I was watching the debates on the upcoming election in the Western Cape recently. A large piece of the debate referred to what was deemed a “housing crisis”. I hear similar things being said around Durban and indeed all over South Africa.
I make the claim there is no housing crisis in South Africa. The focus on finding suitable housing for shack dwellers and the homeless only creates ghettoes and entrenches social problems for the poor.
The crisis is not in the lack of urban housing but a lack of real, substantive rural development. The crisis is a lack of jobs and support for rural spaces. If South Africa focused its energy on rural spaces the poor and desperate would not flock to the slums seeking a better life.
How much better would it be for the poor of South Africa to be able to stay at home in their communities surrounded by friends, family and a larger community with who they share a history?
It is not a big logical leap to make the claim that people do not wish to live in the slums. Yet the assumption being made appears to be that people wish to live in small concrete cubes surrounded by thousands of other soulless concrete bunkers. The other development is the continued use of large hostels to house workers far from home.
I for one cannot believe that it is cost-effective to maintain the soulless hostels in Durban’s south industrial basin. These horrific spaces have social spin-offs in the form of the bawdy and rough shebeens, deeply unhappy people crammed together in terrible living conditions and a need to ever extend municipal services.
Mooi River textiles closed down in 1999 leaving thousands of people out of work as they could not compete with Chinese imports. If industry was offered incentives to work in rural spaces then perhaps urbanisation would not be happening at the rate it is. How many factories and businesses could be run just as easily but with a happier, healthier workforce from rural spaces.
Mass urbanisation is not an inevitable effect of modernity and industrialisation. It is the outcome of narrowly focused technocratic solutions to a problem clearly not being understood. Too many town planners trained specifically in urban solutions seem to be involved in what is essentially a rural problem. The politicians themselves often hail from urban spaces and fail to make the necessary connections.
KwaZulu-Natal still has more than 55% of its population living in rural spaces. It clearly needs to focus on rural planning and I have only heard one party discuss rural issues in any meaningful way. The Inkatha Freedom Party actually makes a lot of sense on these issues.
I for one think that we should support the majority of our province in creating a meaningful life in their communities and not aiding the destruction of their communities and the building of slums to house them.
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29 Responses to “There is no housing crisis in South Africa”
my god, finally someone who understands - must be a ukzn academic - brilliant
What you say is true to some minute extent. The country needs development. But in order to keep up with global economic trends, development has to be aimed at rural and urban development. People cannot be convinced to assume an agrarian mind set, merely because you say they should. People have aspirations, dreams, needs. hopes. The country is going down the tube because it’s leaders serve the interests of a minority, people like yourself no doubt, who have no understanding of what the people want. You see their presence as a nuisance. Were we to elect people like yourself, we would find you re-constructing policies that create bantustans, and our tax rands will find their way to investments in the billions in misdirected projects that you and your cronies that you will soon have around you, will no doubt be the first to benefit from.
If i am wrong, please forgive me and accept that you made a silly entry here, and i am pointing out the end result of such a foul smelling understanding of the crisis.
There is a crisis. It is there because the people say there is one. Who are you to argue that there isn’t one? Should we bow down in obedience to your degree in economics or whatever you are carrying in your pocket, and accept our own ignorance - BECAUSE YOU SAY SO? Well. Ja, Baas!
The pace of urbanization is increasing and will continue to increase regardless of ‘rural development’.
This is occurring as migration in developing countries and as ‘urban sprawl’ in developed countries.
Globally, over 50% of the world’s population is already urbanized, and estimates predict the figure to rise to 60% by 2025 and close to 90% by 2060.
It is an indication of the futility of ‘central planners’ trying to plan human affairs and makes nonsense of ‘demographic land distribution’ philosophies advanced as being so crucial.
Very few people in the U.S. as a proportion of the entire population own any farmland or are involved in farming. Most people live in cities and suburbs, and most land is owned by corporates and large commercial operations, which supply much of the worlds available ‘food aid’ surpluses.
The developing world is necessarily moving away from the small scale and subsistence model, and countries failing to adopt policy not accepting and accommodating increasing urbanization aren’t ‘developing’ very well.
We can either plan for more houses or expect more ‘informal settlements’.
What is going to stabilise population growth and cap urban populations will initially be the availability of water, not developmental policy
I Agree with you. This country needs rural development than cheaply built houses. The government has been busy with this project since 1994 and honestly the shacks are not decreasing but they seem to be at an even greater boom.
