Theorising middle class consumption from the global South: A study of everyday ethics in South Africa’s Western Cape

Emerging research on the increasing significance of consumption in the global South is concerned with its links to the globalizing middle classes. Against the backdrop of optimism invested in the new global middle classes to fuel consumption-led growth, this paper contributes to new debate about the articulations and significance of ethical consumption in the global South. Missing from much current mainstream policy, media and academic debate is acknowledgement of the diversity of the global middle classes and an understanding of how ethical interpretations and behaviour differ in various consumer markets around the world. In response, this paper draws on qualitative research in South Africa’s Western Cape to explore the cultural significance of everyday ethical realities in shaping consumption in the global South. In addition to addressing the relative absence of research into ethical consumption in global South contexts, the paper makes two key contributions based our findings. First, it challenges the tendency, particularly in economic discourses, to generalise about the ‘new’ global middle class consumers by highlighting the significance of locality and context in shaping consumption practices in the Western Cape; specifically it finds that, for diverse middle class consumers, thrift is an important ethical choice and practice determining consumption patterns. Second, it highlights the significance of everyday ethical practices in shaping consumption in the Western Cape, focusing specifically on how thrift is imbricated in concerns with not just economic constraint, but also care, habit and aspiration. The paper concludes with reflections on the wider implications of these findings and suggests that they illustrate a need to theorise ethical consumption from contexts in the global South, on their own terms.     

The accidental enterprise: Ethical consumption as commerce

Ethical consumption is routinely promoted as a form of individualised responsibility taking whereby citizen-consumers consciously engage in morally/politically directed purchasing decisions. This has been heavily critiqued as a neoliberal reduction of civic engagement to market choice. It has also been contested by way of a shift to problematizing the consumer as moral agent; where attention is drawn instead to networks of agential entities - advocacy organisations, certifying bodies, marketing discourses, retail spaces, packages, household routines, and so on - that configure consumption alternatives as practice and performance. In reflecting on these concerns, this paper qualitatively explores the enterprising (rather than consumer enactment) of the ethical. Drawing on a multifaceted, three-year study of alternative consumption in Australia, the paper attends to the framing of ethical enterprise through business language, to the often ambivalent deployment of various commercial models and marketing strategies in the doing of ethical business, and to how a contestatory commerce is being imagined, especially in terms of its relations to a politics of social and economic change and to a commercial mainstream. Informed by work on markets as pragmatically assembled and on the economy as multiple, emphasis is placed throughout this article on ethical enterprise as a space of political ambiguity and as a gesture towards an alternative commerce that displaces an understanding of ethical consumption as resting on the actions of the virtuous consumer.     

Trans-scalar embeddedness and governance deficits in global production networks: Crisis in South African fruit

The governance of labour in global production networks (GPNs) has become a critical area of concern amongst academics and policymakers alike. To date, GPN research has focused on the role of private company codes and multi-stakeholder ethical initiatives primarily driven by lead-firms. Other GPN studies highlight the critical role of civil society organisations (CSOs) in challenging lead-firm purchasing practices and shaping regulatory outcomes at local production sites. However, GPN research has not sufficiently incorporated the role of nation states in regulating work through legislative frameworks and enforcement regimes, often referred to in the literature as ‘state’ or ‘public’ governance. This is despite a ‘regulatory renaissance’ taking place across certain developing countries, seeking to strengthen their national regulatory labour institutions (Piore and Schrank, 2008:1).The GPN framework provides an analytical lens through which to conceptualise cross-cutting strands of trans-scalar governance regimes, involving complex networks of state, private and civil society actors operating at multiple scales. Notions of territorial and societal embeddedness are used to elucidate how global ethical standards derived from particular country contexts become enmeshed in national regulatory frameworks and local societal relations, shaping governance outcomes for precarious workers incorporated into GPNs. The paper draws attention to the ‘trans-scalar embeddedness’ of labour governance regimes which interact across geographical scales and, in the case of South African fruit, reflect a ‘trans-scalar governance deficit’ for precarious workers. It is argued that the influence of national regulatory regimes should be more fully incorporated into analytical frameworks for understanding governance outcomes in GPNs.     

