Onlangse patrone van politieke deelname onder Indiër-en kleurling-Suid-Afrikaners

Abstract

Recent patterns of political participation amongst Indian and coloured South Africans. In this article recent patterns of political participation amongst Indian and coloured South Africans in certain urban areas were investigated in terms of operationalized theories of political alienation and political participation. Assuming a structural inequality between whites and non-whites in South Africa, a cognitive orientation of greater rather than lesser political alienation was expected among respondents, and this was in fact borne out. Political alienation was seen as a combination of political powerlessness and political cynicism. Strong indications of both political powerlessness and political cynicism were found among the respondents. It was concluded that as their socio-economic conditions improve, Indian and coloured South Africans will come to take part in the political life of South Africa to a greater degree. Another conclusion was that further validation is needed of the indicators used in this study to measure political alienation and political participation. It was also deduced that further research is needed to establish whether the theoretical explanation advanced in this study for the relatively low levels of political participation amongst Indian and coloured South Africans still holds at the present time, more than two years after the first elections under the new constitutional dispensation. S. Afr. J. Sociol. 1986, 17(4): 134–142