Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Shallow Solidarities: Space and Socialities of Accommodation and Exclusion in Nairobi and Johannesburg

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Forging African Communities

Part of the book series: Global Diversities ((GLODIV))

Abstract

In Rongai, Kenya and Katlehong, South Africa, two mobile, peri-urban areas, socialities are being shaped by a usufruct ethics: a means of establishing communal logics and rights to space aimed at achieving protection and benefit without communal membership or community cohesion. The resulting modes of mutual accommodation are consequently shaped by spatial circumstance and pragmatic concerns rather than claims for ownership, representation, or cultural hegemony. These findings speak to a growing, global trend in which forms of membership are being locally negotiated in the thrown together spaces characterising cities of the South. Beyond understanding such local dynamics, they give cause to question the spatial scale at which we locate integration and the very ethics and desired ‘outcomes’ scholars often presume ought to underlie diverse societies.

The authors would like to acknowledge the support of South Africa’s National Research Foundation (NRF), the French National Research Agency (ANR), the Atlantic Philanthropies, and the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Ethnic and Religious Diversity.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 79.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 99.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Data compiled by Thomas Brinkerhoff from official records. Downloaded from www.citypopulation.de.

  2. 2.

    Translating interviews can lead to misinterpretations and mistranslations, but the benefit of including at least some non-English speaking participants in the study was considered to outweigh those potential disadvantages.

References

  • Amin, A. 2002. Ethnicity and the Multicultural City: Living with Diversity. Environment and Planning A 34 (6): 959–980.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beavon, K.S.O. 1982. Black Townships in South Africa. South African Geographical Journal 64 (1): 3–20. https://doi.org/10.1080/03736245.1982.10559651.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Berg, Mette Louise, and Nando Sigona. 2013. Ethnography, Diversity and Urban Space. Identities 20 (4): 347–360.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bratton, M. 2006. Popular Reactions to State Repress: Operation Murambatsvina in Zimbabwe. African Affairs 106 (422): 21–45.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brown, W. 2010. Walled States, Waning Sovereignty. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brubaker, R. 2002. Ethnicity Without Groups. European Journal of Sociology/Archives Européennes de Sociologie 43 (02): 163–189.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2003. Neither Individualism Nor ‘Groupism’: A Reply to Craig Calhoun. Ethnicities 3 (4): 553–557.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bryceson, D.F., and U. Vuorela. 2002. The Transnational Family: New European Frontiers and Global Networks. Oxford and New York: Berg.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bulley, D. 2006. Negotiating Ethics: Campbell, Ontopology, and Hospitality. Review of International Studies 32 (4): 645–663.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Campbell, D. 1998. National Deconstruction: Violence, Identity and Justice in Bosnia. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Castells, M. 1996. The Space of Flows. In The Castells Reader on Cities and Social Theory, ed. I. Susser, 314–365. Oxford: Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • City Press. 2013. It’s Payback, Not Xenophobia. Accessed 2 January 2014. http://www.citypress.co.za/news/its-payback-not-xenophobia/

  • Daily Maverick. 2013. Diepsloot. Shootings, Breakings, Lootings. Accessed December 2013. http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2013-05-28-diepsloot-shootings-breakings-lootings/#.UonmsHBmh8E

  • Davenport, T.R.H. 1970. The Triumph of Colonel Stallard: The Transformation of the Natives (Urban Areas) Act Between 1923 and 1937. South African Historical Journal 2 (1): 77–96. https://doi.org/10.1080/02582477008671475.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dikec, M., N. Clark, and C. Barnett. 2009. Extending Hospitality: Giving Space, Taking Time. Paragraph 32 (1): 1–14.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dlamini, Jacob. 2010. The Root of the Matter: Scenes from an ANC Branch. African Studies 69 (1): 187–203.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fangen, K. 2010. Social Exclusion and Inclusion of Young Immigrants: Presentation of an Analytical Framework. Young 18 (2): 133–156.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fanshawe, S., and D. Sriskandarajah. 2010. You Can’t Put Me in a Box: Super-Diversity and the End of Identity Politics in Britain. London: Institute of Public Policy Research.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ferguson, J. 1999. Expectations of Modernity: Myths and Meanings of Urban Life on the Zambian Copperbelt. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fog Olwig, K. 2013. Notions and Practices of Difference: An Epilogue on the Ethnography of Diversity. Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power 20 (4): 471–479.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Freemantle, I. 2015. Mobility and Anti-Outsider Sentiment in Informal Settlements: Blind Spots in South Africa’s Social Cohesion Strategy. ACMS Issue Brief November 2015, African Centre for Migration & Society, Johannesburg, South Africa.