Like any critical issue there are lows and highs on industrialising rural areas. Companies would rather set up their businesses in areas where they can liase easily with the customers and suppliers easily, transportation of goods is much easier in urban areas as infrastructure already exists and qualified professionals would rather work in the cities, these are just some of the core problems with rural industrialisation. But if mining companies can make means to get minerals from rural areas to big cities and around the world surely something can be done to get other goods to this areas.
This is what our country needs.
Perry - It is not an inevitable march to city centres. It is actual planning and economics that guide and direct urbanisation.
The USA is not directly comparable to Africa for many reasons and agri-business while may be productive in the USA due to ecology and mechanised farming is actually inefficient in terms of energy inputs and outputs. The world cannot sustain a 90% urban population unless the majority live in slums and shacks - go see Jakarta, Indonesia for the future according to this plan - and it is a plan or perhaps the lack of a plan for rural spaces that pushes people to the centres.
I mean what I say, people do not wish to live on top of one another in shacks. They do so because of desperate need for cash based employment not some march of modernity.
And I am not talking about supporting subsistence agriculture in rural spaces that has been the death of farms through the land restitution process and the increase we see in the supermarket prices.
I am arguing for real integrated development including support for rural based businesses. Such things are happening elsewhere. I lived and worked for a global tour operator in England from a wonderful small town surrounded by sheep. Quite peaceful and idyllic compared to London. Such developments make sense and make the world a better place.
So lets also develop the transport to facilitate such a process and safe movement of people so they are not isolated as well.
Really? The drift to urban is inevitable ‘its’ what the people want - is it not? That’s a benefit of democracy - debateable? It’s inevitable then, that we end up with Nigerian and Kenyan big city style slum living. Hell, we got the crime and corruption lets continue to compound it with mass drift to cities - its inevitable?
Yahya’Bene’Dicere - I never once said people should accept an agrarian mindset.
That is the very limits of the discourse being used. Rural does not equal agriculture. Just imagine a business of any kind you can dream of existing in a rural space.
Why does a furniture manufacturer set up a factory in Durban? Why not offer incentives for them to set up outside of Durban? A happy healthy workforce not forced into shacks but surrounded by a community they know and trust.
And as for me not knowing what people want I base my understanding of this society and people through long term participant observation and countless interviews with poor rural people. I listen to their laments as they deplore the working and living conditions of urban slums where dreams die. I don’t see the poor as a nuisance as you surmise, but as real people with hopes and dreams that are crushed by the government policies that force them into dehumanising conditions just so they can eat.
People can be part of the world economy (and indeed are) from wherever they live. Lets create plans to allow them to engage it on better terms.
@Yahya’Bene’Dicere - reading your input is sad. it is not constructive to a problem and as fas as the commentary i do not see any suggestions that would further the living conditions in our wonderful country. It is time for positive input. th Rural development idea is not something new or typical to SA.
SA imports soooooo much where we have so much to produce from and export it - we have the knowledge in SA. Why do we have to export our solar energy ideas to Germany as an example, Or our iron to Japan - just to import it later at cost? I am not in SA and was asked the other day why SA (with all its means) does not produce its own car for the world market .. Please try to reply positively to this statement.
The ANC government scrapped many of the ‘decentralisation incentives and gave people social grants. So instead of ‘teaching people how to fish’ the government ‘feeds them fish’. The ANC’s basic policy is to increase poverty and peoples dependence on government handouts.
Well if it is “what the people want” the we are doomed as the human race. The push into the cities has been a result of the industrial revolution in the early 19th century. This was largely driven by greed and resulted in Karl Marx’ Das Kapital.
It depleted the countryside of Europe and created overwhelming poverty, such as had not been seen since serfdom was outlawed after the great plague.
If everyone moves off the land - who will grow the food we need? If we live the industrial greedy life, who will look after our poor, orphaned and elderly? What is wrong with staying on the farm and feeding others, except the need to possess more and more of the latest stuff?
We are all addicts set upon killing ourselves if we continue in this way. And I agree with Owen because the ANC is not assisting our country to feed itself, preserve its clean water and nuture itself.
Dear Michael. The kind of rural development policy you’re proposing was the very essence of the apartheid regime. It was called separate development. “Separate development” - in other words segregation, Jim Crow, apartheid - was a hopeless attempt to keep South African cities more or less exclusively white. The housing crisis that you seem to fantasize away is precisely the consequence of a racist policy that dreamed of idyllic rural vistas for a black yeomenry restrained from moving into the cities. Most black people didn’t appreciate the rural utopia imposed on them by the regime, and of course, the apartheid system came crumbling down.
if my comment is sad, it reflects the truth. many of the opinions here hark back to the days of apartheid, as does the economy itself. this is a sad thing.
Leo, it is my point exactly. we need to become competitive in the market, not as producers of agricultural products. we can take our cue from asian economies, led by people who placed the people of those country’s first, instead of their bosses’ interests in the UK or USA. Canadians with degrees should stay out of suggesting we stay on the farm.
Michael, Noble and sensible theory and sentiment. But have you been in rural KZN? Scattered settlements as far as the eye can see, all 1km apart and requiring a fortune to service. Fantastic arable land, semi pristine natural vegetated areas and breathtaking scenery. Not one bit of sustainable development (a broken down greenhouse tunnel here and there; an empty chicken shed or two) - everyone either works on a commercial farm nearby, has another house in town or travels to town.
Many of these areas could be utilised for conventional agriculture (crops and livestock) or labour intensive fruit, vegetables, rare timber, medicinal plants etc. It lies idle due to tribal systems, communal ownership (can’t borrow money and no one is responsible for anything), corruption in resource allocation, lack of skills (and no teaching), ever threatening crime etc etc.
The potential is (or was) there. To turn it around is a mammoth task.
Unfortunately the rural development hypothesis is not supported by empirical studies relating to human migrations.
Whilst an adequate discussion of urbanization is beyond the scope of this blog, a few remarks may help.
A study by Dr Richard Rhoda “[…] to test the hypothesis that rural development projects and programs reduce rural-urban migration” Concluded that “[…] the common belief that rural interventions reduce urban migration is not justified.”
Cris Beauchemin and Bruno Schoumakera of the Institut National des Etudes Démographiques and Université de Louvain, (Belgium) undertook a study of developing countries “policies to reduce migration to cities” which “usually rely on the assumption that improving the quality of life in rural areas and secondary towns will reduce out-migration to cities.”
While this may seem a reasonable assumption, “Overall, (our) results show that, contrary to policy expectations, most components of rural development either have no effect on migration or rather tend to encourage migration to cities.”
It does not make logistic sense to establish new industry out in the Styx other than due to proximity to raw materials. Such developments don’t attract migration beyond basic labour requirements.
Consolidation and commercialization of agriculture and growth of urban industry increases agricultural output and economic growth, to the ultimate benefit of all
‘Land restitution’ has the opposite effect and fails to stem urbanization anyway.
Getting people ‘back onto the land’ is not a policy of ‘a highly effective country’
( Leon Louw, ‘Habits of Highly Effective Countries’)
To propose rural development does not mean all rural people should farm.
It means that we should spend money and resources on developing infrastructures which would support ALL FORMS OF BUSINESS in rural areas. (And rural does not necessarily mean just the wilderness, but also areas which do not fall under the geographical boundaries of our medium- and larger-sized cities).
Put in efficient road transport systems to ease and facilitate the trade in and out of these areas. Set up wireless broadband networks across our country which are fast and affordable. Build efficient and modern schools, community centres and clinics/hospitals in these areas so that people are not forced to travel far distances for what should be basic rights and services.
20 years ago our fathers worked in offices because the nature of their world required it. Today I run a business from my home because of the advent of high speed internet connectionsand laptops. The previous reliance on office infrastructure is slowly changing to self-reliance in a home office environment. And I am one of many hundreds of thousands.
So the idea is not a return to apartheid-era separate development but rather that we should consider a new way of working and living which dovetails with the world’s approach to sustainable living and development. The way things are at the moment are clearly not working and instead of climbing onto our high horses maybe we should keep an open mind to new possibilities.
Good point. Another thought on the matter which may be driving urbanization to some extent,is the increased number of land redistribution, and the long process involved in such processes. Large area’s of our country in formally busy farming areas are currently lying fallow due to farmers feeling there is no point in cultivating land they will not own. Which leads to less farm worker required which, leads to more people moving to the cities. Amongst other rural developmental issues
Also a very nice theory but go and have a look at these areas then come up with practical and technically viable solutions to what you propose. Let alone finacially viable. Absolutely provide access to services but some very much more fundamental changes (land ownership, traditional leadership) have to be made first. That ain’t gonna happen anytime soon.
