Research Seminar : Civic States of Exception : Democracy and Crime Prevention in South Africa

datum: 19 oktober 2006

This paper addresses the unintended and unforeseen consequences of a set of state policies in contemporary South Africa concerning citizens' participation in crime prevention.

More particularly, it deals with Community Policing Forums (CPFs), a model of community policing that has widely been acclaimed for representing a shift from authoritarian to democratic policing, and therefore an expression of and catalyst for post-apartheid transformation. Drawing on ethnographic research on crime prevention in South Africa's Eastern Cape Province, it is argued that this model of community policing is designed and based on South African principles of democracy, yet at times involves legal transgressions which - paradoxically - occur not in spite of these principles but to a certain extent because of them. This is due to the fact that the CPF principles of all-inclusiveness and transparency hamper the Community Policing Forums' effectivity in crime prevention. It is shown that this constellation can lead to states of exception that are proclaimed by citizens who expressly identify with the principles of CPF policies and enact 'civic states of exception' to affirm these principles - and, by extension, South African principles of democracy - by temporarily suspending them.

Date: October 26, 2006
Time: 15:00-17:00
Place: African Studies Centre, Pieter de la Courtgebouw, Wassenaarseweg 52, Leiden (a 5-minute walk from Leiden Central Station, rear exit), room 1.A12

Thomas G. Kirsch, Department for Social Anthropology, University Halle-Wittenberg, Germany. Among his most recent publications (2005): 'Illegal Connections. Conflicts over Electricity in Soweto, South Africa', in: Soziale Welt 16 (Special Issue): 195-210.

To register for this seminar
http://www.ascleiden.nl/GetPage.aspx?datastore=1&url=/events/event-1506932944