    Google Scholar 

  • George, S.J. 2009. Hospitality as Openness to the Other: Levinas, Derrida and the Indian Hospitality Ethos. Journal of Human Values 15 (1): 33.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Geschiere, P. 2009. The Perils of Belonging: Autochthony, Citizenship, and Exclusion in Africa and Europe. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Gidley, Ben. 2013. Landscapes of Belonging, Portraits of Life: Researching Everyday Multiculture in an Inner City Estate. Identities 20 (4): 361–376. https://doi.org/10.1080/1070289X.2013.822381.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hansen, T.B., and F. Stepputat, eds. 2010. States of Imagination: Ethnographic Explorations of the Postcolonial State. Durham: Duke University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haupt, I. 2010. ‘You Can Only Claim Your Yard and Not a Country’: Exploring Contexts, Discourse and Practices of Quotidian Cosmopolitanism Amongst African Migrants in Johannesburg. PhD Dissertation, University of the Witwatersrand.

    Google Scholar 

  • Helgesson, K. 2006. Walking in the Spirit: The Complexity of Belonging in Two Pentecostal Churches in Durban, South Africa. Uppsala: DICA.

    Google Scholar 

  • Herbst, J. 2000. States and Power in Africa. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Heuser, B.L. 2005. Social Cohesion and Voluntary Associations. Peabody Journal of Education 80 (4): 16–29.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Holtug, N. 2010. Immigration and the Politics of Social Cohesion. Ethnicities 10 (4): 435–451.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Independent Board of Inquiry and Peace Action. 1994. “Before We Were Good Friends” An Account and Analysis of Displacement in the East Rand Townships of Thokoza and Katlehong. Independent Board of Inquiry and Peace Action. http://www.historicalpapers.wits.ac.za/inventories/inv_pdfo/AG2543/AG2543-2-3-5-01-jpeg.pdf

  • IOL. 2013. Shopkeeper in Court for Diepsloot Shooting. Accessed October 2013. http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/shopkeeper-in-court-for-diepsloot-shooting-1.1527145#.UonmvHBmh8E

  • Kalra, Virinder S., and Nisha Kapoor. 2009. Interrogating Segregation, Integration and the Community Cohesion Agenda. Journal of Ethnic & Migration Studies 35 (9): 1397–1415. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=44014507&site=ehost-live.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kankonde, P.B. 2010. Transnational Family Ties, Remittance Motives, and Social Death among Congolese Migrants: A Socio-Anthropological Analysis. Journal of Comparative Family Studies 41 (2): 225–244.

    Google Scholar 

  • Keith, M. 2005. After the Cosmopolitan? Multicultural Cities and the Future of Racism. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kihato, C.W. 2009. Migration, Gender and Urbanisation in Johannesburg. PhD Dissertation, University of South Africa.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2013. Migrant Women of Johannesburg: Life in an In-Between City. New York: Palgrave.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Kihato, C.W., and S. Muyemba. 2015. The Challenges and Prospects of African Urbanisation: Forging Africa’s Economic Growth Through Sustainable Urban Policies. Report for the African Centre for Cities, University of Cape Town.

    Google Scholar 

  • Koefoed, L., and K. Simonsen. 2011. ‘The Stranger’, the City and the Nation: On the Possibilities of Identification and Belonging. European Urban and Regional Studies 18 (4): 343–357.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Landau, L.B. 2006. Transplants and Transients: Idioms of Belonging and Dislocation in Inner-City Johannesburg. African Studies Review 49 (2): 125–145.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2014a. Religion and the Foundation of Urban Difference: Belief, Transcendence and Transgression in South Africa and Johannesburg. Global Networks 14 (3): 291–305.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2014b. Conviviality, Rights and Conflict in Africa’s Urban Estuaries. Politics & Society 14 (3): 359–380.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2015. Being Cosmo: Displacement, Development and Disguise in Ongata Rongai. Africa 85 (1): 59–77.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Landau, L.B., and M. Duponchel. 2011. Laws, Policies, or Social Position? Capabilities and the Determinants of Effective Protection in Four African Cities. Journal of Refugee Studies 24 (1): 1–22.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van Leeuwen, B. 2010. Dealing with Urban Diversity: Promises and Challenges of City Life for Intercultural Citizenship. Political Theory 38 (5): 631–657.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Leung, Gilbert, and Matthew Stone. 2009. Otherwise Than Hospitality: A Disputation on the Relation of Ethics to Law and Politics. Law and Critique 20 (2): 193–206. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10978-009-9046-1.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mabin, A., S. Butcher, and R. Bloch. 2013. Peripheries, Suburbanism and Change in Sub-Saharan African Cities. Social Dynamics 39 (2): 167–190.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Madhavan, S., and L.B. Landau. 2011. Bridges to Nowhere: Hosts, Migrants and the Chimera of Social Capital in Three African Cities. Population and Development Review 37 (3): 473–497.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Madsen, M.L. 2004. Living for Home: Policing Immorality Among Undocumented Migrants in Johannesburg. African Studies 63 (2): 173–192.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Makore, P. 2014. Investigating and Comparing the Media Representation of Violent Attacks on Somali Traders and Self-Representation of the Attacks by Somalis Traders in Johannesburg Township. Unpublished, University of the Witwatersrand.

