wisdom (sophia) in regard to the philosophical and ethical nature of those ends. Third, WIPS re-thinks student learning in ontological ways that focus on the capabilities of the political knower. In sum, WIPS frames WIL as“reflective practice on research-intensive political work”, offering a novel and enriched theoretical model of higher education learning of interest to other academic disciplines looking to embrace WIL.

Commonwealth & Comparative Politics, 2022

The paper articulates a model of urban governance, developed through emergent analysis of the rul... more The paper articulates a model of urban governance, developed through emergent analysis of the rulers, methods, rules and logics evident in the practices of security governance in Hout Bay, Cape Town. Informed by the concept of hybrid governance, this grounded theorising draws on extensive fieldwork on security governance practices in a complex urban neighbourhood to present a model of multiple and sometimes contending forms of governance that include, but are not limited to, bureaucratic, market, developmental, network and informal governance. Our model emerges from a critique of top-down approaches to understanding governance that starts with the state, institutions and law, or approaches that primarily focus on formal partnerships between the state and business or other social partners. The view from above can miss important aspects of how residents are governed 'from below' and informally. Hence it is impossible to understand from the formal, and in advance of grounded research, exactly how many places in urban Africa are governed. Exposing the particular and local forms of governance in urban Africa can support improved forms of service delivery and citizen's experiences of living in their city. In addition, while our model may be relevant in other places, more important is the methodology of identifying the rulers and methods, but especially the rules and logics of practice, to surface the specific, and complex, forms of governance in an urban place.

Democracy Disconnected, 2018

Political Studies Review, 2016

how the modern state’s power to exclude is the product of historical processes laden with racism ... more how the modern state’s power to exclude is the product of historical processes laden with racism and imperialism. Ignoring this history invites historical injustice to be smuggled into contemporary political thought. It is a keen example of the dangers of neglecting history in favour of abstraction and a warning to ideal theorists. Chandran Kukathas also provides a provocative argument that the distinction between refugees and other migrants is not as firm as many would like to think (illustrated by the claim that the vital interests of some economic migrants are in greater danger than some refugees) and that the interests of powerful states, rather than the vulnerable, have shaped the refugee system. However, more could have been said on the matter of illegal migration. Many of the authors claim that there should be a more liberal migration regime. If this is not forthcoming, then is illegal migration justified? And is there a duty to assist them? That being said, this volume is a laudable addition to a topic of growing importance.

Electoral Politics in South Africa, 2005

Commonwealth & Comparative Politics

Routledge, Oct 3, 2018

Why is dissatisfaction with local democracy endemic, despite the spread of new participatory inst... more Why is dissatisfaction with local democracy endemic, despite the spread of new participatory institutions? This book argues that a key reason is the limited power of elected local officials, especially to produce the City. City Hall lacks control over key aspects of city decision-making, especially under conditions of economic globalisation and rapid urbanisation in the urban South. Demonstrated through case studies of daily politics in Hout Bay, Democracy Disconnected shows how Cape Town residents engage local rule. In the absence of democratic control, urban rule in the Global South becomes a complex and contingent framework of multiple and multilevel forms of urban governance (FUG) that involve City Hall, but are not directed by it. Bureaucratic governance coexists alongside market, developmental and informal forms of governance. This disconnect of democracy from urban governance segregates people spatially, socially, but also politically. Thus, while the residents of Hout Bay may live next to each other, they do not live with each other. This book will be a valuable resource for students on programmes such as urban studies, political science, sociology, development studies, and political geography.

