PhD defence T. (Thandiwe) Matthews

Below is a brief summary of the dissertation: 

Centring the right to social assistance in South Africa, this thesis interrogates elite contestations concerning the relationship between constitutionalism, socio-economic rights and social policy to elucidate how systemic inequalities manifest in contemporary South Africa. Structural inequality has increased since the end of apartheid, despite the establishment of a constitutional democracy in 1994, founded on principles of dignity, equality and social justice, and the recognition and justiciability of constitutionally protected civil, political, and socio-economic rights afforded to everyone in democratic South Africa. Poverty and inequality are systemic, racialised and gendered across numerous societal structures, impacting particularly black women, who remain socially excluded while confronting perilous lived realities. The research thus seeks to interrogate the contested legal, political, and socio-economic perspectives between elite actors that have informed the framing of contemporary social assistance policy in post-1994 South Africa, to gain a deeper understanding of the lacuna that exists between South Africa’s constitutional aspirations and its unequal reality