    Google Scholar 

  • Makowski, P.T. 2008. Hegel on Recognition: Moral Implications of “Lordship and Bondage”. Dialectic, Hegel Jahrbuch, pp. 119–124.

    Google Scholar 

  • Malauene, D. 2004 ‘The Impact of the Congolese Forced Migrants’ ‘Permanent Transit’ Condition on Their Relations with Mozambique and Its People. MA Thesis, University of the Witwatersrand.

    Google Scholar 

  • Malinga, Simangaliso. 2000. The Development of Informal Settlements in South Africa, with Particular Reference to Informal Settlements Around Daveyton on the East Rand, 1970–1999. Doctorate, Rand Afrikaans University, Johannesburg.

    Google Scholar 

  • Maylam, P. 1995. Explaining the Apartheid City: 20 Years of South African Urban Historiography. Journal of Southern African Studies 21 (1): 19–38.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mbembe, A., and S. Nuttall. 2004. Writing the World from an African Metropolis. Public Culture 16 (3): 347–372.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Meier, L. 2013. Everyone Knew Everyone: Diversity, Community Memory and a New Established–Outsider Figuration. Identities 20 (4): 455–470. https://doi.org/10.1080/1070289X.2013.822377.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Meyers, G. 2011. African Cities: Alternative Visions of Urban Theory and Practice. London: Zed Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Miller, J.H. 1985. Deconstruction and Criticism. New York: Continuum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Misago, J.P. 2011. Disorder in a Changing Society: Authority and the Micro-Politics of Violence. In Exorcising the Demons Within. Xenophobia, Violence and Statecraft in Contemporary South Africa, ed. L. Landau. Johannesburg: Wits University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Monson, T. 2011. Making the Law, Breaking the Law, Taking the Law into Our Own Hands: Sovereignty and Territorial Control in Three South African Settlements. In Exorcising the Demons Within. Xenophobia, Violence and Statecraft in Contemporary South Africa, ed. L. Landau. Johannesburg: Wits University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Myers, G. 2003. Verandahs of Power: Colonialism and Space in Urban Africa. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • News 24. 2011. Xenophobia Fears on East Rand. Accessed 5 December. http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Businesses-sent-intimidation-letters-20110428

  • ———. 2013. Premier Condemns Xenophobic Attack. Accessed May 2014. http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Premier-condemns-xenophobic-attack-20131031

  • Nzayabino, V. 2009. Spiritual Ecology: The Role of the Church in Territorialising Belonging and Its Impact on Integration of Migrants in South Africa. MA Thesis, University of the Witwatersrand.

    Google Scholar 

  • Posel, D. 1997 [1991]. The Making of Apartheid 1948–1961: Conflict and Compromise. Oxford: Clarendon Paperbacks.

    Google Scholar 

  • Potts, D. 2011. Circular Migration in Zimbabwe and Contemporary Sub-Saharan Africa. Cape Town: University of Cape Town Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Robinson, J. 1997. The Geopolitics of South African Cities: States, Citizens, Territory. Political Geography 16 (5): 365–386.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2013. The Urban Now: Theorising Cities Beyond the New. European Journal of Cultural Studies 16 (6): 659–677.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rogaly, B., and K. Qureshi. 2013. Diversity, Urban Space and the Right to the Provincial City. Identities 20 (4): 423–437. https://doi.org/10.1080/1070289X.2013.822375.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • SABC. 2014. Battle to Control Gauteng intensifies. Accessed May 2014. http://www.sabc.co.za/news/a/f6805b0043c150d5aa89fa239b19c088/Battle-to-control-Gauteng-intensifies-20142404

  • Sandercock, L. 2003. Planning in the Ethno-Culturally Diverse City: A Comment. Planning Theory & Practice 4 (3): 319–323.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Saunders, D. 2011. Arrival City: The Final Migration and Our Next World. New York: Knopf.

