@article{2016:soyapi:environmen,
title = {Environmental justice and slow violence: Marikana and the post-apartheid South African mining industry in context},
year = {2016},
note = {South Africa has come a long way since the constitutional revolution
that swept the country in the early 1990s. The Constitution of the
Republic of South Africa, 1996 introduced and continues to drive
far-reaching changes to the political, social and juridical landscape
and it aims to create a more just and equal society for all; one where
respect for human rights is paramount. On 16 August 2012 the country
was rocked to its core when the South African Police Service killed 34
striking miners at Lonmin Plc’s platinum mine at Marikana in the
country’s North-West Province in what appeared to be a brutal
suppression of one of the most significant labour unrests in the
country’s history. Evoking images of apartheid-era police brutality,
the “Marikana massacre” has unearthed some of the many challenges
the country is struggling with on its long road to creating a just
society for all. The predominant focus of political and juridical
commentary on and scholarly critique of the incident has to date
focused on labour and social justice issues. In this article we focus
on the often ignored, albeit equally critical, deleterious
socio-economic and related environmental impacts of mining in South
Africa by exploring the intimate link between slow violence and the
broader environmental justice movement within the South African
context through the lens of the Marikana massacre. In pursuit of this
objective, the article commences with a brief overview of the actors
involved in the Marikana massacre. The following part seeks to
understand environmental justice and slow violence in relation to the
massacre. We then demonstrate how the South African mining industry,
backed as it was by government, has been highly exploitative of
workers and natural resources, and how successive post-apartheid
governments have been and continue to be complicit in environmental
injustice and slow violence against marginalised black people in South
Africa. In view of the consequences of this historical legacy, in the
final part of the article, we provide some critical observations
within the framework of environmental justice and slow violence.},
journal = {VRÜ Verfassung und Recht in Übersee},
pages = {393--415},
author = {Soyapi, Caiphas and Kotzé, Louis J.},
volume = {49},
number = {4}
}