Community leaders as intermediaries: how everyday practices create and sustain leadership in five informal settlements in Cape Town
SOURCE: Leadership
OUTPUT TYPE: Journal Article
PUBLICATION YEAR: 2020
TITLE AUTHOR(S): E.Vivier, D.Sanchez-Betancourt
KEYWORDS: CAPE TOWN, COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION, INFORMAL SETTLEMENTS, LEADERSHIP
DEPARTMENT: Developmental, Capable and Ethical State (DCES)
Print: HSRC Library: shelf number 11451
HANDLE: 20.500.11910/15422
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11910/15422
OUTPUT TYPE: Journal Article
PUBLICATION YEAR: 2020
TITLE AUTHOR(S): E.Vivier, D.Sanchez-Betancourt
KEYWORDS: CAPE TOWN, COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION, INFORMAL SETTLEMENTS, LEADERSHIP
DEPARTMENT: Developmental, Capable and Ethical State (DCES)
Print: HSRC Library: shelf number 11451
HANDLE: 20.500.11910/15422
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11910/15422
If you would like to obtain a copy of this Research Output, please contact Hanlie Baudin at researchoutputs@hsrc.ac.za.
Abstract
Community leaders are expected to navigate different social and institutional contexts, but they must do so without the direction, authority or legitimacy available to leaders within formal organisations. In this article, we draw on qualitative data from a participation initiative to explore how community leaders get involved in everyday maintenance of public services in informal settlements in Cape Town, in order to understand how they fulfil this intermediary role. Applying the lens of leadership-as-practice, we identify four practices that connect the communities and city, and which facilitate access to public services. We unpack how these practices emerge in and are shaped by the service maintenance system and material conditions of informality. We argue that community leaders fulfil their intermediary role through everyday improvisations to find 'what works', and in the process, they also create and sustain relations of dependence and interdependence that reinforce those very roles.-
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