AFRICAN HUMAN MOBILITY REVIEW, 2016

This chapter surveys the state of public participation and local governance in southern Africa, m... more This chapter surveys the state of public participation and local governance in southern Africa, more specifically in the countries of Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania and Zimbabwe. This is no easy task, and not simply because of the number of countries, but also because of their substantial diversity in demographic, political, and socio-economic terms. Further, to speak meaningfully of the state of citizen engagement with local governance it is not enough to speak of what Cornwall (2002) terms the ‘invited spaces’ of participation – that is, the government created and/or donor-driven opportunities for engagement between local state and society, but also to consider the significance of ‘invented spaces’ of participation, which are initiated and driven by citizens, or more accurately, civil society organisations. Indeed, Gaventa et al (2007) argue that effective public engagement requires not just new empowered institutions, but the political will by politicians and officials to make them work, and the mobilisation and organisation of citizen by civil society to make use of these spaces. Hence, to meet these twin demands, the methodology of the chapter has been to examine both the state-driven processes of decentralisation and public participation, and the society driven response, particularly through examining the size, scope and orientation of civil society, and the character of local state-society relations down time. This has been done for every country (see Appendix Two). From this survey some general lessons are observable, including that stable and effective governance is necessary but not sufficient for decentralisation and local democratisation; that formal liberal democracy is necessary to generalise favourable conditions for public participation in local governance; that local state-building and local democracy-building can be mutually reinforcing; that time helps to improve public participation practices; that not all civil society is good for public participation; and that independent and community-based civil society is central to making participation work.

Rick Turner's Politics as The Art of the Impossible, 2024

Evidence & Policy, 2024

Keywords: climate resilience, participatory research, representation, democratic mediation

Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies, 2023

Cogent Education, 2023

Commonwealth & Comparative Politics, 2022

Democracy Disconnected, 2018

Political Studies Review, 2016

Electoral Politics in South Africa, 2005

Commonwealth & Comparative Politics

Routledge, Oct 3, 2018

AFRICAN HUMAN MOBILITY REVIEW, 2016

Democracy Disconnected, 2018

To Serve and Protect reveals, for the first time, the sensational details behind the South Africa... more To Serve and Protect reveals, for the first time, the sensational details behind the South African Apartheid government's clandestine funding of Mangosuthu Buthelezi's Inkatha Freedom Party, as well as the events that led up to the so-called 'Inkathagate Scandal.' The book is all the more remarkable in identifying the entire expose as the work of one man - a white conscript - who served in the South African police's Security Branch. Brian Morrow's account provides graphic and disturbing details of how the South African police embarked on a 'dirty tricks' campaign with the aim of harassing anti-Apartheid activists. Morrow spent his years in the Security Branch, gathering files that conclusively proved that the government was funding Inkatha to fuel black-on-black political infighting. The book outlines how the police's 'brotherhood of silence' code was prevalent in the force and how it was frequently used to subvert the course of justice. T...

(2005). Results and discussion: 8 professionals of the nursing team of the prison health unit too... more (2005). Results and discussion: 8 professionals of the nursing team of the prison health unit took part in this research, it is observed that 50% (04) of the professionals are male, 33.3% (3) of the professionals have higher education, however only 25% (2) work as a nurse in the prison unit, regarding the time it was observed that 66.6% vary from 1 to 10 years and 100% of nurses have a specialization course. As for qualitative variables, it was observed that the prison health unit started operating within CRASHM just over a year ago, so, until the time of this research, effective actions of the TB program had not been implemented. Related to the professionals' knowledge about TB, they showed weakness in saying what the disease is, as well as its mode of transmission and prevention. When the intern enters, the psychosocial assessment is carried out, as well as the anamnesis. Regarding the conduct recommended in suspected cases of tuberculosis, despite presenting gaps and difficulties regarding the logistics and the physical structure of the building, since there is no specific space for the patient to be isolated, the diagnosis is made and the treatment is done by the institution. However, in some cases the patient receives parole or is under house arrest to continue treatment in the unit closest to his residence, this measure is usually triggered by the patient himself in court, since the unit does not have enough physical space to leave it separated from other people deprived of liberty. Such measures demonstrate that the system is precarious and makes nursing care within institutions difficult, leading to a conflict between health measures and prison security actions. Conclusions: After one year of implementation of the Health Unit at CRASHM, the Tuberculosis Control Program is partially implemented, with the elaboration of a lecture on the theme, dissemination of instruments for disseminating knowledge about tuberculosis such as folders. In addition, the nursing team started to receive guidance on the conduct of suspected cases. In line with this finding, and knowing the importance of information in the agility process in the diagnosis of TB, it was decided to elaborate as an Technical Product of this dissertation an educational material the "Guide to Good Practices in the Prevention and Control of Tuberculosis", which it may be useful for instrumentalizing the nursing team and health professionals.

