New regional imaginaries in post-apartheid Southern Africa - Retail workers at a shopping mall in Zambia

Journal of Southern African Studies

Volumn 31, Issue 1, 2005, Pages 117-145

  Miller, Darlene ^a,b  

^a RHODES UNIVERSITY   (South Africa)

^b AISA   (South Africa)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

INDUSTRIAL PERFORMANCE; MULTINATIONAL ENTERPRISE; POST-APARTHEID; RETAILING;

AFRICA; EASTERN HEMISPHERE; SOUTHERN AFRICA; SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA; WORLD; ZAMBIA;

EID: 17444430869     PISSN: 03057070     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/03057070500035778     Document Type: Review

References (169)

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52. Ibid., p. 97.
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59. G. Arrighi, 1990, pp. 93-94, cited by Silver, Forces of Labor, pp. 22-23 (emphasis added).
60. Silver, Forces of Labor, p. 24.
61. Perrot, 'On the Formation of the French Working Class'.
62. Claims for inclusion are sometimes theorised as different claims on citizenship - political, cultural and market-based citizenship (M. Mamdani, Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa and the Legacy of Late Colonialism ([Princeton, N.J., Princeton University Press, 1996]) or industrial citizenship (R. Munck,[London, Zed, 1988]). These theses of citizenship may well be extended to regional citizenship as a way into the question of regional claims.
63. Silver, Forces of Labor, p. 21.
64. I b i d.
65. Harvey, Limits to Capital.
66. A. Herod, Organizing the Landscape. Geographical Perspectives on Labor Unionism. (Minneapolis and London, University of Minnesota Press, 1998).
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71. E. Schoenberger, The Cultural Crisis of the Firm (Massachusetts and Oxford, Blackwell, 1997);
72. E. Swyngedouw, 'Authoritarian Governance, Power, and the Politics of Rescaling', Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 18 (2000).
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74. A. Herod, 'From a Geography of Labor to a Labor Geography: Labor's Spatial Fix and the Geography of Capitalism', Antipode, 29, 1 (1997).
75. Massey, Space, Place and Gender.
76. Swyngedouw, 'Neither Global nor Local'.
77. Swyngedouw, in Cox, p. 142, emphasis added.
78. See Bond, Miller and Ruiters (2001) for how the space of regional working class formation is shaped by the region's political economy. For a discussion on the societal dimensions of regionalism, see L. Fawcett and A. Hurell, Regionalism in World Politics. Regional Organization and International Order (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1995).
79. Niemann, 'Unstated Places - Rereading Southern Africa', pp. 67-72.
80. B. Maserumule, and D. Miller, 'Understanding Regionalism in Post-Apartheid South Africa', South African Labour Bulletin, 24, 6 (December 2000).
81. T. Nkiwane, 'Contested Regionalism: Southern and Central Africa in the Post-Apartheid Era', African Journal of Political Science, 4, 2 (1999), pp. 126-142.
82. South Africa's Top 300 National Companies. National Edition 2002/3 (Cape Town, Dick Fletcher, 2003), pp. 280-281.
83. www.shoprite.co.za.
84. Unlike the failed colonial venture of Cecil John Rhodes, who initiated the 'Cape to Cairo' vision, Shoprite has completed the envisaged colonial trail. As is so often the case, countries beyond South African borders are referred to as 'African', as if South Africa were located somewhere else. In their African investments, Shoprite's managers claim the 'Cape to Cairo' coup de grâce.
85. A. Ariyo and J. Afeikhena, 'Privatization in Africa: An Appraisal', World Development, 27, 1 (1999), pp. 201-213.
86. G. Adler, 'Zambia's Second Subordination, Re-Colonisation Through Neo-Liberalism', South African Labour Bulletin, 21, 3 (June 1997), p. 54.
87. F. Kolala, 'South African Retail Firms in Zambia', (Unpublished Paper, Workshop on SADC Industrial Development, Namibia Development Policy Research Unit, 29-30 September, 2000), p. 15.
88. ZPA, Privatisation Status Report, July 2002.
89. Torres, Labour Markets in Southern Africa, p. 214.
90. Kolala, 'South African Retail Firms in Zambia', pp. 20-22.
