1 - Wasted Citizenship? Reclaimers and the Privatised Expansion of the Public Sphere
Corresponding Author(s) : Melanie Samson
Africa Development,
Vol. 34 No. 3-4 (2009): Africa Development
Abstract
A large body of literature explores changes in the public sphere related
to the transfer of services and activities performed by the public into
the private sector. Less attention has been paid, however, to the
privatised expansion of the public sphere. This article explores such a
process in Metsimaholo, South Africa, where the municipality sought
to bring landfill recycling into the realm of public policy through a
public-private partnership. As informal reclaimers had salvaged
recyclables at the dump for several decades, this contract amounted to
an enclosure of the waste commons which dispossessed them of control
over their livelihood and confined them to the informal economy.
Countering structuralist accounts of accumulation by dispossession
and top-down approaches to governmentality, the article focuses on
how reclaimers contested these processes. It argues that before the
reclaimers could negotiate with the state, they needed to mount an
‘ontological insurrection’ to counter their dismissal as mere ‘detritus’
and demand that the conception of the public sphere be expanded to
include them as legitimate actors in the realm of public policy. While
this may result in a reconfiguration of the public sphere, it is unclear
whether it would challenge the current privatised nature of its
expansion.
Keywords
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- ANC NGC, Jabu Moleketi, 2005, ‘Discussion document: Development and Underdevelopment Learning from Experience to Overcome the Two-Economy Divide’ in ANC National General Council.
- Barchiesi, F., 2007, ‘Privatization and the Historical Trajectory of “Social Movement Unionism”: A Case Study of Municipal Workers in Johannesburg’, South Africa, International Labor and Working-Class History 71 (1):1-20.
- Beall, J., 1997, ‘Thoughts on Poverty from a South Asian Rubbish Dump: Gender, Inequality and Household Waste’, IDS Bulletin 28 (3):73-90.
- Benjamin, S., 2007, Rapid Assessment on Scavenging and Waste Recycling Work by Children in South Africa, Pretoria: Programme Towards the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour (TECL), ILO.
- Bond, P. (ed), 2007, ‘Special Issue, Transcending Two Economies: Renewed Debates in South African Political Economy’, Africanus 37 (2).
- Burchell, G., 1996, ‘Liberal Government and Techniques of the Self’. In Foucault and Political Reason: Liberalism, Neo-liberalism and Rationalities of Government, edited by A. Barry, T. Osborne and N. Rose, Chicago: Chicago University Press.
- Butler, J., 2004, Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence, London: Verso.
- Central Statistics, 1998, Women and Men in South Africa, Pretoria: Central Statistics.
- Chari, S., 2005, ‘Political Work: the Holy Spirit and the Labours of Activism in the Shadow of Durban’s Refineries’, in From Local Processes to Global Forces. Centre for Civil Society Research Reports, Volume 1, Durban: University of KwaZulu-Natal (www.ukzn.ac.za/ccs/files/RReport_30.pdf , accessed August 15, 2008).
- Chikarmane, P. and Narayan, L., 2005, Organising the Unorganised: A Case Study of the Kagad Kach Patra Kashtakari Panchayat (Trade Union of Waste- pickers): www.wiego.org/program_areas/org_rep/case-kkpkp.pdf (last accessed March 7, 2008).
- de Angelis, M., 2006, ‘Enclosures, Commons and the “Outside”’, In The Accumulation of Capital in Southern Africa Rosa Luxemburg’s Contemporary Relevance. Proceedings of the Rosa Luxemburg Seminar 2006 and the University of KwaZulu-Natal, edited by P. Bond, H. Chitonge and A. Hopfmann, Johannesburg: Rosa Luxemburg Foundation.
- Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism and Department of Water Affairs, 1999, National Waste Management Strategy, Version D.
- Dias, S.M., 2006, Waste and Citizenship Forums – Achievements and Limitations, paper #11. In CWG-WASH Workshop, 2006, 1-5 February Kolkota, India.