Teaching Civic Engagement Globally, 2021

This chapter will advance the argument that Work Integrated Learning (WIL) can reinforce active c... more This chapter will advance the argument that Work Integrated Learning (WIL) can reinforce active citizenship as illustrated with an example from the South African context. WIL is an approach that holds that students will learn better in a program that integrates theoretical knowledge in the classroom with practical knowledge in the workplace. While WIL is not inherently orientated towards building active citizenship, the strategic use of WIL can result in learning outcomes very similar to civic engagement pedagogy, particularly when conceptualized as a collaborative and participatory form of community-based research. This claim is demonstrated through reflection on a research project conducted by master's candidates at the University of the Western Cape in Cape Town, South Africa, in conjunction with a human rights NGO, the Black Sash. The research required students, supported by Black Sash field-workers, to run participatory workshops in various poor communities to explore the impact of the privatization of the social grant payment system in South Africa. We show how the project reinforced the ideas and practices of active citizenship for the students involved and for the fieldworkers from Black Sash with whom they worked. Thus, while not intrinsic to WIL, active citizenship can be built through the strategic use of WIL programs to conduct community-based research or community engagement activities.

Urban Crisis and Management in Africa: A Festschrift for Prof. Akin Mabogunje, 2019

This chapter examines the impact of regulations and law enforcement on the economic activities of... more This chapter examines the impact of regulations and law enforcement on the economic activities of informal traders and micro-entrepreneurs in marginalised communities on the urban periphery. Our case site is Browns Farm, Philippi, a township in the City of Cape Town, South Africa,
where a micro-enterprise census and business operator survey was conducted in 2011 (Charman et al, 2015). The chapter argues that despite the significant number of informal businesses in South African townships, the state continues to pursue efforts that either prevent formalisation or circumscribe informal activities. At the heart of our argument is the assertion that the informal economic practices of the urban poor constitute a ‘lived economy’ whose dynamics are largely ‘unseen’ by the South African state and thus ‘disallowed’ in most policies. Consequently, informality is more the result of exclusion from state policy rather than exit by informal actors.

The Global Informality Project, 2018

‘Tenderpreneur’ is a South African colloquialism for a businessperson who uses political contacts... more ‘Tenderpreneur’ is a South African colloquialism for a businessperson who uses political contacts to secure government procurement contracts (called ‘tenders’) often as part of reciprocal exchange of favours or benefits. The term is a portmanteau of ‘tender’ (to provide business services) and ‘entrepreneur’. Today, ‘tenderpreneurs’ are associated with corruption, nepotism and clientelism. This is because the award of many tenders is driven by informal interests and/or political affiliation, rather than the requirements of formal procedure. The informality of ‘tenderpreneurship’ thus resides in these extra-legal social and political relationships.

Media and Citizenship: Between Marginalisation and Participation., 2017

This chapter makes the case that access to the spaces of public debate in post-apartheid South Af... more This chapter makes the case that access to the spaces of public debate in post-apartheid South Africa is about the challenge of political representation as much as it is about the challenge of access to communication technologies. These representational issues centre on the racialised and partisan nature of state-society relations framed, in part, through identity discourses and, for many poor citizens, patronage politics linked to local governance. In the urban setting this often also takes a spatial form linked to the neighbourhood or community, and involves local leaders who invoke the exclusive right to mediate for poor and marginalised groups in the name of liberation nationalism and service delivery – elsewhere termed the politics of the ‘party-society’. This representational politics creates two distinct publics: one that limits democratic citizenship by affirming racial hierarchies over equal rights, and for poorer, black communities, by constricting citizen voice independent of party sanction. It produces a form of ‘mediated’ citizenship in which third-party representatives and the ways in which they ‘speak for’ citizens come to define (and often limit) possibilities for inclusive, democratic citizenship (Von Lieres and & Piper 2014).