The developmental impacts of backpacker tourism in South Africa

South Africa has recorded considerable growth in tourism activity over the past decade. In the light of the vast range of economic sectors that gain from tourism development, the national government has instituted a range of incentives and initiatives to stimulate tourism development, with the expansion of tourism infrastructure aimed at high-end tourists forming a key component of this strategy. Little investment has, however, been made in tourism infrastructure targeting those markets that prefer to avoid high-end tourism facilities. In this respect backpacker tourists and their preferred accommodation type, backpacker hostels, are a case in point. Despite backpacker tourism being largely ignored in national tourism development initiatives, backpacker tourism is increasingly popular in South Africa. This paper focuses on the recent proliferation of backpacker tourism in this country and seeks to convey the results of the first nation-wide exploration in this regard. The paper has two main objectives. Firstly, it seeks to present broad-ranging empirical data concerning this tourist cohort and their preferred accommodation type- backpacker hostels — in the South African context. Secondly, it aims to demonstrate why backpacker tourists and hostels hold much potential for local development initiatives in South Africa. In the light of the findings of this study, the paper concludes that the expansion of backpacker tourism to this country might form an appropriate means by which to achieve a range of local development objectives.     

Making space for ethical consumption in the South

This paper argues that, given the rapid growth in the middle classes across the Global South, debates about ethical consumption need to be reconfigured to admit these middle classes, not as a problem but as a possibility. It establishes the potential to constitute Southern consumption as a surface of mobilisation for ethical consumption and, through working from the specificities of the South in Bangladesh, demonstrates how within-South framings unsettle and challenge existing North–South understandings of ethical consumption. The paper makes three specific contributions. (1) It shows how North–South conceptual understandings of ethical consumption as political consumption might be reworked to admit the South. (2) Through an examination of the Rana Plaza disaster in Bangladesh it demonstrates the absence of a politics of consumer responsibility amongst the Bangladeshi middle classes, and suggests how a politics of responsibility might be forged, through paying attention to Southern brands and supply chains. (3) Through an examination of the Aarong retail brand of the corporate NGO BRAC, the paper shows that ethical consumption exists in Bangladesh, not as ethical consumption but as ordinary consumption with ethical effects. The paper concludes by considering the wider implications of these findings for furthering academic and practitioner debate.     

The private sector and local economic development in South Africa

The objective in this paper is to analyse private sector involvement in LED in South Africa. Four key spheres of private sector involvement in LED are identified and discussed: (1) as participator and occasional initiator of local development processes, (2) as major partner in the development activities of public-private sector partnerships, (3) as lead role player in certain direct initiatives for reviving South Africa's inner cities, and (4) as promoter and facilitator of local small business development. It is argued that the concept of local dependence could be usefully applied to interpret private sector involvement in LED in South Africa.     

Ethical consumption: Uncovering personal meanings and negotiation strategies

The purpose of this paper is to examine how individuals define ethical consumption (EC) and then how they negotiate ethical consumption as they move from one country to another. The authors explore these questions by reporting on and interpreting the evolution of their understanding of EC and their own ethical consumption behavior, the EC practices that have endured over time and national contexts, the tensions they encountered in maintaining EC practices in these transitions and the adaptive strategies they used to manage those tensions. While there has been research on the tensions faced by individuals practicing EC, there has been a paucity of research investigating those tensions from a cross-country and longitudinal perspective. Moreover, although several studies have focused on EC purchase practices of specific goods (e.g., athletic shoes, fair-trade commodities), none has considered this question in the context of purchases of basic needs categories – food, water, energy, transportation and housing. Each of the three authors has been able to maintain his or her own personal consumption ethic in spite of living in different countries. Whenever consumption practices emanate from, and are imbedded within, a strong ethical framework of values that informs EC, each was able to make the necessary adjustments to overcome the obstacles and points of resistance across countries. Even in those situations involving considerable inconvenience and discomfort, each used adaptive strategies that allowed retention of their consumption practices. Among those strategies employed by the authors were choice of community in which to live, self-regulation and self-reliance.     

