Large and small houses in Luganda: housing construction and gender in South Africa

Abstract

This article discusses the participation of women in housing delivery in Luganda, which occurred at a time of both political and economic changes that had a profound impact on their ability to consolidate their core structures. The findings suggest that few women in Luganda were involved in ‘skilled’ residential construction. When they participated, it was in supportive roles such as clearing the sites for construction, carrying water and mixing the concrete. However, home ownership brought women benefits in that their houses provided the space and infrastructure that they needed to effectively carry out their informal sector activities, which related to the services sector. This study argues that skilled work in construction is better remunerated than in the services sector, in which most women work. If women are to enter the formal construction sector it is imperative that they alter their attitudes and those of their spouses. Projects dealing with shelter delivery should therefore focus not only on the product but also on raising the consciousness of the beneficiaries with regard to gender matters.

1. Introduction

The capital subsidy scheme introduced in 1994 with the post-apartheid housing policy provided the opportunity for groups whose housing need was greatest in South Africa to become involved in housing development. The impact of this massive housing finance programme is yet to be fully appreciated. This article contributes to the body of literature on post-apartheid state-subsidised housing by focusing on the experiences of women in a housing development at Luganda, a project located in southern Pinetown in the City of Durban (eThekwini Municipality).

The article is structured in broad sections, beginning with the background to the study and moving on to the methodology used in gathering primary data. The findings from the fieldwork are presented, along with a discussion, and the issues that arise from the study are recapitulated in the conclusion.

2. Urban South Africa

From the beginning of the colonial era until the end of apartheid, women's access to housing in South Africa was shaped by the state's concept of the family, which influenced the way housing policy developed historically. Public housing provision, for instance, was based on the notion of the small nuclear family, ignoring the different family types that existed in the country (Todes & Walker, 1993: 45). The practices of accommodating more distant relatives in the nuclear family house and of earning income by sub-letting were ignored in the provision of housing.

The notion of gender equity, as advocated in the United Nations Women's Decade (1975–1985) (Kabeer, 1994) was also ignored in South Africa before 1990, in a political climate based on inequalities of race and gender. Single mothers had no access to housing except in terms of their relation with men – husbands, brothers, cousins and partners – (Morris, 1981; Ramphele, 1993: 18). Women's participation, after unexpected removals and later displacement due to political violence, in providing informal shelter was nevertheless often spontaneous and effective (Ndinda, 2001: 62–65).

The influence of international feminist discourse on women's right to equality found expression in the demand for the inclusion of gender equality as a clause in the post-apartheid constitution. Gender equality was not subsumed under the general equality clause, but was inscribed as a right among others in the 1996 South African constitution. The constitution went further to include rights to housing and other basic needs in the Bill of Rights. These constitutional provisions were followed by the creation of the Commission of Gender Equality, whose role is to act as a watchdog for the government to ensure that gender equality is achieved in all sectors of the economy. These legal and policy changes have seen a major shift for African women in particular, from having no rights to having an abundance of rights. Women have experienced a radical change from being powerless relative to men to having equal power. In terms of housing, these shifts represent a major transformation from having access to very little urban housing to broad access to housing. These legal changes are potentially very empowering if pushed to their limits.

Empowerment has different meanings and the word is used in a wide range of contexts. It is a word that has been embraced by conflicting schools of thought; it has been used by neoliberals, neo-Marxists and Third World grassroots groups alike to denote whatever the user wanted it to mean (Rowlands, 1997). As Rowlands states, ‘The term may be used merely to communicate good intentions, and to imply some unspecified recognition of the need for changes in the distribution of power’ (Rowlands, 1997: 7). On the other hand, empowerment as a word can be used to ignore, obscure, confuse or divert debates. Due to lack of clarity on what constitutes empowerment, it ‘becomes possible to sustain the notion of empowerment as something that can be done “to” people’ (Rowlands, 1997: 8). There may be differences in how empowerment is understood in different contexts. In the ordinary sense, ‘empowerment is about people taking control over their own lives: gaining the ability to do things, to set their own agendas, to change events in a way previously lacking. This may include affecting the way other people act, consciously or unconsciously forcing changes in their behaviour’ (Young, 1997: 371). Empowerment is conceived as being more than just something that affects the individual and focuses on political and economic dimensions. In development the notion of empowerment was articulated by Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN). DAWN distinguishes between long-term and short-term strategies. Long-term strategies are needed to break down the structures of inequality between genders, classes and nations. The short-term strategies correspond to practical gender needs; however, long-term strategies contain a wider agenda than strategic gender needs, with national liberation as a fundamental prerequisite for addressing them. According to Kabeer (1994), short-term change leads to long-term transformation. Bombay in India provides an example of grassroots organising to meet their practical and strategic needs, where the Forum Against Oppression of Women began organising around issues such as rape and bride burning in 1979. However, it became clear that housing was a greater priority for women in squatter settlements and the focus shifted to address that need.