Illustrated through the case of two newspapers in Hout Bay, the chapter shows how the main community newspaper, The Sentinel, gives voice overwhelmingly to white and wealthy residents of Hout Bay; views that at least some black residents perceive as racist. Further, attempts by ANC-aligned local leaders to counter the perceived bias of The Sentinel through their own paper, Hout Bay Speak, does not necessarily give voice to all poor, black residents. This is most evident in its deliberately ignoring the existence of community leaders not aligned with the party hierarchy in Hout Bay. This racialised and partisan character of state-society relations is a significant constraint on constructing a more inclusive public sphere in Hout Bay, and indeed we suggest, in much of urban South Africa.

In this chapter I want to focus on one set of reasons related to the phenomenon of ‘popular incom... more In this chapter I want to focus on one set of reasons related to the phenomenon of ‘popular incompetence’ – the fact that voter support for ruling parties, especially the African National Congress (ANC), remains high in areas where the performance of municipalities is widely regarded as dismal. I suggest this outcome is, at least in part, due to the supply-side behaviour of political activists and leaders at the very local level of the ‘community’, and not just the demand-side behaviour of voters. I also argue that the supply-side behaviour of activists and leaders is informed by a set of ideas about democracy and nationalism inherited from liberation politics that enables local practices to contradict the model of democracy encoded in the design of local governance. It is also informed by forms of patronage politics, but these issues will be dealt with in more detail elsewhere (Piper & Anciano 2015). In general I will be making the case for the dominance of local civil society by political society, to the point that we can meaningfully speak of a ‘party-society’ analogous to the ‘party-state’ linked to ANC dominance of political society.

This chapter argues that we should take more seriously the role of intermediaries in relations be... more This chapter argues that we should take more seriously the role of intermediaries in relations between states and citizens in the global south. More specifically it holds that the practice of mediation, the third party representation of citizens to states and vice versa, is a widespread and important political practice in this context. Largely distinct from the contentious politics and popular mobilisation of social movements, mediation is more a politics of negotiation and bargaining by representatives. Developed as an emergent analysis from multiple case studies, mediation is a broad concept that includes practices that at other times might be described as lobbying, clientelism and coercion, but that we conceptualise in terms of claiming legitimacy to speak for the poor and marginalised, and theorise in terms of a democratic deficit between formal political institutions and these groups. In addition to identifying different kinds of mediators, the article categorises mediation in terms of the orientation and nature of various mediatory practices. Lastly, the chapter identifies at least three explanations for mediation including: the endurance of pre-democratic political relations and practices; new forms of social exclusion in post-colonial democracies; and the erosion of state authority brought about by neo-liberal policies and globalisation.

Abstract: Drawing on a case-study of South African National Civic Organisation leaders from Imiza... more Abstract: Drawing on a case-study of South African National Civic Organisation leaders from Imizamo Yethu, a poor black settlement in Hout Bay Cape Town, this chapter examines four challenges that confront leaders in representing the community. These challenges create a set of contradictory popular, party, state and personal demands such that SANCO leaders must demonstrate efficacy in service delivery from the DA state without compromising local ANC party standing or popular legitimacy at the community level. Further, leaders must resist the temptation to take (too much) personal advantage of service delivery success. In this case, the skilful practice of ‘double dealing’, as Bourdieu might term it, is extremely difficult to achieve. In addition to requiring tremendous skill, effective leadership of the Imizamo Yethu community also requires the leader to be a mediator: neither simply of the society or the state but located between them as a (largely) honest broker.

C. Schulz-Herzenberg & R. Southall. Election 2014: The Campaigns, Results and Future Prospects. Johannesburg: Jacana and KAS, pp. 89-103.

This chapter argues that local government elections offer a unique opportunity in South Africa's ... more This chapter argues that local government elections offer a unique opportunity in South Africa's political system for voters to practice forms of democracy that are more local, plural and accountable in character than at provincial or national level. A key reason for this is the mixed electoral system where half of all councillors are directly elected from the wards in which they live. The 2011 election supplied significant evidence of voters attempting to make use of this opportunity, particularly around the candidate selection process of the major parties, and through the accountability talk that dominated public debate. However, analysis of both 'supply' (party behaviour) and 'demand' (voter choice) suggests that this democratic potential was outweighed by bipartisan politics between the ANC and DA which affirmed the national over the local, a choice between two parties over many, and reinforced identity-based political loyalties over the direct accountability of politicians. In short, the 2011 elections were rendered a proxy for a national competition, frustrating much of the unique democratic potential that local government elections offer, effectively taking local politics further from the people. The proposal to hold national, provincial and local elections simultaneously in the future will further impede the democratic potential of the local electoral system.