91. By June 2004, the Angola and Uganda shopping centres were completed with six new stores added to the foreign African stores. In Ghana four U-Save fast chain stores were opened while one store was closed in Tanzania (www.shoprite.co.za).
92. United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Report (New York, Oxford University Press, 2003).
93. I b i d.
94. I b i d.
95. Torres, Labour Markets in Southern Africa, p. 214.
96. J. Weeks and P. Mosley, 'Structural Adjustment and Tradables: A Comparative Study of Zambia and Zimbabwe', in L. Petersson (ed.), Post-Apartheid Southern Africa. Economic Challenges and Policies for the Future (London and New York, Routledge, 1998).
97. Central Statistics Office, Zambia in Figures (Lusaka, CSO, 2000).
98. Central Statistics Office, Zambia in Figures (Lusaka, CSO, 1984, 1995, 2000).
99. C. Colclough, 'The Labor Market and Economic Stabilization in Zambia', in Country Economics Department, World Bank, Policy, Planning, and Research Working Paper (Washington, World Bank, November 1989), p. 14.
100. In terms of Zambian labour law, the Minister of Labour regulates sectors through statutory instruments.
101. Average real monthly earnings in the private sector in 1997 were K42, 000 per month, demonstrating that many employers were paying close to the minimum wage requirement. N. McCulloch, B. Baulch and M. Cherel-Robson, 'Globalisation, Poverty and Inequality in Zambia during the 1990s' (Paper prepared for the OECD Conference on Poverty and Income Inequality in Developing Countries: A Policy Dialogue on the Effects of Globalisation, 30 November 2000-1 December 2000).
102. Torres, Labour Markets in Southern Africa, p. 97.
103. Some of these older, retrenched workers became trade union officials (Interview, NUCIW, August 2002).
104. Ferguson comments on the overwhelming sense of 'decline and despair' he found while doing his research on the Copperbelt in Zambia (Ferguson, Expectations of Modernity, p. 12).
105. Interview, male permanent worker, August 2000.
106. Interview, male permanent price indexing clerk, August 2002.
107. Interview, female permanent cashier, August 2002.
108. Interview, female casual bakery assistant, August 2002.
109. Interview, male permanent shelf-packer, August 2002.
110. A. O. Hirschman, Essays in Trespassing, Economics to Politics and Beyond (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1981).
111. United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Report.
112. Interview, female permanent deli assistant, August 2002.
113. Commodity supply shortages were one of the principal problems in the past.
114. Interview, female casual cashier/till packer, August 2002.
115. Interview, female casual cashier, August 2002.
116. Interview, female permanent cashier, August 2002.
117. Interview, female permanent deli assistant, August 2002.
118. Interview, male permanent receiving clerk, August 2002.
119. Interview, female permanent non-foods controller.
120. Miller, 'Malling or Mauling Africa'.
121. Workers at the workplaces of foreign companies located in strategic sectors of the national economy gain leverage because both governments and the companies are reluctant to suspend production. (C. Bergquist, Labor in Latin America: Comparative Essays on Chile, Argentina, Venezuela, and Colombia [California, Sage, 1984]).
122. While this can suggest interview bias in that the workers willing to be interviewed could also have been those with the most grievances, the subsequent strike by the entire workforce, in July 2003, demonstrates that a significant number of workers were dissatisfied with their work conditions; this despite the unevenness that inevitably exists amongst workers.
123. Interview, male permanent shelf-packer, August 2002.
124. Interview, male permanent scanning clerk, August 2002.
125. Interview, male permanent receiving admin. clerk, August 2002.
126. Republic of Zambia, Social Dimensions of Adjustment. Priority Survey (Lusaka, CSO, 1999).
127. The average wage at Shoprite in South Africa was R1,898 in 2000 (B. Kenny, '"We are nursing these jobs": The Impact of Labour Market Flexibility on South African Retail Sector Workers', in Is There an Alternative? South African Workers Confronting Globalisation (International Labour and Research Information Group, Cape Town, 2001), p. 96.
