The immigration Issues in the Post-Apartheid South Africa: Discourses, Policies and Social Repercussions

Abstract

The paper provides a critical appraisal of changes that have marked the political discourses on immigration from within and outside the Southern Africa region in the aftermath of the 1994 elections in the Republic of South Africa. It also provides insights into the connections of these changing discourses with the rise of social intolerance of immigration from other African countries. The immigration policy in the apartheid period was highly controlled and somewhat in favour of immigration of foreign labour within the Southern Africa region. In the post-apartheid period, the imperative of social reconstruction and with it that of universalism in service delivery have induced a shift in the discourse on immigration, making it markedly exclusionary and selective, since the country has had concurrently to deal with increased immigration flows (refugees, irregular and regular) and shortage of skills. This has had some social repercussions reflected in the negative public perception of immigration, especially that of African origin. The prevailing climate of xenophobia and other forms of social harassment towards African foreigners, accompanying the immigration discourses, finds its roots in the social representations brought, locally, about by the new dispensation of the post-apartheid regime and, internationally, by the redefinition of the strategic positioning of South Africa in the context of globalization.