Law, South African Mothers Living in Poverty and the COVID-19 Pandemic

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.17159/1727-3781/2023/v26i0a13146

Keywords:

Covid-19, poor motherhood, socio-economic rights, