The new struggles of precarious workers in South Africa : nascent organisational responses of community health workers

Abstract: Based on in-depth interviews largely with women working as Community Health Workers (CHWs), documents and internet sources, the article shines the spotlight on CHWs who remain a blind spot in the literature on South African labour studies. Abandoned by mainstream unions and often ignored by labour scholars, the research on which the article is based reveals that CHW workers are crafting their own nascent organisational responses as women and as precarious workers to their conditions. The post-apartheid state has implemented a neoliberal programme which, in part, has led to an increase use of CHWs as a cheap labour system in the provisioning of public health. This article, in several aspects, covers an area that has not been discussed by the literature on labour studies in the South African context, namely the responses of CHWs who have organised themselves to low wages and poor working conditions in the public health system. Besides contributing to the literature, the research demonstrates that in the context of precariousness, new organisational responses led by women who carry most of the social and economic burden are beginning to contest their conditions of precariousness by using tools like strikes, the law and collaborations with other formations like NGOs

Technological changes and manufacturing unions in South Africa : failure to formulate a robust response

Abstract: Technological innovation has had far-reaching implications for labour and for the world of work generally. It has led to job losses, the creation of new jobs, the loss of some skilled positions and the creation of new ones, and an increase in the quality of products like steel. Literature that addresses union responses to technological innovation in production has tended to classify them as either reactive or proactive, with reactive responses predominating. This article examines how South African trade unions in the steel, automotive and chemical industries have responded to technological changes. Based on interviews and documentary analysis, it argues that the unions have adopted a rearguard approach, responding to technological changes only after management has already implemented them. Unions have tended to prioritise “politics from above” and traditional union issues such as wage negotiations. In addition, the current division within unions has contributed to their inability to improve their servicing of members, let alone organise precarious workers and engage with issues of technological innovation

Debating the Fourth Industrial Revolution : First things first

Abstract: The author points out that the 4IR has been introduced into the labour process to give the capitalists greater power and control over the production process and warns that the failure to unpack the role of new technologies in South Africa, and the Global South as a whole, is likely to deepen existing technological, economic and social gaps

The trials and tribulations of Zimbabwean precarious women workers in Johannesburg : a cry for help?

Abstract: There is a growing literature on the conditions of Zimbabwean women working as migrant workers in South Africa, specifically in cities like Johannesburg. Based on in-depth interviews and documentary analysis, this empirical research paper contributes to scholarship examining the conditions of migrant women workers from Zimbabwe employed as precarious workers in Johannesburg by zooming in on specific causes of migration to Johannesburg, the journey undertaken by the migrant women to Johannesburg, challenges of documentation, use of networks to survive in Johannesburg, employment of the women in precarious work, and challenges in the workplace. Rape and sexual violence are threats that face the women interviewed during migration to Johannesburg and even when in Johannesburg. The police who are supposed to uphold and protect the law are often found to be perpetrators involved in various forms of violence against women. In the workplace, the women earn starvation wages and work under poor working conditions. Human rights organizations and trade unions are unable to reach the many migrant women because of the sheer volume of violations against workers’ rights and human rights

Building workers’ education in the context of the struggle against racial capitalism : the role of labour support organisations

Abstract: In South Africa, with few exceptions, scholarship on the modern labour movement which emerged after the Durban strikes of 1973 tends to focus on trade unions that constituted the labour movement, strikes, collective bargaining, and workplace changes. While all these topics covered by labour scholars are of great importance, there is less emphasis on the role played by labour support organisations (LSOs) which, in some cases, predate the formation of the major trade unions. Based on an analysis of historical writings, some archival and internet sources, this article critically discusses the contribution of LSOs and their use of workers’ education to build and strengthen trade unions, which became one of the critical forces in the struggles against racial capitalism in the 1980s. In particular, it critically examines the work of the Urban Training Project (UTP) and the South African Committee for Higher Education (SACHED) workers’ education programmes as a contribution to building the labour movement. The relationship between trade unions which had elaborated structures of accountability and LSOs which were staffed by a relatively small layer of activists also led to debates about accountability and mandates

A reactive approach to technological changes : Solidarity’s responses at the ArcelorMittal Vanderbijlpark Plant, 1989 to 2012

Academic debates about Solidarity’s ‘reinvention’ in a post-apartheid South Africa do not include a discussion on the trade union’s responses to technological changes and production. As a contribution to debates on the role of Solidarity in the postapartheid South Africa, my research was conducted on how Solidarity and its processors at the Vanderbijlpark steel plant responded to technological changes. Indepth interviews, factory visits, and archival sources were the main data sources for the article. The main finding of the article is that Solidarity was unable to respond proactively to technological changes at the plant. In other words, Solidarity’s ‘reinvention’ has not expressed itself in the sphere of production processes and technological changes in the plant. The union left the terrain of production to management, and reacted to the effects of technological changes such as retrenchment long after management had implemented changes in production technologies. The strategy of the union was asymmetrical in the sense that it only focused on wage struggles, and ignored technological changes at the plant

Violence, resilience and solidarity : the right to education for child migrants in South Africa

This article examines the psychology of migrant learners’ resilience, their right to education, and how migrant organizations and South African civil society are supporting and reinforcing the agency of migrant learners and their parents. It is based on a year-long study conducted by researchers at the University of Johannesburg’s Centre for Education Rights and Transformation (CERT), funded by the Foundation for Human Rights. Testimonies, participatory workshops, surveys, interviews, and focus groups with learners, parents, educators, officials, and civil society activists in three South African provinces were studied––Gauteng, Limpopo, and the Western Cape––spanning rural, urban, and township areas. The article is framed by the traumatic experiences of migrant learners before entering South Africa, during their stay, and often when they are deported. Topics covered in the testimonies include children’s rights to, and in education, they also traverse gender issues, the travails of unaccompanied minors, and obstacles preventing migrants’ participation in schooling and society

Setbacks and partial victories for community health workers

Abstract: Mondli Hlatshwayo outlines how the working conditions of community health workers employed by the government to deal with the COVId-19 pandemic has inspired organised protest action. They are calling for an end to decades of exploitation during which these frontline with TB and HIV (AIdS) have been marginalised as outsourced ‘volunteers’ and paid a minimal stipend by subcontracted nongovernmental organisations

How is workers’ education responding to the rising precariousness of work? Some international and South African examples

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