Participatory spaces and the Alexandra Vukuzenzele Crisis Committee (AVCC): reshaping government plans

Abstract

This article challenges the prevailing orthodoxy in the South African literature on participation in development, which suggests that it is government structures alone that determine citizen participation in development. It focuses on the empirical example of the Alexandra Vukuzenzele Crisis Committee (AVCC), an affiliate of the Anti‐Privatisation Forum (APF), to show the ways in which agents shape and recreate development practices on the Alexandra Renewal Project (ARP), an African National Congress flagship programme. To do this, the article draws from interviews with stakeholders involved in the ARP as well as the AVCC who seek to contest the allocation of houses in the ARP. Following Cornwall (2004), this article argues that agents can force the government to concede to their demands despite the government's structures which initially appeared to exclude them.

Keywords:

• participatory development
• participatory governance
• social movements

Notes

1. This research was conducted while I was undertaking my PhD in Development Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand. I am grateful to my supervisor, Dr Noor Nieftagodien, for his advice and support and also to the guest editors of this symposium. I would also like to acknowledge the support provided by the ongoing programme called ‘The voice of the poor in urban governance: civil society, the state and party politics in South African cities’ (2008–2011), funded by the French Institute of Research for Development (IRD).

2. Interview with S. Radebe, Alexandra resident, 8 Sept. 2006.

3. Interview with J. Baskin, ARP director, 9 Oct. 2007. All further quotations from Baskin are from this interview.

4. Interview with B. Lekalakala, 15 Aug. 2007.

5. Interview with F. Dlamini, Chairperson of AVCC, 4 Sept. 2007. All further quotations from Dlamini are from this interview unless otherwise noted.

6. Interview with F. Dlamini, Chairperson of AVCC, 4 Sept. 2007.

7. Interview with D. McKinley, 5 June 2008. All further quotations from McKinley are from this interview unless otherwise noted.

8. Phone interview with F. Dlamini, 22 June 2008.

9. Interview with F. Dlamini, 31 Oct. 2008.

10. Interview with D. McKinley.

11. Interview with F. Dlamini, 31 Oct. 2008.

12. Interview with A. Rasetelo, 5 June 2008.

13. Interview with F. Dlamini, 31 Oct. 2008.