128. Interviews, Shoprite-Manda Hill workers, August 2002.
129. This may be characterised as a claim for industrial citizenship, following the framework of the New International Labour Studies (see Munck, The New International Labour Studies).
130. Interview, male permanent supervisor, August 2002.
131. Interview, male casual check-out controller, August 2002.
132. I think that, in an indirect way, they were commenting on the rudeness of some of the South African management.
133. Interview, female permanent cashier, August 2002.
134. Interview, Mable Makoto, NUCIW Regional Secretary for Lusaka region, September 2003
135. In a speech on 17 September 2002, at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, Chinnua Achebe, the acclaimed Nigerian poet and novelist, said that he felt the spirit of renewal and re-awakening in the South African audiences that he had addressed. Such disempowerment and disillusionment amongst those who are at the interface of bilateral relationships with South Africa, contrast with Afro-optimists.
136. A grammatically incorrect mixture of kiSwahili and English meaning 'whites'.
137. Interview, male permanent sales assistant, August 2002.
138. Interview, female permanent cashier, August 2002.
139. Interview, male permanent receiving clerk, August 2002.
140. Interview, male permanent sales assistant, August 2002.
141. Interview, NUCIW Negotiation Team Leader and Deputy General Secretary for Finance, Kitwe, August 2003.
142. Interview, August 2003.
143. Interview, Focus Group, Shoprite-Manda Hill worker, September 2003.
144. Interviews, Shoprite workers, Manda Hill and Cairo Road, August 2002.
145. Interview, male permanent sales assistant, August 2002.
146. Interview, female permanent cashier, August 2002.
147. Interview, male permanent shelf-packer, August 2002.
148. Interview, male permanent sales assistant, August 2002.
149. Interview, male permanent shelf-packer, August 2002.
150. Interview, female permanent cashier, August 2002.
151. Interview, male permanent supervisor, August 2002.
152. Silver shows how cycles of labour unrest follow new investment and new companies over the course of the twentieth century. See, Silver, Forces of Labor.
153. Interviews, Shoprite workers, Manda Hill and Cairo Road, August 2002. What was significant, however, was how their sentiments shifted a year later (Interviews, August 2003), once they had ventured to take strike action in July 2003. Although cynical of the company's response, they were much more assertive about their ability to challenge the company.
154. Interview, female permanent cashier, August 2002.
155. Interview, female casual cashier, August 2002.
156. Interview, female casual cashier, August 2002.
157. Interview, male permanent shelf-packer, August 2002.
158. Interview, male permanent shelf-packer, August 2002.
159. Interview, male permanent PI clerk, August 2002.
160. M. Clarke, 'Checking Out and Cashing Up' (paper presented to the Trade and Industry Policy Secretariat, Muldersdrift, Annual Forum, 2000).
161. B. Kenny, 'Work Restructuring in Food Retailing: the Long Transition to "Market Hegemony"' (paper presented at the Wolpe Seminar, Johannesburg, 24-26 June, 2003).
162. B. Kenny, '" We Are Nursing These Jobs": The Impact of Labour Market Flexibility on South African Retail Sector Workers', in Newman et al., Is There an Alternative?
163. B. Kenny, and E. Webster, 'Eroding the Core: Flexibility and the Re-Segmentation of the South African Labour Market', (paper presented at the XIVth World Congress of Sociology, International Sociological Association, Montreal, 26 July-1 August 1998).
164. R. Rees, 'Flexible Labour: Meeting the Challenge', South African Labour Bulletin, 21, 5 (1997).
165. I. Valodia, 'Flexibility in the Retail Industry' (unpublished report, Durban, Trade Union Research Project, 1989).
166. Kenny, '"We are nursing these jobs"', p. 92.
167. Kenny and Webster, 'Eroding the Core', p. 232.
168. Kenny, '"We are nursing these jobs"', pp. 94-95.
169. Interview, Zambian Regional Manager, 2003.