In the transition from apartheid to democracy, the ANC devised a policy document known as the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) (ANC, 1994). The RDP was a programme that the ANC-led government was going to use to reconstruct the country in the post-apartheid period. The infrastructural programme of the RDP entailed providing modern and effective services such as electricity, water, telecommunications, transport, health, education, housing and training for all. The provision of housing through the subsidy scheme was in line with the RDP principle of meeting basic needs (Government of South Africa, 1994).

Since 1994 the target group and eligibility criteria for access to the housing subsidy have remained the same; that is, South African citizens over the age of 21 years, with a total household income of less than R3 500. However, the amounts allocated to the different categories have been changing. Whereas the emphasis in the 1994 White Paper on housing was normalising the housing environment in order to ensure housing delivery to the masses, the emphasis in the current housing policy, ‘Breaking New Ground’, is on the creation of sustainable human settlements overall rather than on low income housing (Department of Housing, 2004).

The RDP document set a target of providing one million houses by the end of the first five years of the ANC governance (ANC, 1994). By 2000, six years after the inception of the White Paper on housing, over one million housing opportunities had been delivered, housing approximately four million people (Mthembi-Mahanyele, 2000a, b; Mbeki, 2001; Streek, 2001). It is notable that, although the housing programme as set out in the RDP has continued, the policy was sidelined after two years of implementation in 1996 for the neoliberal Growth, Employment and Redistribution macro-economic policy which was the Government of National Unity (GNU) document for achieving sustained economic growth and development. By the time GEAR came into being economic growth was slow. Among the objectives of GEAR were to bring the fiscal deficit down and to keep inflation in check. Features of GEAR included liberalisation, fiscal discipline, export-oriented growth, privatisation, labour flexibility and a focus on stabilising financial markets in South Africa through the gradual lowering of interest rates while keeping the inflation low (Government of South Africa, 1996). These elements of the macro-economic policy were based on the neoliberal framework of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (Adelzadeh, 1996). The GEAR framework was similar to that of the IMF Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) in Third World countries.

Various analysts have documented the impact of GEAR specifically on employment trends in South Africa. (Adelzadeh, 1996; Heintz, 1997; Osborn, 1997; Natrass, 1996). In particular, Edward Osborn (1997) indicates that while the policy promised the creation of 400 000 jobs by 2000, about 164 000 people lost their jobs in 1997 alone. While production in industry was shown to have increased, employment in manufacturing declined by 6 per cent in 1997. According to Heintz (1997), increased productivity at a rate higher than the rate of economic growth may lead to more job losses. While these analyses provide a broader perspective of the impact of GEAR, the impact was felt most severely at the household level and the findings from Luganda illustrate this.

It is against this background of constitutional and policy changes that the author discusses women's participation in housing development in Luganda, a community in the Inner West Council of the eThekwini municipality in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The extent to which women's roles in the process empowered them is also examined. Luganda consisted of a settled community that had lived there as squatters for a long time before they were granted title to the land. According to the current municipal demarcations, Luganda is part of the areas that make up Ward 100 of eThekwini Municipality. Other areas that make up the ward include Madundube, Mthingwane, Nkomazi, Umbumbulu, Impandwini, Thafelkop and KwaMakutha (see Figure 1) which were all formerly rural areas, hence the roads that link them are gravel roads, as indicated on the map.

