Paper short abstract:

This paper focuses on the asylum and refugee protection regime in South Africa. South Africa has increasingly tightened access to refugee protection and much recently there has been a rise in anti-migrant rhetoric as well as a proliferation of vigilante groups that usurp the powers of the state in enforcing immigration laws.

Paper long abstract:

Globally, there is a steady flow of forced migrants in search of stable political environments and better economic prospects. The direction of these movements is often very diverse and met with mixed reactions in the destination countries. However, the space of protection has increasingly narrowed, and the rhetoric is that of suspicion, doubt, and at times leads to the outright rejection of the claims of those seeking asylum. The extent of the rhetoric is similar across different global contexts and in this instance, I focus on the conditions of asylum in South Africa. In the South African context, migration governance is used as leverage in domestic politics and xenophobic violence against migrant and refugee communities continues routinely. The exclusionary approach works particularly well as a form of leverage in scapegoating the governments’ failures to address poverty and job creation. A focus on securitisation further concretises an anti-refugee and anti-migrant stance in policy. The exclusionary approach contrasts to visions of free movement and Pan-Africanism as well as the benefits of “skilled” migration. Social xenophobic rhetoric is based on the premises of identity-construction through othering as well as being linked to economic deprivation. These discourses are reinforced both through rhetoric by politicians and the media. Much recently this was evident in the local government elections where political parties that openly adopted an anti-immigrant stance performed well. There has also been a rise in vigilante groups such as “operation dudula” targeting so called undocumented immigrants and forcibly removing them from informal trading spaces. These are backed by online-based anti-immigrant media campaigns such as the “Put South Africans First” movement which supports the activities of operation dudula.