Crime And Policing In Post Apartheid South Africa

Once a marginal political issue, crime control now occupies a central place on the social, political and economic agenda of contemporary liberal democracies. Nowhere more so than in post-apartheid South Africa, where the transition from apartheid rule to democratic rule was marked by a shift in concern from political to criminal violence. In this book Anne-Marie Singh offers a comprehensive account of policing transformations in post-apartheid South Africa. Her analysis of crime and mechanisms for its control is linked to an analysis of neo-liberal policies, providing the basis for a critique of existing analyses of liberal democratic governance. Themes addressed in the book include the exercise of coercive authority, state and non-state expertise in policing, the 'rationally-choosing' criminal, and the importance of developing an active and responsible citizenship.

"[A] cogent and well-informed discussion of the South African Police Service and the organisational problems it faces." —Stephen Ellis Since the mid-1990s, South Africa has experienced a crime wave of such unprecedented proportions that the ability of the new democracy to form a stable civil society and govern effectively has been called into question. In this timely book, Mark Shaw describes how a police force that was so effective under apartheid became so ineffectual in the face of rising crime. He shows how an increase in violent crime shapes society, police, and government, and discusses possible solutions for the current crisis. International crimes such as war, terrorism, and organized crime are explored along with crimes that affect individual security, such as armed robbery, murder, and rape. Crime and Policing in Post-Apartheid South Africa draws attention to both the national and the international dimensions of crime in this society in transition.

The state police force of South Africa has acquired massive notoriety since its formation. Its officers have developed a reputation for routinely provoking violence and torturing suspects. As the key bastion of apartheid it is in urgent need of change. In Policing for a New South Africa Mike Brogden and Clifford Shearing evaluate the options for change. They critically analyse orthodos policing ideas imported from the West and contrast them with the indigenous model of independent policing from the townships of South Africa itself. Together they offer significant possibilities for the future. Importantly they suggest that rather than South Africans import ideas wholesale from the West, the latter countries, in the light of the failures of their own police systems have much to learn from South Africa.

Despite being one of the world's most vibrant democracies, police estimate between five and ten percent of the murders in South Africa result from vigilante violence. This is puzzling given the country's celebrated transition to democracy and massive reform of the state's legal institutions. Where most studies explain vigilantism as a response to state or civic failure, in Contradictions of Democracy, Nicholas Rush Smith illustrates that vigilantism is actually a response to the processes of democratic state formation. In the context of densely networked neighborhoods, vigilante citizens often interpret the technical success of legal institutions-for instance, the arrest and subsequent release of suspects on bail-as failure and work to correct such perceived failures on their own. Smith also shows that vigilantism provides a new lens through which to understand democratic state formation. Among young men of color in some parts of South Africa, fear of extra-judicial police violence is common. Amid such fear, instead of the state seeming protective, it can appear as something akin to a massive vigilante organization. An insightful look into the high rates of vigilantism in South Africa and the general challenges of democratic state building, Contradictions of Democracy explores fundamental questions about political order, the rule of law, and democratic citizenship.

Reveals how liberal democracy and free-market economics reproduce the inequalities of apartheid in Cape Town, South Africa.

Crime is one of the major challenges to any new democracy. Violence often increases after the lifting of authoritarian control, or in the aftermath of regime change. But how can a fledgling democracy fight crime without violating the fragile rights of its citizens? In Transformation and Trouble, accomplished theorist and criminal justice scholar Diana Gordon critically examines South Africa's efforts to strike the perilous balance between democratic participation and social control. South Africa has made great progress in pursuing the Western ideals of participatory justice and due process. Yet Gordon finds that popular concerns about crime have fostered the growth of a punitive criminal justice system that undermines the country's rights-oriented political culture. Transformation and Trouble calls for South Africa to reaffirm its commitment to public empowerment by reforming its criminal justice system-an approach, she argues, that would strengthen the country's new democracy. "An eloquent, critical, but ultimately optimistic, analysis of the democratization of crime and justice in post-apartheid South Africa." --Bill Dixon, School of Criminology, Education, Sociology and Social Work, Keele University "A must read for understanding contemporary South Africa's agonizing dilemmas as it struggles to reconcile crime control with democratic values." --Jerome H. Skolnick, New York University School of Law "Gordon's vast experience with criminal justice illuminates her cautionary tale of the search for a new way in south Africa." --Paul Chevigny, New York University Diana Gordon is Professor Emerita of Political Science and Senior Research Scholar, City University of New York.

A country is policed only to the extent that it consents to be. When that consent is withheld, cops either negotiate or withdraw. Once they do this, however, they are no longer police; their role becomes something far murkier. Several months before they exploded into xenophobic violence, Jonny Steinberg travelled the streets of Alexandra, Reiger Park and other Johannesburg townships with police patrols. His mission was to discover the unwritten rules of engagement emerging between South Africa's citizens and its new police force. In this provocative new book, Steinberg argues that policing in crowded urban space is like theatre. Only here, the audience writes the script, and if the police don't perform the right lines, the spectators throw them off the stage. In vivid and eloquent prose, Steinberg takes us into the heart of this drama, and picks apart the rules South Africans have established for the policing of their communities. What emerges is a lucid and original account of a much larger matter: the relationship between ordinary South Africans and the government they have elected to rule them. The government and its people are like scorned lovers, Steinberg argues: their relationship, brittle, moody, untrusting and ultimately very needy.