Articulating an Indian diaspora in South Africa: The Consulate General of India,diaspora associations and practices of collaboration

Engagements between sending states and their diasporas have come under increasing critical scrutiny. Whilst political geographers have driven critical analysis of national level policies, debates have largely overlooked the broader range of actors, transactions and practices involved in implementing national policies in a geohistorically diverse array of diasporic contexts and settings. Over the last decade, the Indian government has invested significant resources in overseas diplomatic missions, consulates and high commissions to administer its diaspora outreach strategies. This paper examines the role of the Consulate General of India (CGI) in Durban, South Africa, focusing in particular on the networks of agents, associations, groups and political actors involved in collaborating with the CGI Durban in diaspora outreach practices. This paper draws on two periods of fieldwork in Durban between 2004 and 2005 and was supplemented by ongoing visual and textual analysis of news articles, promotional material, reports and websites. Using the concept of articulation, the paper highlights the discursive and performative practices involved in bringing together the agendas of the GOI with those of South African Indian diaspora associations through the outreach practices of the CGI in Durban. It argues that articulatory practices are essential to resolving some of the subjective and embodied dilemmas and contestations of belonging inherent in South African Indians’ participation in diaspora outreach initiatives. Investigating how articulation contributes to drawing diverse and even competing agendas together makes room for further understanding the ways in which diaspora outreach practices can travel across a wide network, and the diverse agencies that can become catalysed in the process.     

Fair Trade Rooibos tea: Connecting South African producers and American consumer markets

This article analyzes the recent growth and configuration of Fair Trade networks connecting South African Rooibos tea producers with American consumer markets. As we demonstrate, Fair Trade’s growth in the Rooibos sector engages key issues of black empowerment, land reform, and sustainable development in post-Apartheid South Africa. Fair Trade networks provide small-scale black Rooibos producers with critical markets. Most significantly, the Wupperthal and Heiveld cooperatives have upgraded into processing and packaging and their jointly owned Fairpackers facility now exports shelf-ready Rooibos tea. Analyzing the nature of US Fair Trade Rooibos buyers and their South African sourcing arrangements, we identify key variations in Fair Trade commitment and engagement between mission-driven and market-driven distributors. While mission-driven buyers engage small-scale Rooibos cooperatives in multifaceted partnership networks, market-driven buyers pursue conventional sourcing strategies favoring purchases from large plantations and exporters. We conclude that tensions between a radical and commercial orientation toward Fair Trade in Rooibos tea networks in many ways mirror those in the broader movement.     

Some aspects of Cretaceous ostracod biostratigraphy of South Africa and relationships with other Gondwanide localities

One hundred and thirty-six species, representing 67 genera have been recorded from the late Jurassic-Maastrichtian marine sediments of South Africa. The faunas show a major dichotomy across a regionally-developed late Cenomanian-early Coniacian hiatus with the Portlandian-Cenomanian Cytheruridae/Progonocytheridae/Schizocytheridae dominated faunas being replaced in the Coniacian by Trachyleberididae/Brachycytheridae/Schizocytheridae dominated faunas. Comparison with other Gondwanide localities shows that the two South African basins from which ostracods have been described (Outeniqua and Natal/Zululand) formed part of a Callovian-Cenomanian South Gondwana ostracod province that stretched from the Neuquen Basin of Argentina to Madagascar/Tanzania/Kutch and west Australia. The most characteristic and cosmopolitan forms within this province belong to the Majungaella/Amicytheridea/Progonocythere group, along with Arculicythere in the Aptian-Cenomanian.In Tanzania, (the only locality of the old South Gondwana province where the succession is complete) these assemblages are replaced in the Turonian by the influx of Brachycythere, and Cythereis and various other trachyleberids. Changes of a similar nature are seen whenever marine sedimentation resumed after the local “mid” Cretaceous hiatus (South Africa, India, Argentina). Argentina differs in not having Brachycythere, whose rapid appearance in the West Indian Ocean basin soon after its earliest record in Brazil, is attributed to the destruction of the barrier at the eastern end of the Walvis Ridge/Rio Grande Rise in late Cenomanian or early Turonian times. Despite this common element with Brazil and West Africa, the South African Coniacian to Maastrichtian faunas are closer to those of Tanzania and Australia than they are to either Argentina or Brazil/West Africa. In Zululand they show evidence of a steady increase in water depth, leading to the establishment of progressively more diverse cytheracean populations, with a particularly large increase across the Santonian/Campanian boundary.     