- Dias, S.M., 2007, An Assessment of Social Inclusion in SWM in Brazil - Achievements and Challenges, Washington: Presentation to the World Bank, September 2007.
- Goldsworthy, H., 2006, ‘Book Review: Environmentality: Technologies of Government and the Making of Subjects’, in The Journal of Environment Development 15:450-451.
- Gordon, C., 1991, ‘Governmental Rationality: an Introduction’. In The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, edited by G. Burchell, C. Gordon and P. Miller, Chicago: Chicago University Press.
- Harden, I., 1992, The Contracting State. Buckingham: Open University Press. Hart, G., 2006, ‘Denaturalizing Dispossession: Critical Ethnography in the Age of Resurgent Imperialism’, in Antipode 38 (5):977-1004.
- Hart, G., 2008, The Provocations of Neoliberalism: Contesting the Nation and Liberation after Apartheid, in Antipode 40 (4):678–705.
- Harvey, D., 2005, The New Imperialism, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Huysman, M., 1994, ‘Waste Picking as a Survival Strategy for Women in Indian Cities’, Environment and Urbanization 6 (2):155-174.
- International Labour Organisation, 2004, Addressing the Exploitation of Children in Scavenging (Waste Picking): A Thematic Evaluation of Action on Child Labour, Geneva: International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC), ILO.
- Kwezi V3 Engineers, 2008, IWMP for the Metsimaholo Municipality, (unpublished document).
- Larner, W., 2000, ‘Neoliberalism: Politics, Ideology, Governmentality’, in Studies in Political Economy 63:5-25.
- McDonald, D., 2002, ‘The Theory and Practice of Cost Recovery in South Africa’. In Cost Recovery and the Crisis of Service Delivery in South Africa, edited by D. McDonald and J. Pape, Cape Town: HSRC.
- Medina, M., 2007, The World’s Scavengers: Salvaging for Sustainable Consumption and Production, Lanham, MD: Altamira Press.
- Medina, M., undated, Waste Picker Cooperatives in Developing Countries. Metsimaholo Municipality, 2008, Metsimaholo Sasolburg Integrated Development
- Plan, Review of the IDP 2007-2008, Sasolburg: Metsimaholo Municipality. Millar, K., 2006, ‘Recycling Class: Politics of the Informal Economy at a Brazilian Garbage Dump’, MA Paper, Department of Anthropology, Brown University. O’Malley, P., Weir, L. and Shearing, C., 1997, ‘Governmentality, Criticism, Politics’, in Economy and Society 26 (4):501-517.
- Panitch, L., 1994, ‘Globalisation and the State’, in The Socialist Register: Between Globalism and Nationalism, edited by R. M. a. L. Panitch, London: Merlin Press.
- Republic of South Africa, 2007a, National Environmental Management: Waste, Bill: Government Gazette No. 30142 of 3 August 2007.
- Republic of South Africa, 2007b, Portfolio Committee Amendments to National Environmental Management: Waste Bill: Government Gazette.
- Rogers, H., 2005, Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage, New York: The New Press.
- Rose, N., 1996, ‘Governing in Advanced Liberal Democracies’, in Foucault and Political Reason: Liberalism, Neo-liberalism and Rationalities of Government, edited by A. Barry, T. Osborne and N. Rose, Chicago: Chicago University Press.
- Ruiters, G., 2007, ‘Contradictions in Municipal Services in Contemporary South Africa: Disciplinary Commodification and Self-disconnections’, in Critical Social Policy 27 (4):487-508.
- Rutherford, S., 2007, ‘Green Governmentality: Insights and Opportunities in the Study of Nature’s Rule, Progress in Human Geography 31 (3):291-307.
- Samson, M., 2007, ‘Privatizing Collective Public Goods - Re-fracturing the Public and Re-Segmenting Labour Markets: A Case Study of Street Cleaning in Johannesburg, South Africa’, in Studies in Political Economy 79:119-143.
- Samson, M., 2008, Reclaiming Livelihoods: The Role of Reclaimers in Municipal Waste Management Systems, Pietermaritzburg: Groundwork.
- Tejani, T., 2003, Scrap-collectors Fight For and Win a New Legitimacy April [cited].
- Watts, M., 2003, ‘Development and Governmentality’, in Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography 24 (1):6-34.
- Webster, E., Benya, A., Dilata, X., Joynt, K., Ngoepe, K. and Tsoeu, M., 2007, Making Visible the Invisible: Confronting South Africa’s Decent Work Deficit. Research Report prepared for the Department of Labour by the Sociology of Work Unit, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg: SWOP.
- Weszkalnys, G., 2007, ‘Review: Environmentality: Technologies of Government and the Making of Subjects’, in Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 25:376-377.
References
ANC NGC, Jabu Moleketi, 2005, ‘Discussion document: Development and Underdevelopment Learning from Experience to Overcome the Two-Economy Divide’ in ANC National General Council.
Barchiesi, F., 2007, ‘Privatization and the Historical Trajectory of “Social Movement Unionism”: A Case Study of Municipal Workers in Johannesburg’, South Africa, International Labor and Working-Class History 71 (1):1-20.
Beall, J., 1997, ‘Thoughts on Poverty from a South Asian Rubbish Dump: Gender, Inequality and Household Waste’, IDS Bulletin 28 (3):73-90.
Benjamin, S., 2007, Rapid Assessment on Scavenging and Waste Recycling Work by Children in South Africa, Pretoria: Programme Towards the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour (TECL), ILO.
Bond, P. (ed), 2007, ‘Special Issue, Transcending Two Economies: Renewed Debates in South African Political Economy’, Africanus 37 (2).
Burchell, G., 1996, ‘Liberal Government and Techniques of the Self’. In Foucault and Political Reason: Liberalism, Neo-liberalism and Rationalities of Government, edited by A. Barry, T. Osborne and N. Rose, Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Butler, J., 2004, Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence, London: Verso.
Central Statistics, 1998, Women and Men in South Africa, Pretoria: Central Statistics.
Chari, S., 2005, ‘Political Work: the Holy Spirit and the Labours of Activism in the Shadow of Durban’s Refineries’, in From Local Processes to Global Forces. Centre for Civil Society Research Reports, Volume 1, Durban: University of KwaZulu-Natal (www.ukzn.ac.za/ccs/files/RReport_30.pdf , accessed August 15, 2008).
Chikarmane, P. and Narayan, L., 2005, Organising the Unorganised: A Case Study of the Kagad Kach Patra Kashtakari Panchayat (Trade Union of Waste- pickers): www.wiego.org/program_areas/org_rep/case-kkpkp.pdf (last accessed March 7, 2008).
de Angelis, M., 2006, ‘Enclosures, Commons and the “Outside”’, In The Accumulation of Capital in Southern Africa Rosa Luxemburg’s Contemporary Relevance. Proceedings of the Rosa Luxemburg Seminar 2006 and the University of KwaZulu-Natal, edited by P. Bond, H. Chitonge and A. Hopfmann, Johannesburg: Rosa Luxemburg Foundation.
Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism and Department of Water Affairs, 1999, National Waste Management Strategy, Version D.
Dias, S.M., 2006, Waste and Citizenship Forums – Achievements and Limitations, paper #11. In CWG-WASH Workshop, 2006, 1-5 February Kolkota, India.
Dias, S.M., 2007, An Assessment of Social Inclusion in SWM in Brazil - Achievements and Challenges, Washington: Presentation to the World Bank, September 2007.
Goldsworthy, H., 2006, ‘Book Review: Environmentality: Technologies of Government and the Making of Subjects’, in The Journal of Environment Development 15:450-451.
Gordon, C., 1991, ‘Governmental Rationality: an Introduction’. In The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, edited by G. Burchell, C. Gordon and P. Miller, Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Harden, I., 1992, The Contracting State. Buckingham: Open University Press. Hart, G., 2006, ‘Denaturalizing Dispossession: Critical Ethnography in the Age of Resurgent Imperialism’, in Antipode 38 (5):977-1004.
