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| Title: | South African Cities in the 1980s: The Political Economy of Urban Change |
| Author: | Simon, David |
| Year: | 1985 |
| Periodical: | African Urban Studies |
| Issue: | 21 |
| Period: | Spring |
| Pages: | 81-94 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | South Africa |
| Subjects: | urban society segregation Urbanization and Migration Politics and Government Economics and Trade |
| Abstract: | Recent changes in legislation pertaining to urban apartheid in South Africa fall into two categories, those dealing specifically with racial zoning and those affecting the stability and permanence of urban Africans, in particular measures relating to security of access to shelter and controls on rural-to-urban migration. New urban administrative arrangements have also been introduced under the Black Local Authorities Act of 1982 and the Regional Services Councils Act of 1985. All these various legislative amendments and changes are of differing importance. Some benefit mainly capitalist interests and the new middle classes or have primarily symbolic value, while others eventually will affect the lives of millions. The changes have not radically altered urban form or function, although they will certainly permit more rapid urbanization of Africans. It is moot as to what extent they have formed elements of a coherent reform programme or are merely ad hoc crisis management measures in the regime's search for legitimacy. Seen in comparative perspective, South Africa is currently undergoing some of the changes characteristic of decolonization, as evidenced by the changing role of the oppressed black majority within the urban political economy. Bibliogr. |