Unpacking race,party and class from below: Surveying citizenship in the Msunduzi municipality

On the basis of a 2008 survey conducted in the Msunduzi municipality in the KwaZulu-Natal province, the paper begins an exploration of the character of popular politics and citizenship in South Africa. Embracing a ‘citizen-centred’ methodology informed by participation literatures, and sensibilities to the ‘work in progress’ character of African cities from urban studies debates, the paper interrogates the mainstream liberal-participatory model of citizenship in South Africa, and the critiques of current South African politics informed by these notions, specifically the ‘racial census’ and ‘dominant party syndrome’ analyses. Taken together these views can be read as characterising South African politics as a game for individual citizens governed by liberal rules, but played by racial and/or partisan groups in exclusionary ways, thus distorting liberal democratic mechanisms of representation and accountability. The paper also examines evidence for an alternative class-based analysis of one aspect of citizenship, namely, protest against poor local governance.The paper looks to unpack this ‘liberal model versus racialised communitarian practice’ imaginary by, on the one hand, demonstrating the ways in which citizenship is not racialised, or is asymmetrically racialised. Indeed, other than party allegiances and trust in key offices, very little by way of what citizens do, believe or think of themselves follows discrete racial lines. Similar points hold for partisanship too. On the other hand, the paper does not redeem the liberal-democratic model as there is also evidence of trust in government when it is not deserved based on performance, but more importantly, evidence that citizens embrace ‘informal’ means to secure their rights. A good example of this is protestors who are also more likely to vote than non-protestors. Taken together, these findings affirm both the way in which the racial and partisan legacy of the past is being undone by new institutions and practices, and suggest the complex intersection of these with networks of personal relations which characterise the local politics of most African cities.     

Japan's hidden involvement in South African manufacturing

This paper examines the development of Japanese involvement in South African manufacturing. In the extensive literature dealing with the growth and spread of Japanese investment abroad the unique situation of Japanese companies in South Africa has been overlooked. Despite the introduction of a ban on direct investment in South Africa there is a considerable hidden Japanese presence in local manufacturing which resulted from licensing arrangements. In particular, Japanese enterprise is strongly represented in the South African motor-vehicles sector where it is at the forefront in innovating new flexible production systems.     

Dimensions of drought: South African case studies

The recent drought in southern Africa has underscored the need for detailed analysis of the phenomenon. While geographers have researched the causes and impacts of drought in many African contexts, South Africa and in particular its Bantustans have not received sufficient similar attention. This paper outlines firstly the dimensions of drought in South Africa, including the biophysical and socio-economic factors. Issues such as land-use management, drought planning and relief are interrogated in the South African context. The final section of the paper highlights these debates with specific reference to case studies of past and present drought initiatives in South Africa.     

The African Renaissance and its relation to the geosciences: a South African perspective

Implicit in the African Renaissance is the synergy between government, the private sector, the educated minority and the disadvantaged majority. For this concept to work, belief and commitment must arise first from the African individual, whatever his or her potential contribution may be. The geosciences in South Africa provide a currently vibrant example of such cooperation, which has the potential to contribute significantly to the upliftment of the country and its neighbouring states. Based largely on personal interviews with various role players, from the Presidency of South Africa, through ministerial levels, the corporate sector and down to the individual, we present a spectrum of viewpoints and initiatives which are starting to result in practical implementation of the African revival. An end to conflict and xenophobia, the entrenchment of democratic government and corporate expression of the entrepreneurial spirit are essential to provide the framework within which the individual African can become a “Renaissance Man or Woman”.     

Defense economic restructuring and conversion in South Africa

The aim is to examine issues of defence economic restructuring and conversion in South Africa. Under the new government, overall restructuring of the South African defence sector is occuring. With diminished defence expenditure, the military industry is encouraged to convert production capability to non-military products. The geographical implications of defence economic restructuring and conversion in South Africa are analysed in the context of international experience and debates. The Gauteng region emerges as the national gunbelt of South Africa and contains an incipient military industrial district. In this particular region, the question of defence conversion is critically important for local policy makers and should be linked to new local economic development initiatives.     

Towards sustainable agriculture in post-apartheid South Africa

This paper assesses the possibility of sustainable agriculture in South Africa in the context of recent policy initiatives. The new environmental strategy for agriculture represents a significant break with policy initiatives developed during apartheid. The likelihood of sustainable farming practices being adopted in South Africa will, however, face at least three obstacles. These are the integrated structure of industrial farming, the concern over yields, and current political and economic changes in South African agriculture. It is argued that sustainable techniques are unlikely to develop in the large scale farming sector in the near future. If the considerable research and extension resources of the state are reoriented quickly enough, sustainable farming methods can be embraced by an emerging class of black commercial farmers.     