Zulu identities: being Zulu, past and present, Jan 1, 2009

Critical South: Perspectives on Politics and Society, 2020

The current spate of housing evictions in Cape Town, Johannesburg and eThekwini seems especially ... more The current spate of housing evictions in Cape Town, Johannesburg and eThekwini seems especially malicious, not only because it is winter, but because of the assurance by national government that no evictions would happen in South Africa during the Covid-19 lockdown. City authorities argue that these are not evictions but rather efforts to stop land invasions initiated during the lockdown – a position that national government has endorsed. Whatever one thinks of this defence, it is cold comfort to those like Bulelani Qholani, yanked naked out of his home and left without shelter in the Cape winter rains. Nevertheless, there is a point to the state’s case. Local government is much more concerned about the loss of land than illegal housing, and these evictions offer an important insight into the kinds of power at the heart of city rule in South Africa and beyond.

The last decade has seen growing awareness of violent attacks against foreigners in South Africa.... more The last decade has seen growing awareness of violent attacks against foreigners in South Africa. This includes attacks against foreign traders in the townships where they are seen to beat South Africans on price, thus providing grounds for xenophobic mobilisation. Drawing on evidence from interviews with over 1000 spaza shopkeepers from South Africa’s three main cities, this paper makes the case that business competitiveness does not correspond with being ‘foreign’ or South African. While Bangladeshi and Somali shops were, on average, cheaper than South African shops, Zimbabwean and Mozambican shops were actually more expensive. Further, there is also no simple correspondence between being foreign or South African and your experience of violent crime. Some nationalities report levels lower than South Africans, and some higher. However, there does seem to be a correlation between reported levels of violent crime and economic competitiveness: the nationalities whose shops are more expensive reported lower levels of violent crime, while those who are cheaper reported higher levels. This suggests that the chance of being violently targeted is more likely if you keep prices low and profits high, rather than what your national identity. However, the reality is more complicated as the nature of the crime experienced by the more successful shopkeepers is quite different. Hence Somali shopkeepers endure much more violent crime than Bangladeshi shopkeepers. Not only do these findings explode the myth that all foreign spaza shops are more competitive than South African shops, but also the assumption that all foreign shopkeepers experience the same levels and, especially, forms of violence.

Hence, to meet these twin demands, the methodology of the chapter has been to examine both the state-driven processes of decentralisation and public participation, and the society driven response, particularly through examining the size, scope and orientation of civil society, and the character of local state-society relations down time. This has been done for every country (see Appendix Two). From this survey some general lessons are observable, including that stable and effective governance is necessary but not sufficient for decentralisation and local democratisation; that formal liberal democracy is necessary to generalise favourable conditions for public participation in local governance; that local state-building and local democracy-building can be mutually reinforcing; that time helps to improve public participation practices; that not all civil society is good for public participation; and that independent and community-based civil society is central to making participation work.

This working paper surveys various debate around the emergence of the BRICS as economic and polit... more This working paper surveys various debate around the emergence of the BRICS as economic and political players on the global stage in the last 15 years. In economic terms the paper traverses accounts of the future dominance of the BRICS of the global economy in GDP and growth terms; including the question whether there is more to the BRICS than the rise of China; whether other conceptions of emerging markets might be more useful; and what kind of shifts in the spatial patterns of extraction, production and consumption of global capitalism are signalled by the rise of the BRICS. In political terms the BRICS have breathed life into their conception by Goldman Sachs as an investment meme, meeting regularly since 2009 to construct an alternative form of global economic governance to the traditional centres of the west. Most profoundly manifest in new economic institutions that rival the IMF and World Bank, the BRICS also share a conception of development that is more partnership-orientated than donor-recipient focused in process, and more infrastructure and energy orientated than the social and governance focused in substance. Lastly, the rise of the BRICS as economic and political players on the global stage raises questions about the extent to which they advance neo-liberal capitalism by serving as sub-imperialists in the regions, or offer more state-centric models of capitalist growth that open up the possibility of more inclusive development paths. A related debate is whether the rise of the BRICS is good for their regions or just the leading states of those regions. Lastly, the emerging shifts in global capitalism and economic governance signalled by the rise of the BRICS suggests we are the beginning of the end of the utility of the North-South distinction as differences with countries come to be as important as differences across countries.

