Housing policy in mining towns: issues of race and risk in South Africa

Mining has had much to do with the pattern of housing in South Africa today. Under apartheid, the mines housed black mineworkers, classed as migrants, in high-density compounds, while giving white mineworkers company houses. Changes came with the demise of apartheid and the rise of neoliberalism and globalisation. The post-apartheid government emphasised ownership and permanence for mineworkers. This paper critically reviews post-apartheid government policy for mine housing in South Africa. Mining companies privatised mineworkers’ housing, devolving the long-term risks to households. Among the results have been deterioration of houses, lack of a coherent rental-housing strategy, ownership that could lock households into declining mining settlements, an influx of contract workers for whom the mining companies are no longer responsible for providing housing, lack of capacity to manage mining towns and unwanted houses if a mine closes. To date, policy responses to the problems of mine housing have not been appropriate.