Gustav Visser

Ronnie Donaldson

Anthony Lemon

This book provides an analysis of South African urban change over the past three decades. It draws on a seminal text, Homes Apart, and revisits conclusions drawn in that collection that marked the final phases of urban apartheid. It highlights changes in demography, social as well as economic structure and their differential spatial expression across a range of urban sites in South Africa. The evidence presented in this book points to a very complex set of narratives in urban South Africa and one that cannot be reduced to a singular statement so the conclusions of the various investigations are in many ways open. As urban apartheid represented one clear outcome, its post-apartheid urban legacies varies greatly from city to city. As such this book is a great resource to students and academics focused on urban change in South African cities since the demise of apartheid, and scholars of urban policy-making in South Africa and Southern urbanists generally.

Homes Still Apart?

South African Urban Change Three Decades After Apartheid

Etienne Nel

Lochner Marais

The role secondary cities play in the global space economy and national urban hierarchies is increasingly receiving attention from scholars and international agencies, most notably the Cities Alliance. Secondary Cities and Development considers the role of secondary cities through the lens of South Africa, a middle-income country with characteristics of both the developed and developing worlds. This book brings together a broad overview of international literature on secondary cities in South Africa and mirrors them against global experience. Chapters emphasize the importance of secondary cities as regional services areas, their potential roles in rural development, the vulnerabilities to which they are prone and their signifcant potential. By means of review, six South African case studies, and an assessment of contemporary policy approaches towards these cities, this unique volume provides insight into a spectrum of globally significant challenges. This book would be of interest to academics and policy makers working in urban studies or regional development.

Secondary Cities and Development

This book investigates small town tourism development in South Africa taking into account the most common strategies: branding, promotion, festivals and theming. The contents of the book resonate with the intersection of the power elite and their impacts on small town tourism. Because the book focuses on small town geographies in South Africa, the literature on small town tourism in the country is reviewed in Chapter 2 to provide a contextual background. Each subsequent chapter begins with an overview of international literature to give the conceptual context of the case studies each chapter explores. In Chapter 3 the concept of small town tourism branding is illustrated by an exploration of the Richmond book town. In Chapter 4 the branding theme is probed further in an investigation of two winners of the Kwêla Town of the Year competition namely Fouriesburg and De Rust. Chapter 5 documents the branding of Sedgefield through its proclamation as Africa’s first Cittaslow (slow town), a process driven by the local power elite to the exclusion of town’s poor who have no understanding of the intentions of the Cittaslow movement and its potential benefits for the town. Chapter 6 is a case study of Greyton’s tourism-led rural gentrification by which a small town has transformed in three decades to become a sought after place of residence for elite inmigrants so making the town a jewel tourism destination while reinforcing racial segregation. Because festivals and events - creations of the wealthy - have made significant financial contributions to small towns, Chapter 7 considers festivals and events as strategies to market and brand small towns in a particular way. Case studies of the economic impacts of festivals on small towns are assessed and the assessment methodologies used are critiqued. Chapter 8 provides a synthesis by drawing on the thesis of the urban growth machine by power elites.

Ronnie Donaldson

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