Power of Apartheid: Territoriality and government in South African cities (Policy, Planning and Critical Theory)

Although there have been momentous changes in South Africa's recent political history, the spatial remnants of apartheid and the planning ideas which underpinned it remain to confound post-apartheid city planners. This book draws on detailed case study
material from one South African town, Port Elizabeth, to illustrate the relationship between the state, power, economy and spatial practices.


The racialised character of the urban order which emerged under apartheid meant that, together with the routine capacities of the state to govern, the domination of African people and their exclusion from political power were also effectively secured by
means of the spatial organisation of the city. Aspects of the strong relationship between modernity and racism are teased out in this study of the South African city, as are the general links between spatial form and state power. This book demands
attention from everyone concerned with the spatial politics of urban development.