www.migration.org.za jean pierre misago acms-university of the witwatersrand [email protected]...
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www.migration.org.za
Jean Pierre MisagoACMS-University of the [email protected]
HSRC SeminarPretoria, 30 June 2015
Xenophobic Violence in South Africa: Critical Reflections on Current explanations
www.migration.org.za
• Graduate degree programmes (Hons, MA, PhD) with students from across Africa, North America, and Europe;
• Research in 12 African countries on issues related to migration, urbanisation, human rights, development, governance, and social change;
• Partnerships in 4 continents;
• Provides research services and support to government, international organizations, local NGOs, and rights advocates.
The African Centre for Migration & Society at Wits
An internationally engaged; Africa-oriented; and African-based research and teaching centre dedicated to shaping academic and policy debates
on migration, development and social transformation
www.migration.org.za
Main Arguments
• Most current explanations are valuable in describing the socio-economic and
political context but they fall short as scientific explanations for the
occurrence of the violence
• Only a multivariate explanatory model can account for all the determinants of
the violence
www.migration.org.za
Methods
• A decade of ACMS quantitative and qualitative research; on-going
• PhD work
• All together, more than 30 case studies across the country (latest Soweto)
Focus on explaining violence and not attitudes
‘Most similar systems’ approach to understand why violence in some areas and not in
others
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Conceptual clarifications
• Xenophobia =/= Xenophobic violence: Violence is
not a quantitative degree of conflict (Blubaker et al.
1999). Attitudes are not a good predictor of behaviour
This discussion about causal explanations of
xenophobic violence and not of xenophobia.
• Xenophobia or just criminality? Not mutually
exclusive. Xeno violence is a bias-motivated crime
• Afrophobia? Does not pass empirical test
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Current Causal Explanations: Not these….
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Current Causal Explanations: These rather….
• Can be grouped into 3 main categories:
Economic and material: Competition for scarce resources and opportunities; poverty, inequality, unemployment; Service Delivery Failures; Mass Influx and Inadequate Border Control (invoking The ‘threshold of tolerance’ hypothesis: the greater the numbers of migrants in a context of deep dislike , the more violent the reaction (Relative deprivation theory).
Historical, political and institutional: the legacy of apartheid (segregation, isolation policies, etc.), the impact of post-apartheid nation-building efforts and the failure to meet socio-economic expectations.
Psycho-social: cultural stereotyping, repressed historical trauma, culture of violence.
• Shortcomings:
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Current Causal Explanations: Shortcomings
• Common and long standing: cannot explain violence in some areas and not in
others with similar socio-economic conditions
• Reductionist, one-factor, mono-causal explanations: can be at best partial or
incomplete.
Biggest problem: they do not seem to recognise their limitations. They claim to be all
encompassing i.e. to account for all the elements of the causal chain.
What these explanations really do is to describe the conditions prevailing in affected areas; they do not explain how these conditions exactly lead to mass violence targeting foreign nationals.
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Determinants of Xeno violence(or elements of the violence causal chain)
• Deprivation: real or relative
• Belief: that foreigners are the cause of the deprivation
• Collective discontent towards foreigners
• Micro-politics & political economy: instrumental motives of instigators
• Mobilization of the discontent: the trigger
• Governance and social controls: favorable opportunity structure for violence.
“Nothing happens in out community if leaders do not want it”, Alex respondent
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Conclusion: Towards a Multivariate Model of Xeno Violence
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www.migration.org.za
Jean Pierre MisagoACMS-University of the [email protected]
HSRC SeminarPretoria, 30 June 2015
Xenophobic Violence in South Africa: Critical Reflections on Current explanations