    Google Scholar 

  • Scott, James C. 1999. Seeing Like a State How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Segal, L. 1992. The Human Face of Violence: Hostel Dwellers Speak. Journal of Southern African Studies 18 (1): 190–231. https://doi.org/10.2307/2637187.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Simone, A. 2009. City Life from Jakarta to Dakar: Movements at the Crossroads. New York and London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sitas, A. 1996. The New Tribalism: Hostels and Violence. Journal of Southern African Studies 22 (2): 235–248. https://doi.org/10.2307/2637059.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Skrbis, Z., and I. Woodward. 2007. The Ambivalence of Ordinary Cosmopolitanism: Investigating the Limits of Cosmopolitan Openness. The Sociological Review 55 (4): 730–747.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Snel, E., G. Engbersen, and A. Lekres. 2006. Transnational Involvement and Social Integration. Global Networks 6 (3): 285–308.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sunday Times. 2011. Xenophobia Meets Its Match. Accessed 19 May 2014. http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/2011/06/02/xenophobia-meets-its-match

  • Swanson, M.W. 1977. The Sanitation Syndrome: Bubonic Plague and Urban Native Policy in the Cape Colony, 1900–1909. The Journal of African History 18 (3): 387–410.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Swilling, M., A. Simone, and F. Khan. 2003. My Soul I Can See: The Limits of Governing African Cities in an Era of Globalization and Complexity. In Governance on the Ground: Innovations and Discontinuities in the Cities of the Developing World, ed. P. McCarney and R.E. Stren, 220–250. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Syrett, S., and L. Sepulveda. 2012. Urban Governance and Economic Development in the Diverse City. European Urban and Regional Studies 19 (3): 238–253. https://doi.org/10.1177/0969776411430287.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • The Citizen. 2008. Xenophobia Epidemic Spreads. Accessed May 2008. http://www.citizen.co.za/index/article.aspx?pDesc=65822,1,22

  • Tonkiss, F. 2003. The Ethics of Indifference: Community and Solitude in the City. International Journal of Cultural Studies 6 (3): 297–311.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • UNECA. 2011. International Migration and Development in Africa: The Migration and Climate Nexus. Addis Ababa: United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. http://hdl.handle.net/10855/21291.

    Google Scholar 

  • United Nations. 2011. Africa’s Urbanization Outpaces Capacity to Provide Water, Sanitation—UN. Accessed 19 May 2014. http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=37836#.U3RrX1eTJEI

  • Vasta, E. 2010. The Controllability of Difference: Social Cohesion and the New Politics of Solidarity. Ethnicities 10 (4): 503–521.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Vertovec, S. 2007. Super-Diversity and Its Implications. Ethnic and Racial Studies 30 (6): 1024–1054.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Westmoreland, M.W. 2008. Interruptions: Derrida and Hospitality. Kritike 2 (1): 1–10.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • White, D. 2003. Social Policy and Solidarity, Orphans of the New Model of Social Cohesion. The Canadian Journal of Sociology/Cahiers Canadiens de Sociologie 28 (1): 51–76.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wiesemann, L. 2012. Public Spaces, Social Interaction and the Negotiation of Difference. MMG Working Paper 08.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wilson, H.F. 2011. Passing Propinquities in the Multicultural City: The Everyday Encounters of Bus Passengering. Environment and Planning A 43 (3): 634–649.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wimmer, A., and N. Glick-Schiller. 2003. Methodological Nationalism, the Social Sciences, and the Study of Migration: An Essay in Historical Epistemology. International Migration Review 37 (3): 576–610.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wise, A. 2005. Hope and Belonging in a Multicultural Suburb. Journal of Intercultural Studies 26 (1–2): 171–186.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wrobleski, J. 2012. The Limits of Hospitality. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ye, Junjia. 2015. The Ambivalence of Familiarity: Understanding Breathable Diversity Through Fleeting Encounters in Singapore’s Jurong West. https://doi.org/10.1111/area.12237.

    Google Scholar 

  • Yuval-Davis, Nira, Floya Anthias, and Eleonore Kofman. 2005. Secure Borders and Safe Haven and the Gendered Politics of Belonging: Beyond Social Cohesion. Ethnic and Racial Studies 28 (3): 513–535.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. African Centre for Migration & Society, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa

    Loren B. Landau & Iriann Freemantle

Authors
  1. Loren B. Landau
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Iriann Freemantle
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Global Development Institute, University of Manchester, Manchester, United Kingdom

    Oliver Bakewell

  2. African Centre for Migration & Society, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa

    Loren B. Landau

Copyright information

© 2018 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Landau, L.B., Freemantle, I. (2018). Shallow Solidarities: Space and Socialities of Accommodation and Exclusion in Nairobi and Johannesburg. In: Bakewell, O., Landau, L. (eds) Forging African Communities. Global Diversities. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58194-5_12

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58194-5_12

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-137-58193-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-137-58194-5

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation