The Informal Economy in South Africa: Issues, Debates and Policies – Reflections after an Exposure Dialogue Programme
The basic objective of the Durban Cornell-SEWA-WIEGO Exposure Dialogue
Programme (EDP) was to continue and develop further a dialogue between labour economists, SEWA activists, and WIEGO researchers which began in 2003 with an EDP in Ahmedabad. The dialogue has been around key assumptions of neo-classical economics – and neo-liberal economic policies - which “trouble” heterodox economists, ground-level activists and researchers working on issues of employment and labour.
Following the successful EDP programme and discussions in Ahmedabad in January 2004, and the second and third dialogues, respectively, in Boston in September 2004 and Ithaca in November 2006, the EDP in South Africa was planned to deepen the dialogue by drawing on the experiences of informal workers in another context, where the history of economic development, the economic reforms and, in particular informal employment patterns, differs substantially from that in India. The South African experience is able to enrich the discussion in a number of ways.
Participants included Namrata Bali, Françoise Carré, Nancy Chau, Martha Chen, Donna Doane, Gary Fields, Ravi Kanbur, Francie Lund, Nonpumelelo Nzimande, Caroline Skinner, Jeemol Unni and Imraan Valodia.
Each participant was asked to write two reflections – a personal reflection and a technical reflection. These reflections are presented here. The pieces have only been lightly edited and the names of the hosts have been removed so that they cannot easily be identified. Participant’s reflections mirror the issues and debates that occurred and were discussed over the duration of the EDP.
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