Resisting to spatial exclusion and fighting for economic inclusion: African immigrant traders in the public commercial spaces of the City of Cape Town, South Africa

Abstract

Around South Africa, the major cities are being narrated around entrepreneurialism, which emphasises competitiveness, innovation and partnership between local government and private corporates in the marketing of the city within and beyond the national borders. A large fraction of the population living in those cities is made up of immigrants from other African countries, who are frequently subjected to economic-driven xenophobic violent attacks by local citizens. African immigrants mostly operate in the informal sector and largely remain on the fringes of the city mainstream economy and social fabric. This article interrogates the extent to which the interventions implemented in the City of Cape Town in South Africa by the authorities, within the framework of reimagining the city as a world city, contribute either to the spatial inclusion or the exclusion of African immigrants’ petty trade activities in the design of urban development. The central argument to the article is that, in the pursuit of the entrepreneurial strategy advocated by the City of Cape Town, there are strong indications that some of these interventions are constraining and repressive, exacerbating the economic and social exclusion of African immigrants. Besides, these interventions have tended to increase the social hostility toward immigrants. Against the repressive law enforcement measures for regulating the urban space, there has been, however, a somewhat progressive public shift toward more accommodating efforts that have benefitted African immigrant business owners. The article is informed by the theoretical perspective on entrepreneurial urban governance and data from empirical sources are used in support of the arguments. The results reported show that in the city of Cape Town, the occupancy of any space for trading purpose is restrained by a bundle of by-laws. In responses to the variety of interventions, business owners have displayed different reactions ranging from compliance to subversive acts including resistance or negotiated arrangements have been at time used to influence the direction of other interventions.