A reconsideration of what and who is middle class in South Africa

Visagie, Justin; Posel, Dorrit

doi:10.1080/0376835x.2013.797224

Cited by 58 publications

(60 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…As groups such as Slum Dwellers International (McFarlane, 2009;Satterthwaite and Mitlin, 2013) show, these urban poor movements are intrinsically linked to trans-national networks of solidarity, Þnancing and the coproduction of knowledges around delivering essential urban service provision. Further attention should of course be paid to the emergence of what commentators term Ôthe rising Africa middle classÕ (Melber, 2013;Ravallion, 2010;Visagie and Posel, 2013). Whilst this is a contested term the growth of suburban developments (Mabin et al, 2013) and new housing geographies (Grant, 2009;Mercer, 2014) together with new consumption habits and technology usage predicate a series of niches from which innovations are being generated and reshaping the socio-technical landscapes of energy across these towns and cities.…”

Section: Constituting Urban Capacitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Powering sub-Saharan Africa’s urban revolution: An energy transitions approach

Silver

Marvin

2016

Urban Studies

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This paper develops a geographic understanding of urban energy transitions in subSaharan African towns and cities. In doing so this paper seeks to critically reßect on the value and limits of urban transitions analysis as a framework for understanding energy networks beyond the largely integrated systems across the Global North. We explore how these potentials and deÞcits can be addressed by examining promising developments across a series of debates in urban studies that can help sensitise this approach to energyscapes in the African context. By reviewing urban transi-tions analysis through these debates the paper offers four important contributions to expand existing ways of understanding energy transition. These include the particular urbanisation dynamics of African towns ands cities, the need to locate the urban across energy regimes, the agencies of various intermediaries and urban actors and the contested politics inherent in the governing of energy networks. In the conclusion we reßect on the speciÞc directions that have emerged from the paper in relation to our contributions, offering a geographically informed framework that allows us to better examine the challenges and speciÞcities of transition across these rapidly growing urban regions.

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Section: Constituting Urban Capacitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Powering sub-Saharan Africa’s urban revolution: An energy transitions approach

Silver

Marvin

2016

Urban Studies

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“…Measuring incomes, occupations and consumption patterns is important (Visagie and Posel 2013), yet ultimately limited if we are to understand what middle class lifestyles are like and how they are changing social landscapes (Heiman et al 2012). This is particularly so in places where data on income and employment is inadequate.…”

Section: Introduction: Middle Class Housesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Middle class construction: domestic architecture, aesthetics and anxieties in Tanzania

Mercer

2014

J. Mod. Afr. Stud.

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This paper examines the new styles of houses under construction in contemporaryTanzania and suggests that they can be understood as the material manifestation of middle class growth. Through an examination of the architecture, interior décor and compound space in a sample of these new houses in urban Dar es Salaam and rural Kilimanjaro, the paper identifies four domestic aesthetics: the respectable house, the locally aspirant house, the globally aspirant house, and the minimalist house, each of which map on to ideas about ujamaa, liberalization and the consumption of global consumer goods in distinct ways. The paper argues that these different domestic aesthetics demonstrate intraclass differences, and in particular the emergence of a new middle class.

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“…The way in which the middle class is defined and conceptualised will be of significance for any conclusion drawn, not only regarding this group's size, but also for the estimated impact of class on whatever outcome of interest (Burger et al 2014), including its role in politics and relevance for policymaking (Visagie and Posel 2013;Visagie 2015).…”

Section: The Conceptualisation Of Social Classmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Anxious and the Climbers: Ambivalent Attitudes Towards Democracy Among South Africa's Middle Class

Schotte

2017

SSRN Journal

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Beyond the hopes placed in Africa's emergent middle class as an engine of economic growth, some analysts see this group as a bastion of political stability and enduring democratisation across the continent. This paper's approach differs from that of most studies, which treat the middle class as a homogeneous group, through two key contributions. Terms of use: Documents inFirst, using cluster analysis, I propose a novel way of conceptualising social class that broadly draws on the Weberian idea of shared life chances. I apply this method to South Africa and identify five social classes characterised by their members' living standards, overall life satisfaction, and self-perceived upward mobility. Second, the empirical analysis reveals significant discrepancies in attitudes towards democracy between the downwardly and upwardly mobile strata of the middle class, which I term the "anxious" and the "climbers," respectively. On the one hand, the "climbers" show the highest generic support for democracy as a form of government, whereas the "anxious" middle class displays feelings of resignation. On the other hand, I find indicative evidence of a status-quo bias among the "climbers." Rather than assuming a more demanding or critical stance in politics, they allow their political priorities to be at least partly shaped by an interest in securing and expanding attained living standards; being upwardly mobile is even associated with a higher tolerance for government attempts to constrain freedom of information, opinion, or expression.Keywords: South Africa, middle class, democratic consolidation, political attitudes Simone Schotte, M.A.is a doctoral research fellow at the GIGA and a member of the Globalisation and Development (GlaD) research training group at the University of Göttingen. In her dissertation she investigates the economic and political role played by the new middle classes in emerging and developing countries with a focus on South Africa.

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A reconsideration of what and who is middle class in South Africa

Cited by 58 publications

References 20 publications

Powering sub-Saharan Africa’s urban revolution: An energy transitions approach

Powering sub-Saharan Africa’s urban revolution: An energy transitions approach

Middle class construction: domestic architecture, aesthetics and anxieties in Tanzania

The Anxious and the Climbers: Ambivalent Attitudes Towards Democracy Among South Africa's Middle Class

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