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The effects of modern-day paid digital advertising on the escalating sales of counterfeit goods in South Africa
Get PDFThis article focuses on the effects of modern-day paid digital marketing, commonly known as digital content creation, on the escalating sales of counterfeit goods in South Africa. The marketing and promotion of South African businesses has always been facilitated by established media and marketing houses, which are formal businesses and statutorily bound. This arrangement caused these establishments to shy away from advertising counterfeit goods, to avoid liability from third parties. However, with the move towards digitisation, businesses have swayed from using traditional marketing companies for advertisements and promotion to using the services of individual content creators, popularly known as social media influencers. These influencers/digital content creators are best described as independent personalities who can affect the buying behaviour of their social media audience, as a result of their persuasiveness and engagement with their audience. This is done through advertising on various online platforms such as social media networks, video channels, websites, and blogs. Formerly, celebrities were considered for digital marketing under the guise of “company endorsements and ambassadorships”. Nonetheless, this has since changed as ordinary people, irrespective of their age, financial backgrounds, and with a substantial social media audience, are eligible. Nowadays, social media marketing has become a suitable platform for advertising almost every product or service, despite the legality or illegality thereof. This article aims to investigate the effects of South Africa’s modern-day digital advertising on the increasing sales of counterfeit goods in South Africa and to show a need for explicit legal rules aimed at prohibiting the marketing of fake goods
Born from bad memories: considering the best interests of children conceived through rape and incest
No full textDespite the fact that globally, possibly hundreds of thousands of babies each year are conceived and born from rape and incest, very little research exists as to what are to be considered to be in such children’s best interests. In South Africa, children who are born from rape and incest will be denied a relationship with their biological father since he automatically is not regarded as a parent in these instances. This is not the default position in a few other jurisdictions. The article seeks to explore the rationale for the South African legal position and determines whether the legislative framework provides fairness, justice and certainty in this regard. It examines what the best interests of children born from rape and incest are, and whether these interests are being considered to be of paramount importance, in line with the country’s international and constitutional obligations. Hereafter, the contexts of rape and incest are analysed separately since it is explained that the circumstances during conception, and possibly after the birth of the child, differ. It is argued that, in the case of rape, the South African approach is promoting the best interests and rights of the child. However, the same cannot be said where children are born from certain instances of incestuous relationships. Since some uncertainty exists as to a couple of related aspects, the author calls for legislative amendments and further research to be effected
It gives me anxiety! Black Academics’ experiences of teaching large classes during the Covid-19 pandemic in a South African university
Get PDFThe COVID-19 pandemic continues to disrupt the teaching and learning in international higher education. Those of us in the global South have particularly been hard hit, struggling to balance working/ functioning economies, a struggling healthcare system, education, commerce, trade, transport, and the community spread of what was later found to be a very infectious disease (Porter et al., 2021; Rogerson & Rogerson, 2020; Shamasunder et al., 2020). In this paper, we explored and theorised the experiences of academics who taught large classes at a research-intensive university in South Africa. We purposely recruited and interviewed eight academics for this case study. We drew on Chela Sandoval’s (2013) philosophical notion of “decolonial love” to theorise what an inclusive, democratic and ubuntu-orientated teaching of large classes could look like for us in the global South, beyond the pandemic. The findings revealed that academics continue to be frustrated/challenged/made anxious with teaching large classes due to inadequate infrastructure (digital), lack of resources, and general unpreparedness with the virtual/online teaching and learning. The findings also revealed that large classes were problematic as academics struggled to provide critical engagements and discussions during the hard Covid-19 lockdown, and with some lamenting the frustrations of “teaching to themselves” due to the lack of student engagement. We conclude this paper by proposing a decolonial love approach to the online teaching and learning of large classes, underpinned by the ethics of care, compassion and understanding in curriculum imaginations
Land Resettlement and Elite Monopoly in Peri-urban Harare: The Colonial Legacy of Land Ownership in Post-colonial Zimbabwe, 2000-2019
