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BEHIND CLOSED GATES: EVERYDAY POLICING IN DURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 January 2016

Sarah-Jane Cooper-Knock
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Abstract

Studies of everyday policing in predominantly white areas in South Africa often focus on the spectacle of secured architecture and private policing services, concluding that the growth of the private security industry has created atomized units of residence that are alienated from the state. Such conclusions are important but incomplete: they do not look sufficiently behind closed gates to explore how private security is justified, utilized, supplemented or avoided in daily life. In this article, I explore the everyday policing of theft and robbery in a predominantly white policing sector in Durban. I demonstrate that people have not simply transferred their dependence or allegiance from public to private policing. Instead, their approach to everyday policing straddles these two spheres, perpetually disrupts any simple dichotomy between them, and illustrates how all forms of policing are entangled in the wider inequalities and insecurities of post-apartheid South Africa. In making this argument, I highlight how residents remain reliant on the bureaucratic authority of the state police, are distrustful of their employees who supposedly protect them, and appear far more willing to take matters into their own hands than many interviewees admit or imagine.

Résumé

Les études sur la police quotidienne dans les régions d'Afrique du Sud à population majoritairement blanche se concentrent souvent sur le spectacle de l'architecture sécurisée et les services de police privée, et concluent que l'essor du secteur de la police privée a créé des unités résidentielles atomisées aliénées de l’État. Ces conclusions sont importantes mais incomplètes : elles n'explorent pas suffisamment, derrière les portes de ces résidences protégées, comment la sécurité privée est justifiée, utilisée, renforcée ou évitée dans la vie quotidienne. Dans cet article, l'auteur examine la police quotidienne des vols dans un secteur de police de Durban à majorité blanche. Il démontre que les habitants n'ont pas tout simplement transféré leur dépendance ou allégeance d'une police d’État à une police privée. Au lieu de cela, leur approche de la police quotidienne est à cheval sur ces deux sphères, perturbe sans cesse la simple dichotomie qui pourrait exister entre elles et illustre comment toutes les formes de police sont entremêlées aux inégalités et aux insécurités plus larges de l'Afrique du Sud postapartheid. L'auteur met en lumière, dans son argument, le fait que les résidents restent tributaires de l'autorité bureaucratique de la police d’État, qu'ils se méfient de leurs employés pourtant supposés les protéger et qu'ils semblent bien plus disposés qu'ils ne l'admettent ou ne l'imaginent, pour un grande nombre, à prendre les choses en main.

Type
Law and Social Order in Africa
Information
Africa , Volume 86 , Issue 1 , February 2016 , pp. 98 - 121
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2016 

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INTERVIEWS

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David, Berea resident, June 2011.Google Scholar
Duncan, Berea resident, July 2010.Google Scholar
Geoff, Berea resident, June 2013.Google Scholar
Geoff and Rachel, Berea residents, July 2010.Google Scholar
Isaac, Berea resident, June 2010.Google Scholar
Johannes, Berea police, June 2011.Google Scholar
John, Berea resident, August 2010.Google Scholar
Lawrence, Berea resident, July 2010.Google Scholar
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Sylvia, Berea resident, July 2010.Google Scholar
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