Security and party politics in Cape Town

Despite a long academic debate on the patrimonial dimension of the state in Africa and a more recent interest in African political parties, the effect of patronage and party politics on governability in Africa’s cities remains poorly addressed in the academic literature. This includes the case in South Africa when one looks at the security sector, which to a certain extent, looks like a depoliticised field of expertise. Popular claims for security seem to be a side issue in the literature on social movements, while vigilante specialists and policing experts do not place party politics at the core of security issue challenges, especially in poor townships. The provision of security in poor neighbourhoods is an important resource in the struggle for political support however. This is examined through two case studies in Cape Town Coloured townships, considering the role played by political leaders, NGO leaders and key officials in grassroots mobilisations for security. These mobilisations are not only about politicking however; ‘ordinary members’ of local security organisations also get involved for motivations, which have nothing to do with confrontational party politics. These different agendas between ordinary members and local leaders cannot be read as the manifestation of a fundamental opposition between the popular classes and a westernised elite as suggested by Charterjee. It reveals instead prevalent and ambivalent relationships between partisan politics and popular mobilisations for security in a context of high insecurity.     

Exploring the ‘ethical everyday’: An ethnography of the ethics of family consumption

Using ethnographic research with six families in the North West of England (2007–2009), this paper opens up the ‘black box’ of everyday ethical consumption by adding colour and form to these everyday experiences. While recent geographical literature has recognised the ethical considerations that are implicit in everyday consumption practices, there is a noticeable void of research that explores and fleshes out the everyday ethical actions of individuals and families as consumers. By exploring the everyday ethics of money, waste and health choices in family consumption practices, this paper makes the case for recognising the ethical nature of everyday practices and choices of consumption. It is argued that rather than consumers subscribing to a given set of ethics in consumption, there are multiple ways of recognising consumption as an ethically-embedded process.     

The legal meaning of Lefebvre’s the right to the city: addressing the gap between global campaign and scholarly debate

There is a growing consideration globally of a right to the city in urban policies, strategies and legislation. The mention of this concept in the UN’s New Urban Agenda vision statement, in relation to human rights, both acknowledges and encourages this trend. It is also a result of lobbying and contestation. In the Anglo-American scholarly literature, there has been caution as to whether Henri Lefebvre intended a legal and institutionalized meaning for his ‘right to the city’. This paper reviews these debates and from that perspective examines Lefebvre’s positions on law, rights and the right to the city. It locates this within his wider political strategy and in particular the three-pronged strategy he put forward in The Urban Revolution to address the urban question—political foregrounding of the urban, promotion of self-management, and introduction of the right to the city into a transformed contractual system. By contextualizing and reviewing Everyday Life in the Modern World (published immediately before Right to the City), the paper examines Lefebvre’s thinking on rights formation, within ‘opening’, or the process of inducing change. The paper engages with meanings Lefebvre provides for rights in his concept of the right to the city, including his later conception of a contract of citizenship. The paper suggests that engagement with a fluid role of law and rights, in combination with Lefebvre’s other strategies, is important in opening the pathway he charts for the realization of this right, whether through local or global initiatives.     

Understanding Chinese consumers’ ethical purchasing decision-making process: A combination of qualitative and quantitative study

As with all shopping, there is a wide gap between ethical shopping intention and behavior, and consumers’ ethical shopping processes are very complicated. Through a two-stage study, this paper analyzes those underlying factors that prevent consumers from translating their stated ethical intentions into actual ethical buying behavior. An initial qualitative study uses in-depth interviews with 36 consumers and identifies 6 consumer personal factors and 5 shopping situational factors impeding the transformation of consumers’ stated ethical intentions into actual ethical behavior. In the second stage, a quantitative study uses a large-scale questionnaire, investigating 1200 consumers, to test the adaptability of these personal and situational factors and to investigate their moderating effects on the relationship between ethical intentions and behavior. The findings show that among the personal factors and in addition to ethical consciousness, economic rationality, buying inertia, cynicism, and ethical cognitive efforts all have significant moderating roles on the relationship between ethical intention and action; further, all of the situational factors have moderating effects upon the relationship between intention and action. Finally, the paper provides us with some profound conclusions and insightful implications about how to motivate consumer support for firms’ ethical behavior and how to transfer this type of support into truly positive purchasing behavior.