Protest preferred over elections – research

A culture of representative democracy does not yet really reside with a substantial slice of the South African population judged by the results from two separate studies. In fact a culture of protest, which often turns violent, as the preferred way to engage especially local authorities seems to have become entrenched over recent years.

A recently published research paper by Harvard Law School researcher and visiting fellow at the University of the Western Cape’s Community Law Centre, Hirsh Jain found that protest action in South Africa had become increasingly violent since 2007.

Communities seem to feel that the only way to hold politicians to account (or get results) was to take aggressively to the streets.

Earlier research undertaken by Professor Susan Booysen of the University of the Witwatersrand suggested that protest in the streets does not translate to changed voting patterns at the ballot box. Protesting communities most often actually return the incumbent political party to office.

Over-simplification

Taking into account the fact that more than 550 incidents of protest were recorded by Jain during the period covered by his research, his conclusion that “much of what the state does, starting at the highest level, seems to incentivise  engaging in flagrant displays of violence,” however seems to be an over-simplification of the situation.

He bases this conclusion on an announcement by President Jacob Zuma in early 2009 (some two years into the period covered by the research) that he would be making unannounced visits to troubled areas across the country to take a firsthand look at the inadequacy of particular service delivery systems.

Many months later he visited Balfour, which was then engaged in a series of extremely violent, xenophobic and fatal protests.

“Expectedly, several settlements across the country (such as the Sakhile township in Standerton and Rust-ter-Vaal near Vereeniging) began engaging in acts of violence and asserted that they were unwilling to relent unless President Zuma came to address their concerns,” Jain writes in his report.

Closer to the truth, however, is his statement that “at the most fundamental level, community protests are a natural and probable consequence of systemic institutional problems that exist in the provision of basic services to the most poverty-stricken members of South African society”.

More research

The subject probably needs considerably more research to unpack the problem properly of why communities find it necessary to use protests, with a violent component if deemed necessary, to force especially local authorities to engage directly with them on service delivery problems.

It is likely that the lack of a history of representative democracy, the lingering legacy of liberation politics, the fact that a large proportion of the urban populations is first-generation urbanites, often trapped in informal settlements, fresh from rural areas where almost feudal tribal authorities still largely hold sway and ineffective party political structures are among the factors that feed into a volatile and unstable social environment.

It is clear that political parties, their organizational structures and their elected representatives have not succeeded in establishing themselves as effective and legitimate channels through which communities can route their concerns, needs and desires.

It would, for instance, make for interesting research to establish to what extent elected representatives are compelled by their parties to conduct report-back meetings and hold clinics in the municipal wards they represent.

Unless ways can be found to establish and strengthen the legitimacy and effectiveness of representative democracy at especially local government level, violent protest could become a fixed feature of the South African socio-political landscape.

Back to the future

In his reaction to the report, Frans Cronje, the deputy CEO of the South African Institute of Race Relations, said among others one of the things that could happen in the long term is that government would increasingly turn to the security forces to stamp out protest as the apartheid state was forced to do. “In fact, in many respects Zuma finds himself in a not dissimilar position to PW Botha,” he said.

Jain’s research does, however, contain some very valuable information and provides some important lessons for local governments, where the most acute interaction between citizens and government takes place. Local authorities would do well to study his report.

It gives a clear picture of the state of affairs in the various provinces and gives a good indication of the most pressing issues underlying the protests.

It also indicates how the incidence of violence accompanying protests increased over time, During 2007 about 41.6% of protests turned violent, with people being intentionally hurt, houses and other structures burnt, shops looted, rocks thrown at passing motorists, tyres burnt or roads blocked. By 2010, 54.08% of protests included elements of violence.

The frequency of protests also increased substantially during 2009 and 2010. In 2007, the country saw an average of 8.73 protests occur in a given month. In 2008, that figure rose only modestly to an average of 9.83. During 2009 it jumped to an average of 19.18 per month. During the first half of 2010 the monthly average was 16.33.

It was especially high during the winter of 2009 when it spiked at 37 in July and again in March 2010, when it rose to 38 incidents of protest.

The dramatic increase in community protests has also been documented by other organisations like Municipal IQ, which reported 105 “major service delivery” protests during 2010, which was roughly equivalent to the total for the previous five years combined.

The research figures also show that protests consistently go up during the winter months of June to August – presumably when the adverse effects of things like the lack of decent shelter are at their worst.

“There are several (potentially mutually reinforcing) explanations for the greater unrest in winter monts. First, the increased need for electricity and power during the cooler winter months makes residents more likely to protest electricity shortages, which are a regularity across South Africa.

“Second, the damage caused by winter storms and subsequent instances of flooding may contribute to community unrest…. Third, the winter weather may amplify concerns that residents have about the quality of their housing/the absence of adequate housing.

“Fourth, the South African Local Government Research Centre has found that during winter, heavy rainfall washes pollution of urban areas, significantly undermining the quality of coastal water. The deterioration of water quality in communities along False Bay or the Atlantic Coast, for instance has regularly contributed to unrest in the areas,” the report states.

Not surprisingly, Gauteng as both the most populated province and the most urbanised saw the most protests with a third of all action during the period measured, being 2007 through to June 2010. The Western Cape was in the second sprt over the full period with 16% of the protests, followed by North West and the Eastern Cape. During some year, like in 2007, North West was in the second spot with 18% of all the protests taking place there.

By far the most common reason for protest action was housing. It was cited twice as often as issues like electricity, water and generally poor service delivery. The research also found “strong support for the conclusion that informal settlements on the outskirts of urban areas are disproportionately likely to engage in protests”.