Download or read book South African Legal Culture in a Transformative Context written by Isolde De Villiers and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Joining in the search for a post-apartheid South African jurisprudence, this dissertation departs from transformative constitutionalism, as formulated by Karl Klare. Transformative constitutionalism is a long-term project of bringing about social change through the interpretation and enactment of the constitution. Because the project envisions transformation not as single occurrence but as a continuous process, it requires a legal culture that is conducive to this change. Legal culture pertains to the way in which law and legal concepts are approached. The suggestion is that there is a continuation of a formalistic legal culture in South Africa, and this continuation of formalism stifles the transformation envisioned by the South African Constitution and the project of transformative constitutionalism. The idea of continuation emphasises the momentum of legal culture and is related to institutional inertia. This dissertation links conservatism, positivism, formalism and other related concepts with the notion of spectacle as outlined in the work of Njabulo Ndebele and proposes that South African legal culture is a continuation of spectacle by looking at approaches to history, constitutionalism, democracy and rights. The spectacle, like formalism, prefers the determinate, values display and emphasises the external - it is an overt and celebratory mode devoid of thought. Because the spectacle and the continuation of a legal culture of spectacle stifles transformative constitutionalism, the submission is that there should be a refusal of spectacle in South African legal culture and a return to the ordinary. The notion of refusal comes from an article by Karin Van Marle, and links with a critical and slower approach. Ndebele introduces rediscovery of the ordinary, which is related to the concept of the everyday. Opposed to the spectacle, refusal and the ordinary favours contemplation and commemoration. This leads to a view on approaching history, constitutionalism, democracy and rights as refusal of spectacle and rediscovery of the ordinary. It is an attempt to rethink South Africa's legal culture in order to move closer to the aims of transformative constitutionalism. Following the aesthetic turn in South African jurisprudence, this dissertation makes use of literary examples to illustrate the arguments. Ndebele's The Cry of Winnie Mandela and Eben Venter's Horrelpoot introduce the themes of storytelling, travelling and post-colonialism and aptly expands on the call for a refusal of spectacle.
Download or read book The Making of South African Legal Culture 1902 1936 written by Martin Chanock and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2001-03-05 with total page 596 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Martin Chanock's illuminating and definitive perspective on that development examines all areas of the law including criminal law and criminology; the Roman-Dutch law; the State's African law; and land, labour and 'rule of law' questions.
Download or read book An Introduction to African Legal Culture written by O. B. Olaoba and published by . This book was released on 2002 with total page 92 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Access to Justice and Human Security written by Sindiso Mnisi Weeks and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-11-22 with total page 423 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For most people in rural South Africa, traditional justice mechanisms provide the only feasible means of accessing any form of justice. These mechanisms are popularly associated with restorative justice, reconciliation and harmony in rural communities. Yet, this ethnographic study grounded in the political economy of rural South Africa reveals how historical conditions and contemporary pressures have strained these mechanisms’ ability to deliver the high normative ideals with which they are notionally linked. In places such as Msinga access to justice is made especially precarious by the reality that human insecurity – a composite of physical, social and material insecurity – is high for both ordinary people and the authorities who staff local justice forums; cooperation is low between traditional justice mechanisms and the criminal and social justice mechanisms the state is meant to provide; and competition from purportedly more effective ‘twilight institutions’, like vigilante associations, is rife. Further contradictions are presented by profoundly gendered social relations premised on delicate social trust that is closely monitored by one’s community and enforced through self-help measures like witchcraft accusations in a context in which violence is, culturally and practically, a highly plausible strategy for dispute management. These contextual considerations compel us to ask what justice we can reasonably speak of access to in such an insecure context and what solutions are viable under such volatile human conditions? The book concludes with a vision for access to justice in rural South Africa that takes seriously ordinary people’s circumstances and traditional authorities’ lived experiences as documented in this detailed study. The author proposes a cooperative governance model that would maximise the resources and capacity of both traditional and state justice apparatus for delivering the legal and social justice – namely, peace and protection from violence as well as mitigation of poverty and destitution – that rural people genuinely need.
