Homelessness in South Africa

Street people sleeping in the Company Gardens, Cape Town

Homelessness in South Africa dates back to the apartheid period.[1] Increasing unemployment, lack of affordable housing, social disintegration, and social and economic policies have all been identified as contributing factors to the issue.[2] Some scholars argue that solutions to homelessness in South Africa lie more within the private sphere than in the legal and political spheres.[3]

There is no national census on homeless people in South Africa, researchers instead rely on individual studies of homeless persons in particular cities.[4] The South African homeless population has been estimated at 200,000.[5]

One study found that three out of four South African metropolitan municipalities viewed homelessness primarily as a social dependency issue, responding with social interventions. At the same time, homeless South Africans indicated that the most important thing the municipality could assist them with was employment and well-located affordable housing.[6]

  1. ^ Olufemi, Olusola (1998). "Street homelessness in Johannesburg inner-city: A preliminary survey". Environment and Urbanization. 10 (2): 223–234. doi:10.1177/095624789801000210. S2CID 55973607.
  2. ^ Mji, G. (2006). "Disability and homelessness: a personal journey from the margins to the centreand back". In Watermeyer B; Swaartz L; Lorenzo T; Schneider M; Priestley M (eds.). Disability and Social Change: A South African Agenda. South Africa: Human Sciences Research Council. pp. 350–360.
  3. ^ Nussbaum, Martha (1 September 2002). "Introduction to Comparative Constitutionalism". Chicago Journal of International Law. 3 (2): 429–434.
  4. ^ Speak, Suzanne (2005). "Relationship Between Children's Homelessness in Developing Countries and the Failure of Women's Rights Legislation". Housing, Theory and Society. 22 (3): 129–146. doi:10.1080/14036090510034581. S2CID 154844071.
  5. ^ "Homelessness in South Africa".
  6. ^ Du Toit, Jacques Louis (2010). "Local metropolitan government responses to homelessness in South Africa". Development Southern Africa. 27: 111–128. doi:10.1080/03768350903519390. hdl:2263/14765. S2CID 218526847.