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Abstract
When xenophobic violence erupted across South Africa in May 2008, the role of civil society organisations was central in response efforts. Some analysts noted, however, that much civil society response tended to be humanitarian in nature, rather than presenting any sustained political challenge that would address the underlying structural causes of such violence. This article focuses on the capacity of migrant, refugee, and asylum seeker advocacy and service organisationsFootnote1 to offer an effective political challenge to the exclusionary migration policies and practices of the state. It highlights the substantial difficulties organisations face in advocating for socially and politically unpopular populations, amidst the realities of state mismanagement of migration. These restraints result in a limited, though not entirely closed, space for the concerted advocacy of a progressive migration management regime, let alone the construction of broad-based political and systemic challenges to the socio-economic status quo.
Acknowledgement
This research was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), Canada.
Notes
1 This research is inclusive of organisations which, depending on their funding and mandate, work exclusively with or for those migrants who fit within the Geneva Convention definition of refugees and asylum seekers, as well as those which do not attempt to differentiate and either advocate or offer services for all migrants, including those who are undocumented. The 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees defines a refugee as someone who,
“owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country; or who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of his former habitual residence as a result of such events, is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it” (United Nations General Assembly Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, 1951, 152).
An asylum seeker is an individual in the process of seeking formal refugee status. While the legal categories are clear, in practice, motivations and pressures for migrating are often complex and multi-faceted, as are the reasons why some migrants are documented and others not.
2 I employ the term ‘xenophobia’ with some hesitation, and for lack of a more suitable alternative, as it does not provide an adequate conceptualisation of the complex phenomenon of the violence of 2008. First, as Monson (Citation2011, 195) points out, it pathologises a social phenomenon which is, in fact, a structural characteristic of the nation-state and may serve as ‘a legitimising discourse for opportunistic crime and the privatised production of disorder’. The term has also become synonymous with a fear or dislike of foreigners, which obscures the fact that a third of those murdered in May 2008 were South Africans and also obscures the hierarchical positioning of some foreigners over others (Crush Citation2008a, 4).
3 While the term ‘civil society’ is notoriously difficult and slippery, here, I use Habib and Kotze's (2003, 3) definition of civil society as ‘the organized expression of various interests and values operating in the triangular space between the family, state, and the market’.
4 Interview, Rebecca Chennells, Cape Town, August 2, 2011.
5 The role of the Portfolio Committee in the structure of the South African government is to ‘consider Bills, deal with departmental budget votes; and oversee the work of the department they are responsible for, and enquire and make recommendations about any aspect of the department, including its structure, functioning and policy’ (DHA, n.d.).
6 A former Refugee Reception Office in Cape Town.
7 Interview, anonymous, Cape Town, August 31, 2011.
8 Interview, Hon. Annette Lovemore, Cape Town, September 21, 2011.
9 Interview, Barry Gilder, Johannesburg, November 7, 2012.
10 Interview, Vincent Williams, Cape Town, August 17, 2011.
11 Interview, anonymous, Cape Town, August 31, 2011.
12 Interview, anonymous, Cape Town, October 17, 2011.
13 Interview, Hon. Manny de Freitas, Cape Town, October 10, 2012.
14 Interview, Hon. Annette Lovemore, Cape Town, September 21, 2011.
15 Interview, anonymous, Cape Town, August 31, 2011.
16 Interview, anonymous, Cape Town, August 31, 2011.
17 Despite the common discourse that South Africa is being flooded by foreigners, a 2013 submission to the Home Affairs Portfolio Committee by the African Centre for Migration and Society noted that
for international migrants generally, the recently released 2011 [national] census figures are far more modest than most popular estimates: 1,692,242 foreigners out of a total population of almost 50 million. This equates to roughly 3.3% of the country's total population. This may be an undercount, but even so, the total percentage is unlikely to top 4%. (Landau et al. Citation2013, 4)
18 As of May 2012, for example, the Refugee Appeals Board had a backlog of 74,000 cases, while the Standing Committee for Refugee Affairs had a backlog of 66,000 cases (Parliamentary Portfolio Committee Briefing, May 2012). Elsewhere, in April 2012, the government had reported a backlog of 87,602 cases with the Refugee Appeals Board and a backlog of 68,740 with the Standing Committee (SANews Citation2012).
19 There is no basis in domestic or international law for rejecting access to would-be asylum seekers on these principles. The first safe country principle refers to an obligation by the asylum seeker to apply for asylum in the first safe country in which he or she arrives after fleeing his or her home country. The third safe country principle refers to an bilateral or multilateral agreement between asylum-receiving countries in which an asylum seeker can be returned to a third country, not simply the first safe country through which he or she transited (ACMS and LHR Citation2013, 4). Also, in August 2011, IRIN news reported that South African border officials were turning away migrants from the Horn of Africa at the border, in violation of domestic and international laws. The rejection at the border of would-be asylum seekers may potentially subject individuals to the risks of refoulement or may push them into illegal, and often much more dangerous, means of crossing the border (IRIN Citation2011).
20 Without Section 23 permits, many would-be asylum seekers are (illegally) refused service at RROs, leaving migrants vulnerable to arrest, deportation, and refoulement (ACMS and LHR Citation2013).
21 Interview, Rebecca Chennells, Cape Town, August 2, 2011.
22 Interview, anonymous, Cape Town, October 12, 2011.
23 Interview, Braam Hanekom, Cape Town, October 17, 2011.
24 Interview, Braam Hanekom, Cape Town, October 17, 2011.
25 Legal challenges, for example, have dealt with issues such as the rights of asylum seekers to work and study, access to administrative justice and fair status determination procedures, and the special needs of migrant children. For a discussion of some key cases in post-apartheid refugee law, see Chapter 6 in Handmaker (Citation2009).
26 Interview, Rebecca Chennells, Cape Town, August 2, 2011.