Figure 1. Map showing the location of Luganda

3. Methodology

The fieldwork for this article, conducted as part of a study on women's participation in housing delivery in 2000, entailed a cross-sectional survey of 10 per cent (52) of the 520 households in Luganda (see Figure 2). Using the snowball sampling technique, household heads who had participated in housing delivery were invited to participate in two homogeneous focus group discussions, one composed of eight women and the other of six men. A key informant interview was also conducted with a member of the community who had participated from the inception to the completion of the housing delivery process. The focus group and key informant data were subjected to thematic analysis to provide ideas on issues such as participation in housing delivery, views on housing policy, growth, employment and redistribution (GEAR), provision of public utilities during the implementation phase, and activities in the post-implementation phase, as well as women's empowerment in the housing delivery process. In Luganda, the key informant had been with the community before, during and after the housing delivery drive, so he was able to comment comprehensively on the process and the synergies in housing delivery. The quantitative data were analysed to provide descriptive statistics and frequencies.

Figure 2. Structure of the Development Committee in Luganda

4. From invaders to owners

Before the new government this area was like a rural area. We had large pieces of land. We never used to pay rent. The sizes of the land are now small. They range from 350 to 1 500 square metres. (Elderly woman in her mid-60s, Women's Focus Group, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban)

Luganda in the late 1980s was legally the possession of Indian landlords who rented plots to Zulu people. These tenants, however, regarded the land as their own, allocated to them by their chief. When, towards the end of the 1980s, the land was sold and they were threatened with eviction, this threat compelled them to organise and join with Ezilweleni, which borders on Luganda, to oppose their eviction. Through a process of negotiation the residents finally arrived at a settlement with the landlords and the local authority that allowed the landowners to sell the land to the tenants. However, the amount required for the land was well above what the residents could raise. Through the assistance of the Independent Development Trust (IDT) the community purchased the land in 1991. Facilitated by the Built Environment Support Group (BESG), surveyors were brought in to survey and subdivide the land into portions of 800–1 500 m². The site subdivision resulted in 1 700 plots, with one household per plot. Not all the sites were settled, as the subdivision resulted in more sites than the number of households already resident at that time. The residents' committee devised allocation criteria which would give preference in the following order for land ownership: existing residents, relatives of existing residents, lodgers and others. It should be noted that these criteria omit to mention gender. Children of existing residents who were over 21 were also allocated sites (regardless of gender), even though they did not have dependants. These allocation criteria for the existing residents focused mainly on individuals with dependants. Later, more inhabitants were invited to settle in the area, while some plots were set apart for utilities such as schools, social halls, playgrounds and business premises.

After the subdivision, infrastructure was provided in the form of gravel roads, communal water points, street lighting, storm-water drainage, ventilated improved toilets (VIPs) and electricity connection for the individual households. In this process, there was very little community participation and it was conducted in a top-down fashion. ‘Experts’ (municipal town planners, engineers, and surveyors) carried out the work. The community only provided the labour required for installing the infrastructure.

When the new government subsidy started in 1994, some residents were ineligible for it as their incomes were above the minimum household income (R3 500) required to qualify (Government of South Africa, 1994; Adler & Oelofse, 1996). In the initial upgrading process, the water was situated at the strategic points in the community and shared among the residents. After the subsidy scheme was implemented in 1994, some households managed to connect the water to their houses. The residents also built a community hall, which is multifunctional, serving as a crèche on weekdays and hosting functions on weekends. The houses in Luganda were made of corrugated iron, with steel windows, timber doors and a cemented floor. They had no ceilings. Most of the houses consisted of two rooms, and others were single rooms, depending on the income of the household head.

The level of unemployment in Luganda, as established in interviews conducted in 2000, was found to be about 35 per cent among the adults. Among the unemployed, 61 per cent were women and the rest were men. Those who worked in the formal sector were employed in factories around Pinetown. Men comprised the majority employed in the formal sector (75 per cent) while women comprised a mere 25 per cent.

