African Studies Commons^™

No. 22: Immigration, Xenophobia And Human Rights In South Africa, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

In 2000, the Southern African Migration Project (SAMP) entered into a partnership with the Roll Back Xenophobia Campaign of the South African Human Rights Commission. The two cooperated in offering a series of country-wide training workshops for media and journalists at which the results of SAMP research into media xenophobia was presented and discussed. This publication is the second product of that partnership. The paper sets out to critically review and examine the evidence for the argument that xenophobia is widespread and growing in South Africa. While it is important to document the scale of the problem and the enormity …

No Easy Walk: Advancing Refugee Protection In South Africa, Jeff Handmaker

Southern African Migration Programme

South Africa only began accepting individual applications for political asylum in 1994. A policy designed to recognize former Mozambican refugees for the purposes of a repatriation program became the (awkward) basis of the asylum procedure up until April 2000. Criticized by some, a lively discussion raising often-contradictory views began in 1996, leading to a policy reform process culminating in the Refugees Act in December 1998. The Act only came into force at the beginning of April 2000. This article analyzes the process of policy development in South Africa, focusing on practical and theoretical challenges facing the government in the implementation …

No. 17: Writing Xenophobia: Immigration And The Press In Post-Apartheid South Africa, Ransford Danso, David A. Mcdonald

Southern African Migration Programme

The mass media have become one of the most important institutions in modern society, playing a role not only in our learning and education, but also in how we see opportunities for change and improvements in our lives. For these reasons, the media are seen as a powerful vehicle for social transformation and development, and have drawn increasing attention towards themselves in contemporary society. The print media (ie newspapers) are particularly important in this respect, given that the press has traditionally been a provider of information on daily events and, for many people, are the only source of information about …

No. 18: Losing Our Minds: Skills Migration And The South African Brain Drain, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

Many countries, South Africa included, are in a panic about skills emigration – the so-called “brain drain.” One business-oriented institute even thinks that South Africa’s skills shortage is so “desperate” that the country should immediately throw open its borders to anyone who wishes to enter. Yet most South Africans are ambiguous about the wisdom of using immigration policy to offset skills loss. Immigration, no matter how selective and tightly controlled, arouses nationalist passions and causes moral panics.

Anti-immigrationists argue that governments are supposed to protect citizens from “outsiders”; not let them in to compete with locals for jobs and resources. …

No. 19: Botswana: Migration Perspectives And Prospects, Johan Oucho, Eugene Campbell, Elizabeth Mukamaambo

Southern African Migration Programme

The Southern African Migration Project (SAMP) is committed to supporting basic research on the dimensions, causes and consequences of cross-border and internal migration within the SADC region and to making the results accessible to a range of partners. We believe that a well-informed policy-maker or official is more likely to appreciate the workability of policy choices in the area of migration and immigration management. Policies based on poor or misleading information will not only fail but could have negative unintended consequences. From a human rights perspective, we are concerned that without accurate information about migration, decisions may be made which …

No. 20: The Brain Gain: Skilled Migrants And Immigration Policy In Post-Apartheid South Africa, Robert Mattes, Jonathan Crush, W. Richmond

Southern African Migration Programme

South African immigration policy has become extremely restrictive since 1994. Immigration numbers are at an all-time low, even as emigration accelerates. The number of temporary work permits issued has also declined at a time when South Africa has reconnected to the global economy and many companies and investors wish to import high-level skills. Immigration is not viewed as a public policy tool that could benefit South Africa. Immigrants and migrants (even the most highly skilled) are more often stereotyped as a threat to the economic and social interests of South Africans.

Why has South Africa’s first democratic government taken such …

Vol. 3, No. 2: Spot The Alien, Vincent Williams, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

No abstract provided.

Vol. 3, No. 1: Women Migrants Play Positive Role, Jonathan Crush, Vincent Williams

Southern African Migration Programme

No abstract provided.

Vol. 2, No. 3: Xenophobia: Hostility 'Growing Alarmingly', Vincent Williams, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

No abstract provided.

Vol. 2, No. 2: The Revolving Door, Vincent Williams, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

No abstract provided.

No. 06: Trading Places: Cross-Border Traders And The South African Informal Sector, Sally Pederby, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

Non-South African street traders are often portrayed in the South African media as “illegal”, ill-educated, new arrivals who take opportunities from South Africans and money from the country. The findings of this study challenge some of the basic myths about non-South African street traders and their activities.

The study also makes policy recommendations for changes in both immigration and customs policy on informal cross-border trade. The study examines the participation of non-South African street traders in regional cross-border trade and its implications for customs and immigration policy.

The study focuses on traders in the handicraft and curio sector, as they …

Vol. 2, No. 1: Anti-Foreigners, But Not Obsessed, Vincent Williams, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

No abstract provided.

No. 04: Silenced By Nation-Building: African Immigrants And Language Policy In The New South Africa, Maxine Reitzes, Nigel Crawhall

Southern African Migration Programme

All people in South Africa have constitutionallyguaranteed language rights. To what extent do these rights apply to non-citizens and are they actually observed by various state departments and officials? This report presents the results of a preliminary investigation into this question by focusing on the rights and treatment of foreigners in South Africa, particularly foreigners from other African countries.

The report was commissioned by the Southern African Migration Project (SAMP) as part of a broader programme to understand the reception and treatment of non-South Africans in the new South Africa. Our aim, as authors, is to encourage government departments and …

Vol. 1, No. 1: Benevolent But Troubled Amnesty, Vincent Williams, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

No abstract provided.

No. 03: International Migration, Immigrant Entrepreneurs And South Africa’S Small Enterprise Economy, Christian M. Rogerson

Southern African Migration Programme

Since 1990 there has been a growing movement of foreign migrants and refugees to South Africa. The migrants have come primarily from South Africa’s traditional supply areas, including many Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries. An increasing number, however, are from elsewhere in Africa and further afield. South Africa’s new migration regime has generated considerable controversy within the country. The policy debate focuses on the implications of migration for the national labour market and for the development of new national immigration policy.

The best-documented form of migration by temporary workers is from surrounding African countries in such sectors as mining …

No. 01: Covert Operations: Clandestine Migration, Temporary Work And Immigration Policy In South Africa, Jonathan Crush

Southern African Migration Programme

Significant numbers of foreign workers, both legal and undocumented, are engaged in temporary work in the mining, commercial agriculture and construction sectors in Gauteng, Northern Province, Mpumalanga and KwaZulu/Natal. The actual numbers involved are unknown and unknowable under existing systems of data collection and migration policy. The issue of temporary employment is inextricably liked to the broader issue of undocumented migration to South Africa. The Aliens Control Act is based on principles of exclusion and expulsion. Because non-South African temporary workers have few legal modes of access to the South African labour market, they are unprotected by law and vulnerable …