Land Restitution in Port Elizabeth: Anatomy of a Relative Success

Christiaan Beyers

Journal of Southern African Studies, 2012, vol. 38, issue 4, 827-845

Abstract: In the context of South African land restitution, the ‘collective project’ established under the Port Elizabeth Land and Community Restoration Association (PELCRA) represents a novel initiative based on a city-wide, purposive solidarity that cross-cuts socio-spatial, and to a lesser extent, socio-economic and ethno-racial divisions. Guided by highly competent, forward-looking and pragmatic leaders and service providers, PELCRA developed a model of land restitution which grouped all individual claimants in Port Elizabeth for the purpose of collectively developing well-located urban land. However, as elsewhere in South Africa, the project has been critically hamstrung in partnership with an uncommitted or indifferent state, upon which it is dependent for claims settlement and development. This has, in the end, seriously limited the developmental potential and transformative impact of restitution in Port Elizabeth. It has also affected the extent to which a lasting foundation for group identity, social activity and political mobilisation could be established on which to ground an ongoing collective project.

Date: 2012
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/03057070.2012.749022 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:cjssxx:v:38:y:2012:i:4:p:827-845

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/cjss20

DOI: 10.1080/03057070.2012.749022

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Southern African Studies is currently edited by Ralph Smith

More articles in Journal of Southern African Studies from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().