Get PDFThe article argues that the Fast-Track Land Reform Programme (FTLRP) in Zimbabwe was characterised by stratification which alienated the poor and the marginalised in Harare from accessing prime peri-urban land. It uses the case of peri-urban Harare to unpack dynamics around allocation of farmland during the post-colonial FTLRP since 2000. The article argues that class-based land segregation in the post-colonial era replaced racially based land segregation in colonial Zimbabwe. The article posits that instead of land being distributed to the deserving poor peasants, farmers and the vulnerable, land barons emerged from the ruling elite, business tycoons and war veterans who allocated to themselves land and multiple farms in an approach that typified the colonial land distribution process. The article further argues that land re-distribution must be examined because the post-Third Chimurenga land redistribution methodologies exhibited both elite monopoly over peri-urban urban centres and other renowned centres of mineral production and the absence of institutional regulatory mechanisms on the politically powerful. It adopts an empirical analysis of peri-urban land redistribution modalities with particular bias on spotting elite beneficiaries and the consequent emergence of land barons. The central argument is that in order to put Zimbabwe’s economy back on track and move towards a developmental approach, objective conditions for land reform are necessary as opposed to a political approach to land reform. The article uses qualitative methods of data collection and employs historical analysis of both secondary and primary documents relating to land issues in Harare as well as field observations
Book review of, Arrested Development: The Soviet Union in Ghana, Guinea, and Mali, 1955-1968
No full textAlessandro Iandolo’s first book examining the history of development assistance that the Soviet Union provided to Ghana, Guinea, and Mali starting in the late 1950s is an impressive piece of research. The book is a solid addition to international and transnational histories that have helped deepen our understanding of the Cold War and decolonisation eras in the mid-20th century. Making the case that the Soviet Union was attempting to pioneer a new statist but non-communist style of development in West Africa, the book makes an interesting and important intervention in the growing literature examining development on the African continent in the mid and late 20th century. While retaining a focus on the Soviet Union and its policy makers, as befitting a Soviet specialist, Iandolo also conducted significant research in both Ghana and Mali, as well as in North America and Europe. This extensive archival work ensures that this Cold War story does not merely relegate Africa and African leaders to a supporting or ancillary role in the global conflict. Rather, the leaders of Ghana, Guinea, and Mali emerge as the significant players on the global scene that they were in the late 1950s and early 1960s
African epistemologies and the decolonial curriculum
Get PDFIn this article we argue that a discussion on African epistemologies must precede the quest for both the decolonisation of knowledge and curriculum in Africa. Decolonial thought in Africa is significant because it focuses, among other things, on the decolonisation of Western epistemological supremacy within the space where knowledge is produced and transferred. We contend that knowledge acquired through the process of learning must resonate with people’s lived experiences and realities. To meaningfully pursue that involves placing in focus people’s modes of thought and epistemic ideas, in the interpretation of their experiences and the realities around them. This article argues that designing a decolonised curriculum that centres unique African intellectual ideas should be informed by the understanding of African epistemologies, whose principle of epistemic validation is grounded on the idea of interconnectedness in African thought. Considering a decolonial curriculum as an attempt in pursuing ‘centring’ is to align curricula with the modes of knowledge validation in African thought.
The employment status of uber drivers: Comparing approaches by courts in the United Kingdom and South Africa
Get PDFSouth African labour law draws a distinction between employees, who dedicate their full-time endeavours to the service of a particular employer, and independent contractors, who perform specific projects for a customer. Employees enjoy a wide range of statutory rights such as the right to not be unfairly dismissed, but such protection does not extend to independent contractors. In the advent of the digital era, many people have turned to online platforms to secure their incomes. For example, some have turned to the Uber platform to drive customers seeking transport by means of the Uber application. Such drivers are, in terms of our law, not regarded as employees of Uber, but as independent contractors and are thereby precluded from the statutory protection which extends to employees. This position is demonstrated by an analysis of Uber South Africa Technology Services (Pty) Ltd v NUPSAW & Others (C449/17) [2018] ZALCCT 6. This case is further compared to a similar decision in the United Kingdom, Uber BV and Others v Aslam and Others [2021] UKSC 5, where protection was afforded to the Uber drivers. Suggestions are made for legal reform, in order to align the prevailing position in South Africa with the approach in the United Kingdom, thereby extending legal protection as employees to uber drivers
Biblical discourses and the subjugation of Africa: A Decolonial-Foucauldian perspective