Even those residents who were employed perceived themselves as poor. This suggests that although most people were employed, they were in low-paying occupations which did not greatly improve their status but left them as the working poor. According to a participant in the women's group,

No one is rich here. Only one guy who has a tuck shop here and at the shopping centre… The government gave us two rooms. If we were rich we should have six rooms. If we had money we would have our own houses'. (Middle-aged woman, member of baking group, Women's Focus Group, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban)

The responses from the focus group discussion correlate with the findings of the household survey, which showed that about 83 per cent of all the households in Luganda built two-roomed starter units. Of those who built two rooms, 63 per cent were headed by women and 37 per cent by men. Although the male-headed households were just above a third of the households that had built two-roomed starter units, the differences in the ability of households to consolidate became evident when viewed in terms of households that had increased the number of rooms. Most households headed by women (45 per cent) did not extend beyond the initial two rooms built with the consolidation subsidy accessed in 1994. In contrast, most of the households headed by men were in the category that had improved their starter unit to five or more rooms (72 per cent). The size of the houses was dependent on the household income. It was revealing to see that the proportion of households headed by women decreased in the statistics of consolidated houses, and the larger the scale of house extensions were the less the probability that the household would be headed by a woman. Women ended up with small houses and men with larger houses.

In Luganda, the constraints that households faced in improving their housing conditions were cited as low income, unemployment, and consequent lack of credit. Many respondents (66 per cent) pointed to low income and lack of credit as the key obstacles to accessing housing finance. The notion of incremental housing was tied to income levels and the availability of funds.

4.1 Post-apartheid housing policy

The community understood the housing policy in terms of providing land tenure to the people in Luganda. Both men and women in Luganda had an idea of what the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) was about. According to the men's focus group discussion, ‘it's about developing your own area. But there's no RDP. Houses are part of the RDP’ (middle-aged man, spaza owner, men's focus group discussion, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban). The community was also well informed about the demise of the programme and some of the projects that constituted it. One of these was the ‘poverty fund’ from which some of the women received funding for their income-generating activities such as tailoring and baking. As the extract shows, housing was associated with the programme. The women's sense of the RDP was similar: ‘We have heard that it was helping people but in our area… We got houses only’ (elderly woman, pensioner, Women's Focus Group, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban).

Women felt a sense of disappointment that the RDP did not achieve everything that they expected. This study shows that both men and women knew what the RDP was, and even if they could not define it they were able to identify programmes and projects started under it. However, it was apparent that there was little knowledge among either men or women about the macroeconomic policy which replaced the RDP, and is still current in South Africa: GEAR. They knew that something had made an impact on their lives because some men had lost their jobs and women who worked in the textile industry as machinists had been retrenched. While men stressed job losses in the formal sector, women were concerned about steep increases in the prices of consumer goods. Women, however, were able to identify job losses because these had affected them at a personal level; the men went further to relate the impact of GEAR to other sectors of the economy such as housing, pointing out that, as a result of GEAR, government spending on housing had declined. The interviews in Luganda reveal that ‘Getting housing subsidies is becoming harder because the government is not giving enough money for housing like before’ (middle-aged man, local builder, men's focus group discussion, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban). This suggests that the impact of neoliberalism in the form of GEAR is already being felt in terms of the cuts in the housing budget.

Before accessing the housing subsidy, the residents in Luganda used to live in shelters made of wattle and daub or corrugated iron sheets. Women in Luganda perceived secure tenure as a mixed blessing: it gave them ownership and allowed them to access the subsidy, but it brought new costs in terms of paying rates to the municipality. Security of land tenure is one of the constraints to housing access for women, because most do not own land.

4.2 Community participation

Community participation is understood in terms of the role of the target group and local organisations in project design, implementation, maintenance and evaluation. Decision-making about the design and allocation of sites is of central importance. In Luganda the community participated by deciding the allocation of the plots. This community decided that people would be allocated the plots where they lived, thereby avoiding the inconvenience of relocation.

4.2.1 Organisation

The Luganda Working Committee was established in the late 1980s to fight against the forced removals for which the apartheid regime was notorious. After winning that battle, it was then transformed into a development committee. The aims and objectives of the committee were identified as: the development of the area, especially focusing on housing and infrastructure; the mobilisation of the community for development purposes; action as a united voice for the community; and mobilisation of resources for the community. The development committee was comprised of different sub-committees, such as the development trust, civic association, water committee and crèche committees. The executive development committee consisted of the chairperson, secretary, treasurer and additional members.