You are making the same mistake the ANC made, planning for present population, not future population.
Even with AIDS and wars, most countries in Africa have their populations increasing by 3% per annum ( 30% per decade ). 50 years ago there were few sluma and few squatter camps around the colonial cities of Africa. Now they all have them.
Perry,
I read the article and space does not let me answer in full. It raises some really valid points even if it is dated (1983). What I think the problem is that it is largely based on large empirical studies that fail to acknowledge that the improvements they discuss in rural spaces are actually really marginal improvements and again based on agriculture.
The green revolution in Asia also referred to saw the creation of more land for farming but also a consolidation of peasant farms into large business ventures. This then ‘freed’ up the poor to move to urban centres. So on paper it showed rural improvement in actual jobs and overall income but also closed down small producers. I recommend James Scott (1985) Weapons of the Weak for more information.
What the article also fails to acknowledge is that during the late 70s and early 80s many of the countries it uses as examples that were developing rural spaces were also doing massive amounts of industrialisation in the city centres.
It also misses that often the improvements in rural spaces are not shared evenly and often the benefits are very marginal for the rural poor.
I am arguing for incentives for businesses and real development beyond peasant agriculture (land reform as done now).
It is happening in developed states as businesses move to rural spaces and we see mixed areas of industry and farming. The trick is to not mess with the reserves or create rural ghettos.
Minimum effort for maximum return drives human decision making and consequent human behaviour.
The density of urban living potetially provides a solution, to this human need, for urban dwellers provided that they have the money. Money is obtained through employment, if you can get it. The chances of obtaining employment are far greater in an urban area.
Massive investements would need to be made in rural areas to create these kind of conditions for rural dwellers and Michael recognises this. However government policy has, up until now, not looked at rural development in this way at all. I see Michael’s blog as a plea for a much needed change in the direction of government’s rural policies.
“The crisis is a lack of jobs and support for rural spaces. If South Africa focused its energy on rural spaces the poor and desperate would not flock to the slums seeking a better life.” Flock to the slums is a frightening, disturbing oxymoron. So well put.
Very interesting dialogue. Most rational governments try to get the maximum return for their investment Rands. It is a very trying situation in South Africa, as the country can develop from rural and urban development. (Throw political decisions into the fray, and it becomes more complicated).
I sometimes think we are misled by ourselves. There is something called a ‘Fundamental Attribution Error’ and, although this isn’t the perfect application, we should think very carefully before speaking about what people want. I imagine there are a lot of people who come to the city who would prefer to stay in a rural area. There are certainly many who live in cities who would love to live in a rural setting.
One thing is for certain though, we don’t need most of the things we think we need. As U2 so aptly put it, ‘you don’t need what you haven’t got’ But I don’t think we’ll be convincing many people of that until they see scores of people giving up what they already have. It would be better for our planet.
While I think we have many crises here, I don’t think we should forget the work we can do on the human heart. It costs the least and produces the most results. I’ll work on the heart, you guys work on the development. I’ll do my best, I hope you will too.
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I am a cultural anthropologist at Athabasca University who writes about ethnicity, identity and social change in a globalised Southern Africa. I am fascinated by the way in which people find and create their 'identity' in this rapidly changing world. Processes of cultural creativity and regeneration of histories was stark in Southern Africa , but I have found that returning to Canada I was shocked to find the familiar strange and when in Africa to see the strange as familiar. I started to see patterns of life that had once been unsee-able and just matter of fact ways of doing things. I enjoy seeing the patterns of life that inform us; the tropes of life that are silently transmitted from our past. And in our increasingly mass-mediated world how these are visualized, transmitted and transformed.
I have worked with Zulu speakers in the Drakensberg Mountains who claim dual identities of San and Zulu as well as different San communities in South Africa and Botswana. I have a deep love and respect for these rural communities who have been kind, welcome places for me since 2002 when I first moved to South Africa. I am sad to have left South Africa, but will return each year for research and to visit my friends.
I am a pacifist, but love a good verbal fight. My pacifism is based on reason and logic and not religious or spiritual beliefs. If I am not to be found in my office look high up in the mountains as I may be there seeking solace from the cruelty of the world.
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my god, finally someone who understands - must be a ukzn academic - brilliant
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