Download or read book Socio economic Rights written by Sandra Liebenberg and published by Juta and Company Ltd. This book was released on 2010 with total page 572 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on a wide range of interdisciplinary resources, this scholarly work provides an in-depth and thorough analysis of the socio-economic rights jurisprudence of the newly democratic South Africa. The book explores how the judicial interpretation and enforcement of socio-economic rights can be more responsive to the conditions of systemic poverty and inequality characterising South African society. Based on meticulous research, the work marries legal analysis with perspectives from political philosophy and democratic theory.
Download or read book Human Rights and the South African Legal Order written by John Dugard and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2015-03-08 with total page 492 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As an Advocate of the Supreme Court, John Dugard observes the South African legal order daily in operation. In this book he provides a thorough description and probing analysis of the workings of the system. He places South Africa's legal order in a comparative context, examining the climate of legal opinion, crucial judicial decisions, and their significance in relation to contemporary thought and practice in England, America, and elsewhere. He also considers South Africa's laws in the light of its history, politics, and culture. Originally published in 1978. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Download or read book Transformative Constitutionalism in Latin America written by Armin von Bogdandy and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017-06-16 with total page 465 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This ground-breaking collection of essays outlines and explains the unique development of Latin American jurisprudence. It introduces the idea of the Ius Constitutionale Commune en América Latina (ICCAL), an original Latin American path of transformative constitutionalism, to an Anglophone audience for the first time. It charts the key developments that have transformed the region and assesses the success of the constitutional projects that followed a period of authoritarian regimes in Latin America. Coined by scholars who have been documenting, conceptualizing, and comparing the development of Latin American public law for more than a decade, the term ICCAL encompasses themes that cross national borders and legal fields, taking in constitutional law, administrative law, general public international law, regional integration law, human rights, and investment law. Not only does this volume map the legal landscape, it also suggests measures to improve society via due legal process and a rights-based, supranational and regionally rooted constitutionalism. The editors contend that with the strengthening of democracy, the rule of law, and human rights, common problems such as the exclusion of wide sectors of the population from having a say in government, as well as corruption, hyper-presidentialism, and the weak normativity of the law can be combatted more effectively in future.
Download or read book Legal academics and progressive politics in South Africa Moving beyond the ivory tower PULP FICTIONS No 2 written by Karin van Marle and published by Pretoria University Law Press. This book was released on 2006-01-01 with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Legal academics and progressive politics in South Africa: Moving beyond the ivory tower - PULP FICTIONS No.2 Edited by Karin van Marle 2006 ISSN: 1992-5174 Pages:30 Print version: Available Electronic version: Free PDF available About PULP FICTIONS - A space for dialogue: Central to the becoming of a society in the context of posts (postapartheid, postcolonial, postmodern) and in the context of trans-formations of the political, legal, socio-economic and cultural is the creation of a vibrant and active public sphere. Of particular concern is an insistence on democracy and transparency radically different from strategic and instrumental conceptions – a space for dialogue and dissent, an opportunity for crea-tivity, experimentation and re-imaginings. About the publication In the second edition of PULP FICTIONS we continue the search for a vibrant and active public sphere through debate. As in the first edition, the dialogue is one between two academics from the faculty of law and, as in the first edition, different conceptions of law, politics and the role of the academic are teased out. The context of the debate in this edition is a series of research meetings of the Department of Legal History, Comparative Law and Jurisprudence at the UP Law Faculty. Over a course of a few of these meetings different perspectives on law, politics and the limits/ potential of the law were voiced by different colleagues.Tshepo Madlingozi presented in one of the meetings his views on the role of legal academics in progressive politics. In this contribution, which appears here, he urges all of us to move ‘beyond the ivory tower’, get out of our ‘air conditioned offices’ and embrace participatory action research. Madlingozi defines the latter as field research where the researcher interacts and participates with communities and engages in research that is ‘unashamedly’ political. Anton Kok in response takes what he calls a ‘pragmatic instrumentalist’ view in contrast to Madlingozi’s more ‘ambitious critique’. Focusing more on law’s potential he highlights the areas where law could contribute to transformation. Both colleagues are not afraid to put their personal political/ideological views on the table. In this way they contribute to the vision of creating a space for dialogue, dissent, creativity and re-imaginings. About the authors: Mr Tshepo Madlingozi works at the Department of Legal History, Comparitive Law and Jurisprudence, Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria. His article: Legal academics and progressive politics in South Africa: Moving beyond the ivory tower. Mr Anton Kok is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Legal History, Comparitive Law and Jurisprudence, Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria. His article: Legal academics and progressive politics in South Africa: Moving beyond the ivory tower - A reply to Tshepo Madlingozi About the editor: Karin van Marle is a Professor at the Department of Legal History, Comparitive Law and Jurisprudence, at the Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria.
