Maano Ramutsindela

The perfect way to ending a painful past? Makuleke land deal in South Africa

Abstract This article presents a discussion of one of the first large-scale community based rural land claims in South Africa. The Makuleke land claim was highly contentious, as it involved more than 20 stakeholders: government departments, local communities and their chiefs, NGOs, mining companies, commissions and task teams, and individuals; all pursuing vested and conflicting interests. [According to the former Chief of the Defence Force, General George Meiring, “the whole area (was) riddled with claims. Many of the claims came from people who visited (the area) once in a blue moon” (WildNet Africa, 1997. News File, May 9)]. Moreover, the greater part of the claim lies within the Kruger National Park, thus, drawing statutory environmental conservation policies into the ambit of land reform. The analysis presented here juxtaposes historical material and trajectories of restitution in order to shed light on the contestation between national goals and community interests.

Land reform in South Africa's national parks: a catalyst for the human–nature nexus

Abstract The most formidable challenge to conservation policies has been to reconcile human needs and conservation imperatives. Strategies to deal with that challenge impacted on the relationships among humans on the one hand, and between humans and nature on the other. Conservation history shows the development of persistent enmity between conservation authorities and local communities. Against this backdrop, the present paper examines land claims in South Africas national parks as a process of redress. The paper shows that, contrary to views that land reform is a threat to conservation, land claims in national parks and nature reserves contributed significantly towards a shift from a preservationist conservation approach in South Africa.

Geography : the state of the discipline in South Africa (2000 - 2001)

ABSTRACT The research team presents the findings of a comprehensive investigation into the status and role of Geography as an academic discipline in South Africa. The paper begins by placing the discipline in historical and epistemological context. Extensive and intensive interviews were conducted with geographers at all South African universities and, on a smaller scale, in the workplace. Information was also gleaned from an array of documents. Comments on the characteristics of university departments, general school education, the geography research environment the geographer in the workplace are given. Emerging trends, many of which relate to recent socio-political change, show that contemporary emphasis is on applied geography, specific fields of specialisation, the accommodation of Environmental Science and Environmental Management, skills training and on curriculum development with a marked vocational orientation. As geographers continue addressing national and international environmental and social issues in their professional endeavours, they are alerted to critical concerns voiced with conviction by practising geographers. In the final analysis a positive conclusion is reached and the academic merit and status of the discipline is confirmed.

Down the Post-Colonial Road: Reconstructing the Post-Apartheid State in South Africa

Abstract South Africas transition to democracy earned its place among the ‘miracles’ of the twentieth century. The transition not only symbolised the end of a protracted struggle against apartheid but also ushered in a new era of the reconstruction of state and society. My intention in this paper is to analyse the reconstruction of the post-apartheid state in South Africa against the backdrop of the post-colonial state in Africa. The paper focuses on territorial restructuring and nation-building as some of the main challenges facing the new polity. Such challenges, I argue, are not unique to South Africa, but are a familiar feature of the post-colony on the continent. However, South Africa faces those challenges against a pessimistic record of its counterparts in Africa, and under different circumstances. Notwithstanding that pessimism, the question that is central to the analysis presented here is how South Africa has responded to challenges of territorial restructuring and nation-building.

The Politics of Territory and Place in Post-Apartheid South Africa: The Disputed Area of Bushbuckridge

The new-found democracy in post-apartheid South Africa was bound to confront the legacies of apartheid, one of which was the segregated spaces designed to foster a separate existence of different o...

Half-Earth or Whole Earth? Radical ideas for conservation, and their implications

We question whether the increasingly popular, radical idea of turning half the Earth into a network of protected areas is either feasible or just. We argue that this Half-Earth plan would have widespread negative consequences for human populations and would not meet its conservation objectives. It offers no agenda for managing biodiversity within a human half of Earth. We call instead for alternative radical action that is both more effective and more equitable, focused directly on the main drivers of biodiversity loss by shifting the global economy from its current foundation in growth while simultaneously redressing inequality.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF PROGRESS AND SOUTH AFRICAN GEOGRAPHY

ABSTRACT The question of how much progress has been made in any sphere of life calls for the interrogation of both the meanings and measurements of progress. This applies to discussions on ‘progress’ made by scientific disciplines. For a discipline such as geography, which stands at the confluence of philosophies of science, evaluating progress is a complex undertaking. Nevertheless, philosophies of progress could possibly highlight the ebbs and flows of the discipline. In this paper, I appropriate one of the many versions of the philosophies of progress to assess the achievements and shortcomings of South African geography over the last three decades. The paper concludes that, while the influence of mainstream geography cannot be discounted, local political environments have profound impact on the twists and turns of local geography.

National identity in South Africa: the search for harmony

The history of South Africa shows that different approaches have been employed to develop South African national identities. These approaches, however, could not produce a single national identity. When the Government of National Unity (GNU) came to power after the first democratic national elections in April 1994, a new chapter was opened for the country to search for a new South Africanism. This paper attempts to give an overview of the nationalisms which dominated the politics of the Union and the Republic of South Africa. The overview is intended to provide the reader with the background for understanding the efforts by the GNU to build a new post-apartheid national identity. The central focus of the paper is the changing bases on which a South African nationhood was/is built.

THE BITTER HARVEST OF THE BANTUSTANS

ABSTRACT Observers have variously captured the foundation and implementation of the notorious apartheid system. The legacy of that system in a democratic South Africa continues to receive scholarly attention. However, the enormous imprint of the bantustan programme has not been fully understood. That gap could become even deeper in the post-apartheid era, where bantustans no longer exists as political entities. The collapse of the bantustans and their subsequent reincorporation into the new polity did not, and should not, close a chapter on the effects of ‘bantustanization.’ Bantustans no longer exists as political entities, but has left imprints that cannot be wished away. That legacy and the intellectual response to it inform the analysis presented in this paper.

Peri-urban transformation in South Africa: Experiences from Limpopo Province

Notwithstanding the problem of defining, and attaching meanings to, peri-urban, a great deal of work has attempted to capture the processes that underpin peri-urban dynamics; the focus being to measure peri-urban change and their outcomes. What seems to be common among peri-urban studies is the realisation that peri-urban areas are zones of rapid change. That change is often ascribed to processes of peripheral urban expansion rather than those that underpin rural change. That is to say that notions of peri-urban are premised on urban change. The question that arises from that premise is how rural change impact on the peri-urban. At the level of abstraction, this translates into whether rural change is a response to urban processes. In South Africa, the development of peri-urban peripheries is ascribed to black in-migration to former white areas and the failure of the state to police peri-urban boundaries. In contrast to the association of the emergence of peri-urban zones with the black immigrant, Cross (2001) argued that the end of influx control legislative measures that aimed to curb black urban migration did lead to rapid rural-urban migration, particularly in KwaZulu-Natal. This raises the question of the kinds of processes that account for peri-urban changes in post-apartheid South Africa. The present paper analyses local government transformation and its impact on the periurban of Louis Trichardt in Limpopo Province. The first part of the paper presents an overview of peri-urbanism in the context of South Africa. This is followed by discussion of local government transformation and the attendant re-conceptualisation of rural-urban boundaries. In the third part we present case study material to capture the impact of peri-urban changes on the ground. While endorsing the view that peri-urban transformation processes are associated with contradictions and unintended results, the paper seeks to locate the causes of those contradictions.