Citizenship, property, and place: Land and housing in South Africa

This dissertation is a critical analysis of the South African land and housing reform programs, which form part of the strategy to address the legacy of apartheid, and generate a new basis for citizenship. The analysis is centered on the issues of citizenship, property, and place. It is based on the construct that citizenship--the practices which define membership in society and consequently shape the allocation of resources--is conditioned not only by social, legal, or political status, but also by access to property and place. Property, especially land rights, empower and so impact socio-economic standing. Access to place helps secure socio-economic resources, and the organization of place shapes social relations and facilitates integration. Segregation and apartheid deprived South African blacks of citizenship through dispossession of land and housing, and restrictions on access to place. Accordingly, land and housing reform have become central issues in the quest for redemption of citizenship.;The dissertation is structured around a series of questions about the competing notions of citizenship that inform land and housing reform, and the various constituencies that contest citizenship through policy formulation and implementation. Historical analysis of the effects of apartheid on patterns of citizenship and orderings of place, and analysis of the land and housing policy-making process, provide the basis for a critique of the emerging policies in terms of their capacity to address unequal patterns of citizenship and place. The empirical content is also derived from case studies of Cato Manor and District Six, which as metaphors of apartheid-based urban dispossession, provide graphic contextual views of the conflicts and dynamics of citizenship.;Emerging policy does not mediate the tensions between the liberal and communitarian citizenship equitably. By placing stress on the former, it is limited in achieving restitution and redistribution, and unable to realize the objectives of equal citizenship and social justice. Policy paths towards these goals will depend on the degree of commitment to communitarian, place-based citizenship, particularly the willingness and capacity to build constituencies, broker representation, and address diversities through the category of place.