Download or read book UBuntu and the Law written by Nyoko Muvangua and published by Fordham Univ Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 485 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book brings together the uBuntu jurisprudence of South Africa, as well as the most cutting-edge critical essays about South African jurisprudence on uBuntu. Can indigenous values be rendered compatible with a modern legal system? This book raises some of the most pressing questions in cultural, political, and legal theory.
Download or read book Conquest Constitutionalism and Democratic Contestations written by Joel M. Modiri and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-05-21 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two decades since the enactment of South Africa’s present constitution, the durability and endurance of ‘past’ inequalities and injustices illustrate that the ‘new South Africa’ – lauded as a miracle nation with the best constitution in the world – can no longer be regarded as an unqualified success. The legal and constitutional foundations of post-1994 South Africa are in a process of renegotiation that invites new and alternative perspectives and approaches. This comprehensive volume explores this process of renegotiation by engaging political and intellectual contestations circulating in South African academic and public discourse relating to continuities and discontinuities between the colonial-apartheid past and the post-1994 constitutional present. The authors analyse the moral, intellectual and political unravelling of post-1994 South African constitutionalism (as legal text and political culture) and enquire whether it has been able to respond adequately to the fundamental contradictions generated by colonisation and apartheid. They also consider how centring the historical problem of European domination and conquest in Africa – and South Africa in particular – might provide an alternative frame or lens to theorise and understand contemporary South African realities. This book marks out a complex field of contestation – involving competing histories, locations, visions and perspectives – that raises multifaceted questions regarding law, history and politics. It is the outcome of a South African Journal of Human Rights colloquium and was originally published as a special issue of the journal.
Download or read book Rights and Democracy written by Henk Botha and published by AFRICAN SUN MeDIA. This book was released on 2004-01-01 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The twelve essays in this book pay tribute to senior Harvard law professor Frank Michelman whose thinking ? and input ? on Constitutional Law has made a great contribution to constitutional development in South Africa. These essays are the work of some of the best practical and academic legal minds in this country and, given South Africa?s recent successes in this field, represent an advanced position in constitutional thinking in the world.
Download or read book Engaging with Social Rights written by Brian Ray and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2016-04-21 with total page 395 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With a new and comprehensive account of the South African Constitutional Court's social rights decisions, Brian Ray argues that the Court's procedural enforcement approach has had significant but underappreciated effects on law and policy, and challenges the view that a stronger substantive standard of review is necessary to realize these rights. Drawing connections between the Court's widely acclaimed early decisions and the more recent second-wave cases, Ray explains that the Court has responded to the democratic legitimacy and institutional competence concerns that consistently constrain it by developing doctrines and remedial techniques that enable activists, civil society and local communities to press directly for rights-protective policies through structured, court-managed engagement processes. Engaging with Social Rights shows how those tools could be developed to make state institutions responsive to the needs of poor communities by giving those communities and their advocates consistent access to policy-making and planning processes.
