Appropriating social citizenship: Women's labour, poverty, and entrepreneurship in the manual workers union of Botswana

Journal of Southern African Studies

Volumn 36, Issue 3, 2010, Pages 693-710

  Werbner, Pnina ^a  

^a KEELE UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

AUTONOMY; CITIZENSHIP; DECISION MAKING; ENTREPRENEUR; GENDER ISSUE; INDEPENDENCE; POVERTY DETERMINANT; UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFIT; WOMENS EMPLOYMENT; WOMENS ORGANIZATION;

ARTICLE; BOTSWANA; COMMERCIAL PHENOMENA; CULTURAL FACTOR; ECONOMICS; EDUCATION; EMPLOYMENT; ETHNOLOGY; FEMALE; HISTORY; INCOME; LEGAL ASPECT; POLITICAL SYSTEM; POVERTY; PSYCHOLOGICAL ASPECT; SOCIAL BEHAVIOR; SOCIAL CLASS; SOCIAL DOMINANCE; TRADE UNION; WOMEN'S HEALTH; WOMEN'S RIGHTS;

BOTSWANA; CULTURAL CHARACTERISTICS; EMPLOYMENT; ENTREPRENEURSHIP; HIERARCHY, SOCIAL; HISTORY, 20TH CENTURY; HISTORY, 21ST CENTURY; INCOME; LABOR UNIONS; POLITICAL SYSTEMS; POVERTY; SOCIAL IDENTIFICATION; SOCIAL MOBILITY; WOMEN; WOMEN'S HEALTH; WOMEN'S RIGHTS; WOMEN, WORKING;

BOTSWANA;

EID: 77957118506     PISSN: 03057070     EISSN: 14653893     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/03057070.2010.507576     Document Type: Article

References (59)