This thesis investigates the relationship between ethnicity, nationalism and political history. B... more This thesis investigates the relationship between ethnicity, nationalism and political history. By close empirical research on the recent political transition in South Africa, it provides original and convincing argument for the radically contingent connections between these three phenomena. More specifically, it is a study in the comparative failure of ethnicity as an instrument of political manipulation. The central claim of the thesis is that the unprecedented public invocations of Zuluness made during the transition, roughly the era of ‘the politics of Zuluness’, expressed the concerns of political parties, principally the IFP and ANC. This argument is substantiated by examining how these invocations depended on political strategies which, in turn, reflected party fortunes in transition politics. The argument is reinforced by examination of how, once the transition was largely complete by 1996, the IFP and ANC reviewed their strategies and downscaled their invocations of Zuluness. Further, post-apartheid political conditions mean that a Zulu nationalism driven by élite manipulation has little prospect for the foreseeable future. The public invocations of Zuluness during the transition were directly tied to the dynamics of grand politics, and grand politics has worked out in such a way as to render such invocations redundant.

This argument does not deny the resonance of Zuluness as a social identity, far from it. Indeed there exist several constructions of Zuluness which vary according to geography, gender, race and so on. Nevertheless, it is argued that all resistance nationalisms of the transition were, to use Hutchinson’s terms, ‘political’ rather than ‘cultural’ nationalisms; that is, they were driven by élite political interests rather than by popularly-rooted identity politics.[1994] Consequently, not only is Zulu nationalism dead for the foreseeable future, but the evidence suggests that most Zulu people see themselves in ways not inconsistent with a multi-cultural or ‘rainbow’ South African nation.

Regional Studies, 2020

In Resisting Redevelopment, Eleonora Pasotti argues that city residents around the world have dev... more In Resisting Redevelopment, Eleonora Pasotti argues that city residents around the world have developed new ways of resisting gentrification beginning with the construction of neighbourhood identities. Central to this practice are ‘experiential tools’, including festivals, local tours, food markets and the like, that help build a local sense of belonging, pride and legitimacy. Generalising from 29 cases across 10 cities, Passotti argues that experiential tools are likely to aid resistance when combined with both ‘protest legacies and broad networks’, and to bring successful outcomes when supported by allies in both City Council and higher levels of government (pp.4-5).

Transformation, 2019

Power in Action is an important intervention into debates on politics and democracy at a critical... more Power in Action is an important intervention into debates on politics and democracy at a critical time in the history of democratic rule globally. It is a thought-provoking, contentious and powerful case for re-thinking some traditional assumptions about how power works, and what democracy should be. Ultimately, the great strength of Power in Action is that it conceives of politics and democracy in ways that gives hopes to the activist rather than the politician or the civil servant. If change comes through collective action rather than institutions, then activism rather than elections is the better route to social justice. Furthermore, if democracy is people controlling decision over their lives, then the popular will rightfully trumps the expert knowledge of civil servants. Practically and normatively then, Power in Action conceives of politics and democracy in ways empowering to ordinary citizens and civil society rather than politicians and civil servants. It is, on its own terms, epistemically democratic: that is, a fundamentally empowering and democratic way of thinking about power and democracy.

Urban Studies, 2019

Written by long-standing research practitioners Ian Palmer and Nishendra Moodley, as well as one ... more Written by long-standing research practitioners
Ian Palmer and Nishendra Moodley,
as well as one of South Africa’s leading academic
urbanists, Professor Sue Parnell,
Building a Capable State tackles the hard
question of whether the post-apartheid state
is up to delivering rights-based, sustainable
development, and more specifically the task
of providing local services like water, electricity,
roads and housing.

This collection is an important addition to a new but burgeoning literature on South African citi... more This collection is an important addition to a new but burgeoning literature on South African cities, and urban government in particular.

