University of the Witwatersrand School of Social Sciences African Centre for Migration & Society
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
University of the Witwatersrand School of Social Sciences African Centre for Migration & Society Migration, Governance and Violent Exclusion: Exploring the Determinants of Xenophobic Violence in Post-Apartheid South Africa Jean Pierre MISAGO Student Number: 0404030D Dissertation in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Migration and Displacement Studies, School of Social Sciences, Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand April 2016 Declaration I declare that this thesis is my own unaided work. It is submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. It has not been submitted for any other degree or examination in any other university. Jean Pierre Misago 11 April 2016 ii Dedication To family members and all other victims of violent discrimination. iii Acknowledgements I would like to express my most heartfelt gratitude to Prof. Loren Landau, my supervisor, for the generous support throughout all my years of study and work at the University of the Witwatersrand and for the guidance and patience that went far beyond supervision duties. I am deeply indebted to the African Centre for Migration & Society (ACMS) for providing an enabling and supportive environment. I am also thankful for financial support received from the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) and the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation. iv Table of Contents I. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................................ 1 1.1 SETTING THE SCENE.............................................................................................................................................. 1 1.2 XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE: GLOBAL DIMENSIONS AND THEORETICAL APPROACHES ............................................. 9 1.3 STRUCTURE OF THESIS ....................................................................................................................................... 21 II. METHODS AND METHODOLOY: RESEARCHING THE DETEMINANTS OF XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE .................... 30 2.1 INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................................................. 30 2.2 XENOPHOBIA AND XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE: CONCEPTUAL DISTINCTIONS AND CAUSAL LINKAGES ................ 31 2.3 THE NEED FOR A QUALITATIVE METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH AND A MICRO-ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK ..... 40 2.4 DATA SOURCES AND THE USE OF SECONDARY ANALYSIS ................................................................................... 45 2.5 BASELINE STUDY: RESEARCH METHODS AND DESIGN ........................................................................................ 50 2.6 CONCLUSION ...................................................................................................................................................... 61 III. XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE IN CONTEMPORARY SOUTH AFRICA: HISTORY, MORPHOLOGY AND POPULAR EXPLANATIONS .............................................................................................................................................. 62 3.1 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................................ 62 3.2 HISTORY AND NATURE OF XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE IN CONTEMPORARY SOUTH AFRICA .................................. 63 3.3 POPULAR EXPLANATIONS AND THEIR LIMITATIONS .......................................................................................... 98 3.4 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................................................... 118 IV. MICRO-POLITICS AND THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE VIOLENCE: LOCAL DYNAMICS, ROLES AND MOTIVATIONS OF VIOLENCE ENTREPRENEURS ............................................................................................ 121 4.1 INTRDODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................ 121 4.2 LOCAL DYNAMICS AND THEIR IMPACT ON XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE ................................................................ 122 4.3 VIOLENCE ENTREPRENEURS’ ROLES AND MOTIVATIONS FOR VIOLENCE ......................................................... 146 4.4 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................................................... 167 V. MOBILIZATION AS A TRIGGER OF XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE ........................................................................... 170 5.1 INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................................................. 170 5.2 PERSPECTIVES ON MOBILIZATION AS A KEY DETERMINANT OF COLLECTIVE VIOLENCE ................................. 172 5.3 MOBILIZATION TECHNIQUES AND PROCESSES FOR THE MAY 2006 XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE ........................ 183 5.4 CONCLUSION: TOWARDS A ‘MOBILIZATION OF DISCONTENT’ MODEL .......................................................... 199 VI. LOCAL GOVERNANCE AND XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE IN SOUTH AFRICA ........................................................ 203 6.1 INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................................................. 203 6.2 LOCAL GOVERNANCE: A POLITICAL OPPORTUNITY STRUCTURE FOR XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE IN SOUTH AFRICA ........................................................................................................................................................................ 204 6.3 ON SOCIAL CONTROLS AND COLLECTIVE VIOLENCE: THE STATUS QUO QUESTIONED.................................... 223 6.4 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................................................. 234 VII. CONCLUSIONS: TOWARDS A GOVERNANCE MODEL OF XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE ......................................... 237 7.1 XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE AS ‘POLITICS BY OTHER MEANS’ .............................................................................. 238 7.2 THE TRIGGER EFFECT OF MOBILIZATION ........................................................................................................ 239 7.3 GOVERNANCE AND COLLECTIVE VIOLENCE: A MISUNDERSTOOD RELATIONSHIP .......................................... 242 7.4 A MULTIVARIATE MODEL OF XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE ................................................................................... 245 7.5 FROM MULTIVARIATE TO THE GOVERNANCE MODEL OF XENOPHOBIC VIOLENCE ........................................ 251 7.6 CONCLUDING REMARKS ................................................................................................................................. 256 VIII. REFERENCES ................................................................................................................................................. 258 IX. ANNEX I: BASELINE STUDY RESEARCH THEMES ............................................................................................ 271 v Abstract Responding to inadequacies and limitations of current causal explanations for xenophobic violence which has become a long standing feature in post-Apartheid South Africa, this study proposes a Governance Model of Xenophobic Violence that provides a comprehensive empirically-based and theoretically informed causal explanation. It is a multivariate empirical and integrated theoretical explanatory model that identifies and explains the roles of - and the complex interplays between - the key determinants of xenophobic violence consisting of underlying causes, proximate factors and triggers. The six key determinants the model identifies are: deprivation, xenophobic beliefs, collective discontent, political economy, mobilization and governance. This study argues that these determinants and their interconnections in a value-added process constitute the necessary and sufficient conditions for the occurrence of xenophobic violence. I call it the governance model because of the predominant role governance plays in the occurrence of xenophobic violence. With underlying causes (deprivation, xenophobia and collective discontent) already established, the study pays particular attention to the often missed proximate factors and triggers (the political economy of the violence, mobilization and governance). It is through the findings on these new factors that the study introduces new empirical and theoretical insights and innovations to the understanding of, not only, xenophobic violence in South Africa but also collective violence generally. First, this study argues that xenophobic violence in South Africa is just ‘politics by other means and by doing so brings to the fore the often missed centrality of micro-politics and localised political economy factors as key drivers of collective violence particularly communal violence. Second, the study argues that that the triggers of xenophobic violence and of collective violence generally lie in the mobilization processes and not in the grievances and ensuing discontent as argued by many theoretical approaches to collective violence. The study suggests a new theoretical model, the Mobilization of Discontent Model, which captures the increasingly recognised centrality of mobilization as a trigger of collective