There were six women in the development committee. They held the positions of secretary, treasurer, and four additional committee members. Whether the women in the committee were influential in decision-making can only be determined by looking at their role in the process of community participation and the decisions that emerged from the process. The provision of services that address women's needs, for example the crèche and the individual water pipes, point to women's influential role in decision-making in Luganda. Although the gender representation among the additional members of the development committee was equal, the key decision-making positions in Luganda, that is chairman and vice-chairman, remained firmly in the hands of the men.

4.2.2 Gendered roles

In terms of skills, 13 per cent of the residents were trained in house construction. Of these, 58 per cent were men and 42 per cent were women. The training provided was in house construction from the foundation to roof level. This lesser proportion of women trained in housing-related trades was the result of their difficulties in meeting the set criteria. These criteria included attending the training sessions regularly, which most of the women could not do because of their need to simultaneously earn income. Female household heads could not attend because they were sole breadwinners. To attend training, many women would have had to forego their income, which was too high a price to pay. Most of those who could attend training were more interested in participating in activities which they could combine with their domestic work, such as making beadwork, sewing and baking. These activities related to the traditional roles of women as caregivers, which are poorly remunerated in the labour market.

Later on in the delivery process, four women were trained by Kuphuka in various trades such as plastering, painting and plumbing. In total, 16 people from Luganda received training in building trades [Kuphuka is a non-governmental organisation (NGO) funded by the government to provide training support to housing projects]. Households participated in providing their sweat equity in order to reduce the costs of labour (‘sweat equity’ refers to the labour contribution of household members to the construction of their housing). The role of untrained women was the traditional one of clearing the sites and providing water for construction. When the community as a whole was involved in housing delivery, the motivation behind the initial participation appears to have been the need for shelter, because after beneficiaries had accessed housing they saw no need to continue being involved in the process.

Ironically, after the mass delivery phase, in the later process of house consolidation women who had been trained in construction did not feature in building work, but the men continued to practise both in their community and in the neighbouring communities such as Ezilweleni. Discussions by the focus group suggest that after the mass construction phase both the trained and untrained women went back to their traditional roles. When the author asked why this was the case, stereotypical explanations were given. The child-care responsibilities of the trained women meant that they had to remain at home and were even encouraged to do so. While childbearing is biological, child caring is not; it is socially allocated. And since women were encouraged to pursue activities consistent with their socially defined roles, they were confined to ill-paid work.

4.2.3 Social amenities

Many people got jobs because of the new houses but very few women. Women were only involved in building the crèche. (Middle-aged woman, member of sewing group, Women's Focus Group, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban)

Housing delivery led to job creation in Luganda. However, women participated only in building the crèche. When viewed in the light of those trained, it is apparent that those who got the skilled jobs were mainly the men and those who got the unskilled jobs were mainly the women, because of the low proportion that had been trained. The women were involved in clearing the sites for construction, carrying water and mixing concrete.

4.2.4 Costs of buildings

The material suppliers in Luganda were from the local trading centre. None of the suppliers lived in this settlement where housing development was taking place. The community in Luganda was not involved in the production and supply of bricks. The lack of beneficiary involvement in the material suppliers led to their exploitation by the established material suppliers.

In 1995 when we started the materials costed about R7 500. But now you have to buy the roof, doors, and windows. Out of the subsidy the builder gets R1 500 for two rooms. If it's one room, the builder gets R900. Builders come with their own labourers. (Single middle-aged woman, factory machinist, Women's Focus Group, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban)

The above quotation provides an example of how the subsidy was spent in Luganda. Although the women could not account for the labour costs, the estimate indicates the difference between what they could procure with the subsidy between the initial stages of the subsidy scheme (1994–1996) and six years into the delivery process (2000). Beneficiaries did not purchase the materials but rather took their vouchers to the hardware dealer selected by the committee, where the building materials supplier issued materials of the amount stated in the voucher. Hardware stores were said to sell river sand to the subsidy beneficiaries even when the sand was locally available, instead of using that money to purchase what could not be substituted. Taking the voucher to the hardware dealers to supply materials of equivalent value meant that the end-users were left with little option to choose the specific materials they required. This points to a weakness in the voucher system, because it gives material suppliers more power than the beneficiaries in the selection of construction materials.

