Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
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Chapter 6: Down at <strong>the</strong> dumps“we are citizens of this city. We are expected to pay for services. We usedto pay for services, now it is difficult”.While <strong>the</strong> reclaimers have knowledge and experience of recycling materials, ofcollectively organising <strong>the</strong>mselves, and of negotiating with buyers of materials, <strong>the</strong>council has consistently failed to recognise <strong>the</strong>m as recyclers, or even just stakeholders,in recycling decisions. In a focus group one reclaimer offered <strong>the</strong> explanation that<strong>the</strong> council “just take[s] us for granted. Even if you have a serious problem <strong>the</strong>y don’tlisten. They say you are just people from <strong>the</strong> dumpsite. You are just scrap.”Under neo-liberal ordersMunicipal waste management has seen a variety of organisational forms emerge since1994 – which in itself reflects <strong>the</strong> ‘variable geometry’ of networked neo-liberalism.While apar<strong>the</strong>id discriminated on racist grounds, <strong>the</strong> neo-liberal city aggressivelyasserts <strong>the</strong> order of <strong>the</strong> market. For Cape Town, McDonald and Smith [2004] showthat, as an ideology, neo-liberalism is embraced by all political parties 103 and mostcity managers and planners and is, indeed, represented as <strong>the</strong> means of addressingapar<strong>the</strong>id inequalities. In part, <strong>the</strong>y are responding to fiscal constraints imposed bycentral government which slashed financial transfers to local government by 85%between 1991 and 1997, and by a fur<strong>the</strong>r 55% between 1997 and 2000. This financialsqueeze was accompanied by <strong>the</strong> expansion of municipal mandates to deliver servicesto all citizens ra<strong>the</strong>r than just <strong>the</strong> white minority.Private-public partnerships, punted by <strong>the</strong> World Bank and national government,<strong>the</strong>n appeared as an efficient and cost effective means of serving ‘unfunded mandates’while <strong>the</strong> notion of extending public service delivery was systematically downgraded.Local departments, still responsible for delivering services, are meanwhile corporatised– meaning that <strong>the</strong>y are fenced off from <strong>the</strong> rest of local government so that <strong>the</strong>ycan be run like businesses. The variability of local opportunities and pressures for,as well as resistance to, corporatisation and public-private partnerships – a sort ofupmarket variation on outsourcing – <strong>the</strong>n accounts for something of <strong>the</strong> variety oflocal organisational forms.103 The real difference between <strong>the</strong> Democratic Alliance and <strong>the</strong> ANC in Cape Town is that <strong>the</strong> DA says it outloud while <strong>the</strong> ANC shrouds its neo-liberal affiliation in euphemisms.- 172 - groundWork - <strong>Wasting</strong> <strong>the</strong> <strong>Nation</strong>