Women and the Civic Space in Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe: Constraints and Counter-constraints
Civic space constitutes the substratum for women to be able to organise, communicate and participate in democratic processes, including claiming their rights, as well as influencing the trajectory of the political and socio- economic structures around them. With the proliferation of the recogniti...
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | research article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
University of KwaZulu-Natal
2023
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://cris.library.msu.ac.zw//handle/11408/5599 https://doi.org/10.29086/2519-5476/2022/v29n2a13 |
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| Summary: | Civic space constitutes the substratum for women to be able to organise,
communicate and participate in democratic processes, including claiming
their rights, as well as influencing the trajectory of the political and socio-
economic structures around them. With the proliferation of the recognition
and participation of women in political processes, their attempts to occupy
the civic space have also intensified. While the civic space is theoretically
open for women’s civic participation, structural violence and cyber-violence
have militated against women’s civic space visibility. This has culminated in
the shrinking of the civic space for women’s articulation of political and
socio-economic issues; especially in the African context. Against this
backdrop, the objective of this paper is to examine the constraints women in
Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe experience in operating in these
spaces and the strategies they deploy to deal with these constrictions. Having
said this, the paper intends to examine the manner in which physical, cyber
and structural violence against Namibian, South African and Zimbabwean
women manifests and affects their participation in civic spaces. Moreover, it
Women and the Civic Space
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explores the strategies deployed by women to counter the various forms of
violence and other stumbling blocks inherent in the civic space. Data for this
paper were generated from both primary and secondary sources and thematic
analysis was used to analyse the data. |
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