Just Deserts
Race, Class and Distributive Justice in Post-Apartheid South Africa
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4767732 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jeremy Seekings (0000-0002-8029-412X, University of Cape Town, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2008 |
| Volume | 34 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 39-60 |
| Publication date | 2008-03-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Southern African Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0305-7070 • E-ISSN: 1465-3893 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/03057070701832874 |
| OpenAlex | W2061521019 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 11 |
This article examines how racial differences affect perceptions of distributive justice in post-apartheid South Africa. In ‘divided’ societies, citizens might be expected to discriminate on the basis of race or culture in assessing the justice of other citizens’ claims. South Africa is a prime example of a ‘divided’ society in which, in the past, legislation and racial elite culture combined in pervasive discrimination. Given the continued importance of race in daily life in South Africa, we might expect that attitudes about distributive justice would continue to be racialised, with people considering members of the same ‘racial group’ as themselves as being more deserving than members of other groups. But evidence from both national data-sets and a new data-set for Cape Town in particular suggests that race has complex and often counter-intuitive effects on perceptions of distributive justice. By some criteria, and some analytic techniques, people do not discriminate on the basis of race when assessing ‘just deserts’; by other criteria, and other analytic techniques, ‘just deserts’ appear still to be somewhat ‘coloured’ in post-apartheid South Africa. Overall, however, the evidence suggests that the effects of race are either weak or work in counter-intuitive directions. Rich and white Capetonians are certainly more generous in their views on redistribution than is generally assumed
Criminology · Distributive justice · Economic Justice · Elite · Ethnic group · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Gender Politics and Representation · Gender Studies · Human Rights and Development · Law
From power-blind binaries to the intersectionality of peace
A mall for all? Race and public space in post-apartheid Cape Town
Reductionism and post-apartheid culture
Everyday Conversations About Economic Inequality
Minority identities and negative attitudes toward immigrants
The continuing salience of race
GugulethuTM
The conditional legitimacy of claims made by mothers and other kin in South Africa
The Zimbabwean Crisis and the Unresolved Conundrum of Race in the Post-colonial Period
The Principle‐Implementation Gap in Attitudes Towards Racial Equality (and How to Close It)
Your Place or Mine? Beliefs About Inequality and Redress Preferences in South Africa
| Citations per year | 0.61 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2008 - 2024 (17) |
| Highly cited | No |