Get PDFThe Western missionaries and colonialists pushed a similar agenda of subjugating the receptor’s core aspects of life. Among their targets were aspects of culture, religion, gender, and sexuality. This trend continues in the contemporary era within different global spaces. In Africa, the Americas, and Asia, missionaries promulgated colonial ideologies through the transmission and reception of biblical discourses. This was done under the guise of civilisation, Christianisation, and evangelisation of Africans who were and are still perceived and portrayed as primitive, savages, and pagans. This article argues that biblical resources served as modalities of power in the colonial subjugation agenda. The article uses the transmission and reception of biblical discourses as lenses for examining how coloniality targeted these aspects. The de-colonial motif was used to problematise these discourses. On the other hand, Foucault’s perspective on discourses andpower shed some light on how colonial power dynamics were at play in this context. A clarion call was then made to shift Christianity’s centre of power from the Northern continents to the South
Analysing the spatial pattern of road networks in Kimberley, South Africa
Get PDFThe increasing burden on South African road networks necessitates sustainable solutions that conclude their spatial configuration and arrangement. A deeper understanding of the existing road network’s spatial organisation is, therefore, required. This study evaluates the structural design of road networks in Kimberley, South Africa, using spatial network science and open-source OpenStreetMap data. Nonplanar-directed multigraphs for Kimberley are constructed to analyse the structural and morphological characteristics of the network. The study area was evaluated with several network-analysis methods such as completeness, degree of centrality, betweenness, closeness, and PageRank. The study found that Kimberley has a low degree of centrality of 0.00111. This indicates that the road network should be less congested because there are fewer vulnerable spots. Because of the availability of two-way streets, the total edge length in the Kimberley network is nearly double the total street length. There are 2.97 streets radiating from Kimberley nodes on average. This suggests that three-way intersections are prevalent in Kimberley. Centrality measures and analysing the effects in terms of accessibility to the commerce and services of the city show how the legacy of racial segregation, poverty, and isolation from social and economic opportunities impedes the places within Kimberley. Results from the study also indicate that the informal sections of Galeshewe are fine-grained in terms of road network, while Kimberley CBD and nearby districts have coarse grain roads. This pattern contributes to the relative overall low average street segment length (a proxy for block size) of 107 metres in Kimberley
Evaluating the Role of Judicial Oversight in the Context of the Post-2018 Emolument Attachment Order Legal Frame: Revisiting University of Stellenbosch Legal Aid Clinic V Minister of Justice 2015 5 Sa 221 (WCC)
Get PDFHistorically, mechanisms facilitating civil debt collection and its broader discipline of civil procedure have been an unpopular legal research area, not only in South Africa, but also abroad.[1] In recent years, one civil debt collection mechanism has, however, attracted some academic attention.[2] This attention has resulted from relatively rapid legal developments to counteract widespread debtor exploitation resulting from systemic abuses.[3] The emolument attachment order (hereafter, “EAO”) mechanism, sometimes also referred to as garnishee orders,[4] functions as a civil debt collection instrument, usually following the granting of a default judgment,[5] where the debtors are judged to be legally liable to their creditor.[6] Through the application of EAOs, debtors’ property, specifically their wages, are exposed to execution, in order to satisfy the creditors’ expectations of performance. In this manner, a portion of workers’ wages are withheld from them by the debtors’ employers (the garnishees) after being legally requested or reserved by creditors. The EAO mechanism is a popular debt-collection instrument affecting the lives of potentially millions of people.[7] Creditors favour debt collection through the EAO mechanism, as it offers a relatively convenient and secure form of debt enforcement.[8]
[1] De Vos 2002:236-237.
[2] See, for example, Coetzee & Van Sittert 2018; Van der Merwe 2019.
[3] Van der Merwe 2019:87-90.
[4] There is a slight, but important difference between garnishee orders, a term used to describe an order that empowers the creditor to attach any debt owed to the debtor by any third party, and EAOs, which are specific forms of garnishee orders applicable to the employer-employee relationship. See Van der Merwe 2019:78.
[5] Van der Merwe 2008:78.
[6] The definition of EAOs is apparent from their function, which is explained in sec. 65J(1)(b) of the Magistrates’ Courts Act 32/1944.
[7] As far as the author can ascertain, there are no statistics available on the exact number of EAOs currently in circulation. Haupt et al. 2008:85-104 experienced a similar challenge and relied on estimates to provide some indication of the extent of EAO use at the time. The author’s estimation of the number of lives affected by EAOs, including extended family members, is aligned with available data regarding the extreme scale of South African indebtedness (see, for example, Coetzee & Van Sittert 2018:110) and earlier indications of the prevalence of EAOs in circulation. See, for example, Van der Merwe 2019:80 at fn. 26, referring to an audit of a portion of the 1,75 million EAOs in existence in 2007.
[8] South African labour laws are relatively protective of employees and EAO debtors are specifically safeguarded from employer retaliation as a result of EAO deductions. See Smit & Van Eck 2010:47, 65-66. In terms of sec. 185 of the Labour Relations Act 66/1995, every employee has the right not to be unfairly dismissed