Download or read book Albie Sachs and Transformation in South Africa written by Drucilla Cornell and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2014-03-05 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many critical theorists talk and write about the day after the revolution, but few have actually participated in the constitution of a revolutionary government. Emeritus Justice Albie Sachs was a freedom fighter for most of his life. He then played a major role in the negotiating committee for the new constitution of South Africa, and was subsequently appointed to the new Constitutional Court of South Africa. Therefore, the question of what it means to make the transition from a freedom fighter to a participant in a revolutionary government is not abstract, in Hegel’s sense of the word, it is an actual journey that Albie Sachs undertook. The essays in this book raise the complex question of what it actually means to make this transition without selling out to the demands of realism. In addition, the preface written by Emeritus Justice Albie Sachs and his interview with Drucilla Cornell and Karin van Marle, further address key questions about revolution in the twentieth- and twenty-first centuries: from armed struggle to the organization of a nation state committed to ethical transformation in the name of justice. Albie Sachs and transformation in South Africa: from revolutionary activist to constitutional court judge illuminates the theoretical and practical experiences of revolution and its political aftermath. With first-hand accounts alongside academic interrogation, this unique book will intrigue anyone interested in the intersection of Law and Politics.
Download or read book The South African Legal System and Its Background written by H. R. Hahlo and published by Gaunt. This book was released on 1968 with total page 658 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Transformative Environmental Constitutionalism written by Melanie Murcott and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2022-10-24 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Transformative Environmental Constitutionalism, Professor Melanie Jean Murcott writes from a Global South perspective, drawing on South African context to provide a transformative theoretical framework for adjudication of environmental law disputes which could be more responsive to social, environmental, and climate injustices.
Download or read book Law and Poverty written by Sandra Liebenberg and published by Juta and Company Ltd. This book was released on 2012 with total page 488 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Law and Poverty: Perspectives from South Africa and Beyond" is a collection of essays by leading South African and international experts, as well as emerging young scholars. The collection focuses on key theoretical and strategic questions concerning the relationship between law and systemic poverty. The essays were first presented at a colloquium on Law and Poverty organised by the Stellenbosch Law Faculty, which took place from 29 to 31 May 2011. The range and richness of the essays illuminate the multifaceted nature and causes of poverty, as well as the possibility and limits of law in responding to the social injustice which poverty represents. By engaging with these questions, the book aims to deepen critical reflection and debate on law's ability to respond effectively to social and economic marginalisation. "The substantive content of law is influenced by how lawyers conceive and frame cases, by what theories we choose to advance, and what understanding of the legal process and the scope of judicial review we offer to the courts. Working on these questions is at best a modest contribution towards establishing a just society. But, as the learning, insight, imagination and intellectual daring on display in this collection of essays reveals, it is a contribution that should concern all those interested in the interrelationship between law and social justice." Prof Karl Klare, George J and Kathleen Waters Matthews Distinguished University Professor, Northeastern University School of Law The collection was edited by Sandra Liebenberg, HF Oppenheimer Chair in Human Rights Law at the University of Stellenbosch Law Faculty, and Geo Quinot, Professor of Law at Stellenbosch Law Faculty and Editor of the "Stellenbosch Law Review". Professors Liebenberg and Quinot co-direct a newly formed research and postgraduate training project on Socio-Economic Rights and Administrative Justice (SERAJ) based at the Stellenbosch Law Faculty.
Download or read book Comparative Perspectives on the Enforcement and Effectiveness of Antidiscrimination Law written by Marie Mercat-Bruns and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-06-30 with total page 558 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book focuses on anti-discrimination law in order to identify commonalities and best practices across nations. Almost every nation in the world embraces the principle of equality and non-discrimination, in theory if not in practice. As the authors' expert contributions establish, the sources of the principle vary considerably, from international treaties to religious law, traditions and more. There are many approaches to methods of enforcement and other variables, but the principle is nearly universal. What does a comparison of the laws and approaches across different lands reveal? Readers may explore the enforcement and effectiveness of anti-discrimination law from 25 nations, across six continents. Esteemed authors examine national, regional and international systems looking for common and best practices, identifying innovative approaches to long-standing problems. The many ways that anti-discrimination law is enforced are brought to light, from criminal or civil prosecution through to community resolution processes, amongst others. Through comparing the approaches of different lands, the authors consider which methods of enforcement are effective. These enriching national and international perspectives highlight the need for more creative, concrete and coordinated means of enforcement to ensure the effectiveness of anti-discrimination law, regardless of the legal tradition concerned, but in light of these traditions. Readers will find each nation remarkable, and learn something new and interesting from each report.
