Land reform in South Africa: A vehicle for justice and reconciliation, or a source of further inequality and conflict?

Abstract

One of the primary stated aims of the South African government's land reform programme is to contribute towards reconciliation by addressing the injustices and inequalities of past land allocation. It is however not clear that the land reform initiative will be able to pursue its goals of distributive justice and reconciliation without in the process contributing to the very problems of inequality, competition and conflict that it seeks to overcome. The article outlines some of the ways in which this potentially contradictory process is likely to unfold, both in terms of the official approach outlined in the Green Paper on Land Policy, as well as in terms of likely developments on the ground. A related paradox is considered: that in order to overcome the land dispossession and disruption caused by forced resettlement, there will need to be further resettlement, as black people move onto formally white‐owned land. While in theory voluntary, and involving land gain, rather than loss, such resettlement is nevertheless likely to involve significant difficulties of its own. For land reform to stand any realistic chance of succeeding and of helping effect justice and reconciliation, we need to be as clear and honest as we know how as to what the real costs and unintended consequences are likely to be.

Notes

Professor, Department of Anthropology, Rhodes University. The author wishes to thank Robin Palmer, Nick Vink and Michael Whisson for their useful comments on an earlier version of this paper.