Abstracts

65 specifically the ways in which housing in the urban centers and surrounding areas of Cape Town and Johannesburg was organized. Furthermore, I analyze the consequences of policies meant to diminish housing disparities and investigate new approaches and solutions. Despite contemporary attempts to rectify injustices, some have failed and induced further harm, forcing the need to center a community- based approach when implementing new solutions that address housing segregation and interwoven disparities. Historical Background While apartheid legislation was notoriously racist, many regulations targeting nonwhite populations were implemented before the apartheid regime in 1948. Lemon (1991, p. 2) argues that racial segregation is built on systems and practices that stem from the settler-colonial period, begun when Europeans entered the Cape in 1652. Some forms of pass laws, which regulated movements of nonwhites, date back to the mid-1700s. Enslaved people in the Cape had to carry passes authorizing their travel between urban and rural spaces (Savage, 1986, p. 181). More specifically, the Glen Grey Act of 1894 solidified the legalization of residential segregation by establishing an individual land tenure and a Xhosa male labor tax, deterring native land ownership. South African cities were designed as white hubs and for white use. Much of apartheid rested on the maintenance of this spatial separation, and, as Levenson (2014, p. 14) writes, “this meant the prevention of nonwhites from entering city centers by force if necessary and cloaking this in the rhetoric of legality.” In the 1920s to 1950s, black South Africans were largely prohibited from residing in city centers and instead settled on the outskirts of the cities. Regardless of the accelerated urban influx, little was done to accommodate the growing urban black population. Instead, the government enacted significant exclusionary policies as a response, including the Native (Urban Areas) Act of 1923, the Native Urban Areas Consolidation Act of 1945, and the Native Laws Amendment Act of 1952 (Lemon, 1991, p. 4). The Native (Urban Areas) Act of 1923 segregated urban residential spaces and instituted “influx controls” against black migration into cities. This forced black people coming to cities to find work in only two weeks, later reduced to three days in 1945. If proof of work could not be provided, they would be forced to leave, pushing them to reside on city peripheries. The Native Laws Amendment Act of 1952 was an amendment of the earlier 1945 act and forced all black people over the age of 16 to carry passes and prohibited black people from staying in urban areas for longer than 72 hours (Lemon, 1991, p. 5). These areas acts established the principles of segregation legislation, further strengthening the exclusionary system and exacerbating disparities. Many early policies of segregation only applied to and specifically targeted black South Africans (Christopher, 1992, p. 573), but historically, both black and colored South Africans have been impacted by segregation. Ultimately, the history of racialized urban development deeply informs the way housing disparities currently are conceived. By the time apartheid was instituted, there already had been a strong base of a racialized social order upon which the Afrikaner National Party was built. The reorganization of urban areas that occurred during the beginning of apartheid was achieved in tandem with the classification of all persons into racial categories. Racial zoning required different groups to live in specific designated areas (Christopher, 1992, p. 571). The passing of the Group Areas Acts of 1950 and 1966 had more expansive impacts on racial segregation than previous legislation, structuring “distinct apartheid cities” on the remnants of the “segregation cities which preceded them” (Lemon, 1991, p. 8). By 1989, more than 1300 group areas had been established (p. 11). The ultimate goal was to create exclusive racialized space for separate groups, while maintaining a white-ruled social order. Racial zoning and the creation of group areas through residential segregation were manifestations of this. Unfortunately, such disparities have not dissipated much since apartheid ended in 1994. Cape Town is the oldest urban area in South Africa, and by 1935, Langa and Ndabeni townships became the only places allowable for black African or colored residential housing.