The city from its margins

Rethinking urban governance through the everyday lives of migrant women in Johannesburg

Dados Bibliográficos

ID3629883
AutoresCaroline Wanjiku Kihato (0000-0003-2311-4935, University of the Witwatersrand, autor correspondente)
Ano2011
Volume37
Fascículo3
Páginas349-362
Data de publicação2011-09-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoSocial Dynamics (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0253-3952 • E-ISSN: 1940-7874
EditoraInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/02533952.2011.656432
OpenAlexW2076981007
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas12
Referências citadas23

Drawing on ethnographic data, this article explores migrant women’s relationships and encounters with the state in South Africa’s largest city, Johannesburg. Focusing on the experiences of people in this marginal location, the article re-examines the notion of ‘urban governance’, which is often understood as the realm of formal urban institutions in which the state asserts its authority and regulatory powers. Through the everyday lives of migrant women we see that local urban practices are not simply shaped by the formalism of state rules and regulations, or their informal illegal counterparts. The way migrant women navigate the city, trade on the streets, and interact with the state and other urban actors illustrates that governance is co-constructed by a multitude of regimes, legal and illegal, visible and invisible. Indeed, women’s lives collapse the dichotomy of the official and unofficial, governed and ungoverned city, in ways that allow us to rethink how we conceptualise the city. Keywords: urban governancegendermarginalityco-constructed urban spaceseveryday practices Acknowledgements The author would like to thank the MacArthur Foundation and the Institute for the Study of International Migration for providing the support needed to complete this article

Corporate governance · Economic growth · Economics · Everyday life · Management · Migrant workers · Political science · Sociology · Gender Studies · Law · Legal Issues in South Africa · South African History and Culture · Urban and Rural Development Challenges