4.2.5 Post-implementation activities

The housing delivery process in Luganda resulted in various income-generating activities, particularly among the women. Women comprised about 75 per cent of all those that used their new housing for income-generation. While the men found work in building, being security guards and gardeners, the women began their own income generating activities as individuals and also in groups. A group of about 20 women began gardening in an empty space next to their houses and used water from their own houses to grow fresh vegetables, which they sold and also used for their own consumption. Although some people had engaged in gardening before the project, the availability of water encouraged more people to participate. Other activities included crocheting jerseys, hiring out their tent for functions, painting, block-making, selling in spaza shops, operating shebeens, hairdressing and catering for functions (‘spaza’ is a local term for the grocery store; a ‘shebeen’ is an informal drinking place). The men who were trained continued to work in building trades within and outside the area.

In 1998 a group of about 25 women got together and began baking and processing foods for sale to the community. In support of the activities of these women, the civic office provided the space and electricity. Through advertising, the group created local demand and market for their products, and with the profits they expanded their entrepreneurial activities to include sewing. Through a grant from the Department of Welfare and the poverty alleviation fund, the women bought electric sewing machines and rented a room next to the school to begin supplying their children with uniforms. The women's group approached the school governing body and the school principal to procure a contract to supply the school with uniforms. Before the women could be entrusted with supplying uniforms to the local school, they were asked to supply a sample of their products. To prove that they could provide quality goods, the women went to the uniform distributors in town where they bought a sample of the school uniform so that they could make an exact copy. The principal originally refused the sample they had made, but the women negotiated and got approval. They said:

Our uniform is cheaper than the town uniforms. At the shop where the parents used to buy, uniforms are sold at between R89 and R90. The uniforms that the women sew are sold for between R55 and R65. (Elderly woman in mid-fifties, member of sewing group, Women's Focus Group, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban).

Women's involvement in baking, food processing, gardening and sewing was not accompanied by any sort of training, making it difficult to determine whether they were empowered by participating in their traditional roles. The baking activities of women in Luganda were intermittent and depended on the frequency of functions in the community. Their tailoring activities appeared to have the potential for long-term benefits to the community. However, they had neither the marketing skills nor a marketing strategy that would have given them an edge over the uniform distributors in town. Although the women found this edge by undercutting the formal uniform distributors, their sales were largely dependent on the head teacher in charge allowing them to supply the local school. There was also the issue of gaining credibility in the community and changing the belief that the uniforms from the shops were better than those produced by the so-called informal traders.

4.3 Empowerment

For some of the women, the small size of the houses was seen as a constraint on empowerment; as they argued, ‘We can't rent the houses out because they are too small even for the families’ (elderly woman, member of sewing group, committee member, Women's Focus Group, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban). The starter units initially comprised two rooms, but for those whose subsidies were approved after 1996, the materials were only enough for one room, owing to inflation. However, some women were particularly pleased with the new housing policy that had granted them access to housing. Before the current government subsidy scheme, women had to rent; now they owned their houses. They no longer had to live with the fear of being arbitrarily evicted by landlords or partners. For the women, the idea of house ownership signifies their freedom from the paternalism of landlords, as well as from exploitative relationships entered into because of their desperation for shelter. House ownership in this case can be said to have contributed to empowerment by providing women with safety from violence.

We have better houses now… In the old government we had township houses for rent. The government gave subsidies for people working for the government only. The new government gave us subsidies for two rooms and we don't have to rent anymore. I've got my own house now. (Young woman, single mother; one of those invited to settle in the area after the subdivision. Formerly lived in Umlazi Township. Women's Focus Group, 2 April 2000, Luganda, Durban)

The above quotation points to the impact of subsidised housing on the lives of the end-users, especially women. Whereas in the past they could not access housing because they were unemployed, now they had access to housing regardless of their marital and occupational status. The women's views indicate that in the past, despite their irregular incomes, they had to rent accommodation which drained their resources without giving them security, because if they could not pay they would be evicted. The views held by women in the same community point to the diversity among women and how their position in society influenced their perception of the subsidy scheme.

5. Discussion

Housing policy studies in the Third World suggest that land ownership as a requirement for housing assistance often excludes large numbers of female-headed households because in most cases they do not own the land (Aliyar & Shetty, 1993: 18). This would have been the case in South Africa before 1994, but the law now at least decrees equality between the genders in accessing land, although practice is sometimes a different matter in terms of land ownership.

