Structural forces shape xenophobia in South Africa: Looking beyond the human agent

Abstract

AbstractIn examining xenophobia in South Africa, scholars have advanced various theoretical explanations to make sense of its causes and nature. Within this paper, I focus on the ways in which multiple structural arrangements create conditions for the manifestation of xenophobia in post‐apartheid South Africa. By drawing on Louis Althusser's notion of ‘interpellation’ and Judith Butler's concept of ‘the subject,’ I disconnect xenophobia in South Africa from the conscious and autonomous human agent and locate it within larger structural frameworks, namely historical residues of othering, neo‐liberal political economy, the exclusionary state and negative media representations of refugees and migrants. I argue that voluntary, conscious attitudes do not primarily lead to violence or other forms of exclusion as some may argue; instead, a constellation of systemic/structural forces shape and inform xenophobic attitudes and violence. This paper asks scholars to look more deeply into the relationship between exclusion/violence and structural constraints than perhaps they have.