Hart, G., 2008, The Provocations of Neoliberalism: Contesting the Nation and Liberation after Apartheid, in Antipode 40 (4):678–705.
Harvey, D., 2005, The New Imperialism, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Huysman, M., 1994, ‘Waste Picking as a Survival Strategy for Women in Indian Cities’, Environment and Urbanization 6 (2):155-174.
International Labour Organisation, 2004, Addressing the Exploitation of Children in Scavenging (Waste Picking): A Thematic Evaluation of Action on Child Labour, Geneva: International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC), ILO.
Kwezi V3 Engineers, 2008, IWMP for the Metsimaholo Municipality, (unpublished document).
Larner, W., 2000, ‘Neoliberalism: Politics, Ideology, Governmentality’, in Studies in Political Economy 63:5-25.
McDonald, D., 2002, ‘The Theory and Practice of Cost Recovery in South Africa’. In Cost Recovery and the Crisis of Service Delivery in South Africa, edited by D. McDonald and J. Pape, Cape Town: HSRC.
Medina, M., 2007, The World’s Scavengers: Salvaging for Sustainable Consumption and Production, Lanham, MD: Altamira Press.
Medina, M., undated, Waste Picker Cooperatives in Developing Countries. Metsimaholo Municipality, 2008, Metsimaholo Sasolburg Integrated Development
Plan, Review of the IDP 2007-2008, Sasolburg: Metsimaholo Municipality. Millar, K., 2006, ‘Recycling Class: Politics of the Informal Economy at a Brazilian Garbage Dump’, MA Paper, Department of Anthropology, Brown University. O’Malley, P., Weir, L. and Shearing, C., 1997, ‘Governmentality, Criticism, Politics’, in Economy and Society 26 (4):501-517.
Panitch, L., 1994, ‘Globalisation and the State’, in The Socialist Register: Between Globalism and Nationalism, edited by R. M. a. L. Panitch, London: Merlin Press.
Republic of South Africa, 2007a, National Environmental Management: Waste, Bill: Government Gazette No. 30142 of 3 August 2007.
Republic of South Africa, 2007b, Portfolio Committee Amendments to National Environmental Management: Waste Bill: Government Gazette.
Rogers, H., 2005, Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage, New York: The New Press.
Rose, N., 1996, ‘Governing in Advanced Liberal Democracies’, in Foucault and Political Reason: Liberalism, Neo-liberalism and Rationalities of Government, edited by A. Barry, T. Osborne and N. Rose, Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Ruiters, G., 2007, ‘Contradictions in Municipal Services in Contemporary South Africa: Disciplinary Commodification and Self-disconnections’, in Critical Social Policy 27 (4):487-508.
Rutherford, S., 2007, ‘Green Governmentality: Insights and Opportunities in the Study of Nature’s Rule, Progress in Human Geography 31 (3):291-307.
Samson, M., 2007, ‘Privatizing Collective Public Goods - Re-fracturing the Public and Re-Segmenting Labour Markets: A Case Study of Street Cleaning in Johannesburg, South Africa’, in Studies in Political Economy 79:119-143.
Samson, M., 2008, Reclaiming Livelihoods: The Role of Reclaimers in Municipal Waste Management Systems, Pietermaritzburg: Groundwork.
Tejani, T., 2003, Scrap-collectors Fight For and Win a New Legitimacy April [cited].
Watts, M., 2003, ‘Development and Governmentality’, in Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography 24 (1):6-34.
Webster, E., Benya, A., Dilata, X., Joynt, K., Ngoepe, K. and Tsoeu, M., 2007, Making Visible the Invisible: Confronting South Africa’s Decent Work Deficit. Research Report prepared for the Department of Labour by the Sociology of Work Unit, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg: SWOP.
Weszkalnys, G., 2007, ‘Review: Environmentality: Technologies of Government and the Making of Subjects’, in Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 25:376-377.