The mode of housing delivery used in Luganda was mutual help housing with the help of the Built Environment Support Group (BESG), whose role was that of development facilitation, where the community had mobilised its members to build housing. The process of self-help housing that was conducted at Luganda with facilitation from an external agency also happened in other communities, such as Nthutukoville Ezilweleni (Ndinda, 2002). At the 1998 Urban Sector Network (USN) Conference, examples of mutual help projects were provided (USN, 1998) and it was after this major conference that the policy document on the people's housing process (PHP) was passed. The data on consolidation points to gender-related differences in terms of the ability of households to extend their starter units. That more male-headed households (72 per cent) than female-headed ones were able to improve on their initial two rooms confirms the supposition that female-headed households are often unable to improve their starter units incrementally.

In terms of housing construction, the analysis of the activities of women in Luganda reveals that they were seen, and saw themselves, as playing a supportive role. In South Africa generally, women in formal construction are relegated to doing the ‘unskilled jobs’ and they constitute the bulk of the labour force in unpaid construction work as opposed to paid (Mjoli-Mncube, 1996: 5). This observation holds true in the case of Luganda.

The idea of empowerment is central in the findings on women's involvement in residential construction. In Luganda women were empowered by their access to work by constructing the crèche. The fact that they could work in crèche construction suggests that they could have also participated in the construction of their own housing. Yet it was clear that they did not; instead they employed local builders to construct their houses. Some long-term empowerment occurred among both men and women, but it had more effect on the men, who constituted the majority of those who acquired skills.

The benefits accruing from housing delivery in terms of job creation were short-lived for the women compared with the men. As this study has shown, women went back to their traditional roles after the delivery process. The evidence in this study agrees with the philosophy of the housing policy, which suggests that investment in housing has multiplier effects in terms of job creation in construction work in the long term. However, job creation in housing delivery is gendered, with more men than women benefiting, owing to the low proportion of women in building trades. Few women in Luganda, when compared with the men, acquired marketable skills to enable them to continue earning an income through construction, which is better remunerated than the services sector where women are concentrated.

The perception of women as caregivers is consistent with the welfarist approach, where women are viewed in terms of their maternal role, hence the assistance provided by development agencies was meant to strengthen women's role as mothers (Kabeer, 1994: 6; Visvanathan, 1997: 20). From a women in development (WID) efficiency perspective, it was evident that women generated income alongside their domestic roles, hence the formation of groups involved in activities which women performed within their homes such as baking, sewing and knitting. The combination of the productive and reproductive roles is consistent with the basic needs approach, where women are viewed in terms not only of their reproductive roles but also of their productive ones. Assistance was directed towards strengthening their productive roles through the provision of micro-credit and other support required for small, medium and micro-enterprises (SMMEs).

The financial support from the poverty fund boosted the women's activities by helping them to purchase equipment that increased their efficiency in producing clothing and snacks. This points to the impact that access to credit has on boosting women's entrepreneurial activities. However, credit alone addresses only the practical need for income and does not empower them to challenge the structures that maintain women's oppression and which confine them to survival activities, while assigning well-remunerated jobs to men. Participation in building work challenges the gender division of labour and provides women with better incomes than those earned in the services sector. It meets a strategic gender need for equality in occupation and remuneration. Evidence suggests that where women have had to break through to fields of work or expertise rather than those assigned by the gender division of labour, there has been some kind of intervention. The case of skilled women in Luganda lapsing back into their gendered roles seems to suggest the same: there is need for some kind of intervention. The supportive policy framework needs to be accompanied by re-education about gender roles.

Women took the initiative to participate more in the local economy by producing and distributing uniforms, an activity that was a direct result of improved housing and infrastructural services. In the past women had to spend time supplying water and fuel; now they have it in their houses. The time is now spent making the ‘fat-cookies’ (Afrikaans vetkoek), biscuits and other foodstuffs sold at bus terminals in Pinetown town and at the nearby schools. The findings of this study are therefore consistent with the existing literature, which suggests that housing is not just about accommodation but is the site of production for informal sector goods and services (Kusow, 1993: 21; Mahajan, 1993: 246–250; Miraftab, 1993: 226–227; Selat, 1993: 234–243). The location of the settlement next to an industrial area has provided a ready market for the range of products made by the community. The fact that few women were trained in housing-related skills made it unlikely that they would enter the labour market on the basis of their acquired skills. The range and intensity of informal sector activities seem to suggest that housing as a product had a greater multiplier effect for women than their direct involvement in the implementation process.

