Alternative resident-led governance in the housing sector: The case of Ruo Emoh, Cape Town

Abstract

Democratic South Africa’s inheritance of apartheid-imposed socio-spatial injustices created a deficiency in accessible housing for the poorer citizen. Despite attempts by the post-apartheid state’s enabling approach to address this issue, and its neoliberal ideology to transfer power to the citizen, housing shortages continue to grow. Housing delivery is ideally where individual aspirations and broader policy frameworks meet, and the integration of resident-centred initiatives and empowerment into the housing framework offers possible assistance. This possibility, therefore, questions whether a neoliberal government can truly enable resident- led housing action. Taking this further leads to questioning how citizens’ radical insurgent practices in the pursuit of socially just, adequate housing fare against state-led delivery. This thesis analyses housing policies, literature on neoliberalism, and resident-led self-help theory to evaluate the local case study of Ruo Emoh (‘our home’ backwards) in Mitchells Plain. Ruo Emoh is a medium density housing development spanning less than one hectare, accommodating 49 households. Behind it is a resident-led savings scheme initiated in 1995, with a 22-year trialling journey to ‘achieve’ (dis)satisfactory and (un)affordable freehold ownership. An important principle in this research approach is a focus on ‘ground-up’ processes, centred on the collective capabilities of residents. By arguing and discussing the neoliberal hegemonies over alternative citizenship practices, this research shifts the top- down delivery paradigm in the way housing is strategised in South Africa and identifies challenges that prohibit residents from assuming active – and recognised – roles in housing delivery. This thesis makes four central arguments, that: (i) the unfounded language-policy nexus systemically limits opportunity for the democratic mobilisation of citizens against the power-central state’s delivery; (ii) a detachist, silent corruptor state does not fulfil democratic participatory aspirations and debases citizen insurgency; (iii) citizen collectives attaining temporally goaled housing does not guarantee continued community nor sustained social capital wealth, and (iv) retrogressive state-provided housing does not meet the evolving infrastructural and place-making needs of residents. While self-help approaches are a start-to- an-end, resident-led processes can contribute positively to – but cannot lead – housing delivery, with an opportunity for residents to play an increased role in constructing houses, and subsequently meeting their contextualised needs. From these arguments, realising the concept of ‘mobilised residentship’ becomes important in formulating and upholding alternative resident-led governance. The investment of skills into residentship can perpetuate a process of self-help-driven, yet state-assisted delivery. In other words, addressing these pressures can form foundations for an alternative resident-led housing governance model and ensure a higher rate of success for mobilised residentship.