Beyond the apartheid workplace : studies in transition

Abstract

Has the apartheid workplace been superseded or entrenched over the past ten years of democracy in South Africa? In order to answer these questions, the authors of this book studied seventeen different workplaces, including BMW, a state hospital, footwear sweatshops and the wine farming industry. The editors broaden the definition of work to cover studies of the informal economy, including street traders, homeworkers and small rural enterprises. Beyond the Apartheid Workplace shows how South Africa's triple transition - towards political democracy, economic liberalisation and post-colonial transformation - has generated contradictory pressures at workplace level. A wide range of managerial strategies and union responses are identified, demonstrating both continuities and discontinuities with past practices. These studies reveal a growing differentiation within the world of work between stable, formal-sector work, casualised and outsourced work, and informal work where people struggle to 'make a living' on the margins of the formal economy. The majority of workplaces are marked by the persistence and reconfiguration of the apartheid legacy.The growth of casualisation and informalisation generates deepening poverty and exclusion among great numbers of households. These are some of the startling conclusions drawn by the editors of this groundbreaking collection, which will undoubtedly stimulate debate and further research among social scientists, trade unionists, managers and policymakers.

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