It is evident that women were involved in all facets of the housing delivery process. However, their level of participation appears to have been influenced by various factors such as culture in the case of decision-making, access to credit for their income generating activities and the level of training both in construction and areas considered to be women's work only. Yet, despite the lack of formal training in construction and related trades, most women still participated in providing labour in the construction of their own houses and thereby learnt the skills necessary for the maintenance of housing. These skills, when they belong to women, may not be recognised in the market but they remain useful in the maintenance of housing and other community facilities. The level of participation among men and women in the different phases of the housing development was related to gender. While men were involved in the actual construction, women appear to have been more involved in using the infrastructure which came with the starter units, such as water and electricity. The men continued using their construction skills after the implementation phase in Luganda. The few men who were directly involved in other economic activities that arose from housing mainly concentrated on tuck shops and running shebeens. (In the African townships in South Africa, ‘tuck shop’ is another term for a small grocery store.)

Control over housing provided women with the space and the infrastructure to participate in a range of income generating activities with greater efficiency and effectiveness than before. Now women have more housing space than when they lived in informal housing that had no electricity or water. The notion of space in the context of housing as demonstrated in the women's responses points to its importance in their lives. Women gained control of their lives (were empowered) as a result of their access to home ownership, that is ‘power over’. Yet the notion of control or ‘power over’ was not seen as leading to domination, but rather as providing women with assets and more options and choices.

6. Conclusion

This article began by highlighting the position of South African women with regard to access to housing and went on to show how this position has changed as a result of the demise of apartheid and the shift to a democratic state. Constitutional and policy changes largely contributed to women's improved status, as well as their role in shelter development.

There are two findings in this case study. The first is that women are not frequently involved in the ‘skilled’ jobs in residential construction. They tend only to be active in this area when the particular activity is related to their female gender role – examples are building their own houses and the crèche. Even in such cases, their roles are ancillary: clearing sites for construction, water carrying, and concrete mixing are examples. The provision of formal housing nevertheless allows them, even at the present time, to perform female-gendered economic activities, which generate valuable additions to household income. The male-dominated construction sector, however, is far more remunerative than women's work in the service sector.

If it is deemed desirable for women to become qualified in construction work, it will be necessary to alter their attitudes in matters related to their gender, and probably also those of their husbands or partners. Changing attitudes to construction work is a long-term goal and in this regard the media can play a role in depicting women role models in the building-related professions to show that women, too, can be involved in construction and be highly successful. What is evident, however, from these findings is that the female-headed household is seriously disadvantaged in the present situation. In terms of income, its head is likely to earn less than a male household head, and will therefore be less able to obtain credit of any kind. She will nevertheless not, in all probability, have the training in construction work which might allow her to extend her house at small expense. The acquisition of skills is necessary for higher remunerative work and also for consolidation. In the current housing delivery drive in South Africa, where the state continues allocating part of the national budget to housing subsidies and where the frenzy of activity in the construction industry has been fanned by the country's successful bid to host the 2010 Soccer World Cup, the residential construction sector can and does offer long-term employment to women. However, for them to participate and benefit fully from the synergies in the sector there is a need for training in construction skills to target women and for such training to be conducted at times convenient to women who have to carry out multiple roles both in productive and reproductive work. In terms of planning, the inclusion of social amenities such as child care facilities would greatly help single mothers who are the sole breadwinners, as well as having sole responsibility for child care.

The second finding is that, in addition to building skills, housing delivery should also raise the consciousness of women in the economy as to the various options available to them. In this regard the national and provincial housing departments and the schools of architecture, planning and housing are well placed to sensitise students about the professions in the built environment such as architecture, quantity surveying, construction management, planning and housing. Students unable to join universities should also be made aware of the opportunities that exist in building trades, such as bricklaying, painting, laying tiles, plumbing, electrical fitting work and contracting. While formal policies and the legal framework are supportive of women's empowerment in shelter development, there is need to follow up these policies with action to ensure gender equity in training and in employment opportunities.