Social movement struggles for decolonization and (re)constitution from below: Abahlali baseMjondolo's strivings against pariahdom

For better and for worse, the ‘decolonial turn’ has made its mark on almost all disciplines, sub-disciplines, and focus areas of the social sciences. However, while most scholars are agreed that ‘decolonization is not a metaphor’ most proponents of decoloniality and decolonization often do not identify constituent powers or movements that can drive or have driven decolonization of society and the state in the contemporary era. Secondly, there is a dearth of scholarship on what we may call ‘everyday strivings for decolonization’; that is, decolonization struggles outside of the epochal and the spectacular. This chapter is part of a global south contribution to social movement scholarship with the aim of demonstrating that in historically settler colonial settings beyond classic claims for recognition and/or distribution, many movements are engaged in everyday decolonization struggles against pariahdom. Pariahdom is a constitutive and foundational settler colonial condition that confines indigenous people, historically enslaved people, and other oppressed people to lived experiences of unhomeliness, homelessness, rootlessness, namelessness, and ultimately worldlessness. Abahlali baseMjondolo (the Shack-dwellers Movement of South Africa) serves as a case study.