Hamilton is a republican, albeit a deeply uncommon one, who holds that the fundamental and comple... more Hamilton is a republican, albeit a deeply uncommon one, who holds that the fundamental and complex interconnectedness of modern society means that freedom requires the exercise of power in individual and group and national domains. This demanding conception of freedom is rooted in a Marxian conception of freedom as the capacity to bring about a choice, as well as to make that choice at all. Thus Hamilton defines freedom as the ‘combination of my ability to determine what I will do and my power to do it – that is, bring it about’ (p.10). It is this definition that, located in a theory of contemporary social and political life, yields the Hegelian style synthesis of ‘freedom as power’ across four domains. Hence freedom as power requires a) the power to overcome existing obstacles in my life, b) the power to determine who governs, c) the power to resist the disciplining power of the community, and d) the power to determine social and economic environment via control over representatives (p.95). Critically, Hamilton notes that these domains are not definitional, so much as a list of the ways in which freedom depends on power, and further that, for the individual, there is more to freedom than dependence of power in these ways as there is always a personal and subjective component to freedom. For society more widely, and specifically for groups, Hamilton believes that his account offers ‘objective’ and ‘necessary’ conditions for freedom. They are objective because they are shared by all in a society, and necessary because all in that society need them too (p96).

SAAPS Regional Colloquium, North West University, 2019

The paper outlines the limits of city and state authority over the city of the urban south. It id... more The paper outlines the limits of city and state authority over the city of the urban south. It identifies the emergence of both formal partnership with non-state actors in ruling the city (co-governance, hybrid governance etc), and the informal contestation of city rule by non-state actors. In addition to the proliferation of public authorities, the paper identifies divergent and sometime contending logics of rule. This context of multiple rulers and sets of rules both disconnects key decision-making from the control of most residents of the city and further segregates the city politically as well as socio-economically and (in South Africa's case) racially.

City Futures IV , 2019

The paper explores the peculiar politics of popular resistance to the upgrading of an informal se... more The paper explores the peculiar politics of popular resistance to the upgrading of an informal settlement in Imizamo Yethu, Cape Town, following a major fire in 2017. The paper traces the politics around the response to the fire by the city and contending groups of poor residents, many of whom, paradoxically, continue to resist the upgrading of the burn site. While this politics maps somewhat onto identity politics between local and foreign migrants to the city, the paper contends that it is the imposition of what Chatterjee terms developmental governance of needy populations onto emergent but informal forms of entrepreneurship that underwrites this larger conflict. This is but one example of the multiple and contending forms of governance evident in the city that help explain the divergent ways in which residents experience urban rule along racial, national and class lines; and which constitute an obstacle for more just and inclusive rule.

In this fantastic, wide-ranging but closely argued paper Prathama Banerjee makes the case that th... more In this fantastic, wide-ranging but closely argued paper Prathama Banerjee makes the case that the concept of sovereignty is not a universal concept, but rather that it has a particular, substantive meaning developed in Europe over many centuries. Furthermore, this substantive meaning can be contrasted with alternative notions of 'rulership' in South Asia that Banerjee terms variously 'overlordship' or 'ascendancy'. At the heart of this contrast is the degree to which political power is imagined as absolute and unqualified versus accounts where the power of the political leader is imagined as qualified, counterbalanced , networked and nodal. At the moment of colonialism in south Asia, Banerjee concludes, this latter conception of political power was supplanted by the colonial imaginary and reproduced in post-colonial rule, with indigenous traditions forgotten. In developing this contrast between the European conception of sovereignty and the south Asian theory of ascendancy, Banerjee is doing far more than a history of ideas or an exercise in comparative political theory. This is because she is not only analyzing the evolution of ideas down time (both accounts of sovereignty and ascendancy are also arguments about how to understand political practice). Nor is she simply comparing different theories of state or kingly power, although this kind of exercise sits at the heart of this paper. Rather, through reconstructing a version of sovereignty and contrasting it with a new theory of 'ascendant' rule, Banerjee is advocating for 'thinking across traditions' to become 'a composer and assembler of a new theory from different sources and different histories'.