1. Republished in G. Arrighi and J.S. Saul, Essays on the Political Economy of Africa (New York, Monthly Review Press, 1963), esp. pp. 69, 80-1, 120-21, 141-3.
2. C. Brewster and G. Wood, 'Introduction: Comprehending Industrial Relations in Africa', in G. Wood and C. Brewster (eds), Industrial Relations in Africa (London, Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), p. 8.
3. R. Sandbrook and R. Cohen, 'Worker and Progressive Change in Underdeveloped Countries', in R. Sandbrook and R. Cohen (eds), The Development of an African Working Class: Studies in Class Formation and Action (Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1975), where they point out that the ratio between the earnings of the highest and lowest paid government employees is as much as 38 or 40 (p. 3).
4. F. Cooper, Decolonization and African Society (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 461-62.
5. R. Cohen, Contested Domains: Debates in International Labour Studies (London, Zed Books, 1991), pp. 85-6. Writing about the rise of the black nursing profession in South Africa, Shula Marks notes that nurses formed the core of an emergent black middle class.
6. See S. Marks, Divided Sisterhood: Race, Class and Gender in the South African Nursing Profession (London, St. Martin's Press, 1994).
7. H. Alavi, 'Politics of Ethnicity in India and Pakistan', in F. Haliday and H. Alavi (eds), State and Ideology in the Middle East and Pakistan (London, Macmillan, 1987).
8. H. Rosenfeld and S. Carmi, 'The Privatization of Public Means: The State-Made Middle Class, and the Realization of Family Value in Israel', International Journal of Politics, Culture and Society, 3, 1 (1990).
9. A. Peace, 'The Lagos Proletariat: Labour Aristocrats or Populist Militants', in Sandbrook and Cohen (eds), The Development of an African Working Class, pp. 281-310. The one way linear urbanisation thesis of African workers was strongly critiqued by the Manchester School, of course.
10. See R. Werbner, Reasonable Radicals and Citizenship in Botswana (Bloomington, IN, Indiana University Press, 2004), Chapter 7
11. Ritual Passage, Sacred Journey (Washington, DC, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989), Chapter 3.
12. J. Ferguson, Expectations of Modernity: Myths and Meanings of Modern Life on the Zambian Copperbelt (New Haven, CT, Yale University Press, 1971).
13. Sandbrook and Cohen, The Making of an African Working Class, p. 3.
14. The examples are too numerous to cite. See, for example, M. Larmer, Mineworkers in Zambia: Labour and Political Change in Post-colonial Africa (London, Taurus Academic Studies, 2007) which focuses on the Zambian Copper Mine Union's struggle for multi-party democracy in Zambia.
15. J.S. Saul, '"The Labour Aristocracy" Thesis Reconsidered', in Sandbrook and Cohen, The Making of an African Working Class, pp. 305-6.
16. M. Mogalakwe, The State and Organised Labour in Botswana: 'Liberal Democracy' in Emergent Democracy (Aldershot, Ashgate, 1997), p. 104.
17. Mogalakwe, The State and Organised Labour, pp. 104-5.
18. M. Larmer, '"The Hour Has Come to the Pit": the Mineworkers' Union of Zambia and the Movement for Multi-Party Democracy, 1982-1991', Journal of Southern African Studies (JSAS), 32, 2 (2006), p. 295.
19. On the emergence of this post civil service elite see Werbner, Reasonable Radicals.
20. For example, a recent civil service job in Botswana was advertised at scale E2 (P252,744 - P262,956 per annum or roughly £24,000) on 11 May 2009. This compares with the average salary of P24,000 per annum of an industrial class worker (£2180. £1 is about 11 pula at current rates). Botswana also has a 'superscale' for very senior civil servants (S1 and S2), which is far higher.
21. Nurses in Botswana form their own association. NGO workers on relatively modest salaries, are usually middle class, and earn about 120,000-150,000 pula per annum (approx. £11,000).
22. See P. Werbner, 'The Politics of Infiltration: An Anthropological Case Study of Factionalism and Party Politics in the Manual Workers Union of Botswana', Critical African Studies (online journal), 3, 1 (May 2010).
23. Cooper, Decolonization and African Society, p. 216.
24. Ibid., pp. 217-21, 364.
25. Ibid., p. 218-19.
26. Ibid., p. 467.
27. See J.C. Makgale, Z. Maundeni and P. Molosiwa, History of the Botswana Manual Workers Union (Gaborone, National Amalgamated Local and Central Government and Parastatals Manual Workers Union - NALCGPMWU, 2007), pp. 76-81.
28. Ibid., p. 81.
29. They are: employment injury benefit, sickness benefit, medical benefit, invalidity benefit, maternity benefit, unemployment benefit, old age benefit, survivors' benefit and family benefit. See D. Ntseane and K. Solo, Social Security and Social Protection in Botswana (Gaborone, Bay Publishing, 2007), p. 24.
30. Ibid., pp. 24, 29-33, 48-84.
31. The code was formulated in 2005 but was still under review in 2007. The statement issued at the meeting in Zambia on 8-9 February, 2007 reads: 'To address the issue of Social Security in the region, the Ministers and Social Partners approved the SADC Code on Social Security and recommended it to the ICM for adoption and urged Member States to involve Social Partners in the domestication process of the Code.' The full text of the Code is unavailable but see SADC (2007) 'Communique of the Meeting of SADC Ministers of Employment & Labour and Social Partners Held in Lusaka, Zambia on 8th-9th February 2007', http://www.sadc.int/archives/ read/news/940 Accessed 11 May, 2009.
32. See Ntseane and Solo, Social Security and Social Protection, pp. 90-1.
33. In 2003, at the height of union membership, the union had 60,000 members. The numbers dropped drastically following a factional split in 2004-5 but it remained the largest union in Botswana.
34. Minutes and other official documents are, however, in English.
35. I refer to the situation until August 2007. At the time of writing, their present terms of employment may be in the process of being renegotiated.
36. R. Greener, K. Jeffries and H. Siphambe, 'The Impact of HIV/AIDS on Poverty and Inequality in Botswana', South African Journal of Economics, 68, 5 (2000), pp. 888-915. Paper presented for BIDPA in Gaborone, at the International Conference on Aids, 9-14 July 2000.
37. This means that each income earner has almost 24 dependants on average.
38. Earthtrends (2003) Country Profile: Botswana: Agricultural Production. Pdf. http://earthtrends.wri.org/gsearch. php?kw = botswana. Accessed 11 May 2009.
39. S. Hansen, 'Botswana: An African Success Story Shows Strains', Council on Foreign Relations, 10 January, 2008. Available at http://www.cfr.org/publication/15108/. Accessed 11 May 2009.
40. This was recently redefined to employ only select skilled workers, excluding most rural women who relied on the relief works to subsidise their livelihoods from remittances.
41. Ntseane and Solo, Social Security and Social Protection, p. 51.
42. The women were among a cohort of union members interviewed in depth in 2007 and 2008. I also attended their meetings and those of the Union in which they participated. Some women I knew better than others, and I had many conversations with them over several years.
43. All names henceforth are pseudonyms apart from the names of salaried union officials. 'Seriti' means dignity in Setswana.
44. Form V is the final year of Senior High School which, in the state system, marks the achievement of a Cambridge Junior Certificate (the equivalent of GCSE), enough to be considered a candidate at the University of Botswana.
45. Interview, 11 July 2005.
46. See Werbner, 'The Politics of Infiltration'.
47. In Botswana, respect for elders is an important principle. The counterpart to it is that elders are expected to be wise and responsible.
48. P. Werbner, 'Dialogical Subjectivities for Hard Times: Expanding Political and Ethical Imaginaries of Subaltern and Elite Batswana Women', African Identities, Special issue on African labour 7, 3 (September 2009), pp. 299-325.
49. My account refers to J. Iliffe, Honour in African History (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005).
50. Interview, 16 August 2005.
51. There were about five such employees, paid by the union, with the National Organising Secretary receiving around 12,000 pula a month, a multiple of ordinary members' pay. This became a source of tension (see Werbner, 'Politics of Infiltration').
52. Interview, 16 July 2005.
53. In other regions such as Kanye and Gaborone there have been female union chairpersons.
54. The eligibility of experienced storekeepers without academic qualifications to attend the course was successfully negotiated by the Union. MaPelotona had been educated to Junior certificate level but had failed the exams and thus was originally barred from the course. Salaries presented here are all at the 2005 rates, and have been subject to revision since 2006. They are also raised annually in line with inflation.
55. Interview, 17 August 2005.
56. On Mozambique, see J. Sender, C. Oya and C. Cramer, 'Women Working for Wages: Putting Flesh on the Bones of a Rural Labour Market Survey in Mozambique', JSAS, 32, 2 (2006), pp. 313-33.
57. On South Africa's 'peripheral' workforce, see P. Dibben, 'Industrial Relations and Employment Insecurity in South Africa: the Possibilities of Social Justice Unionism', in Wood and Brewster (eds), Industrial Relations in Africa, p. 112-13.
58. See Dibben, 'Industrial Relations and Employment Security', p. 111.
59. Ali Nobil Ahmad, 'Dead Men Working: Time and Space in London's ('Illegal') Migrant Economy', Work, Employment and Society, 22, 2 (2008), pp. 301-18.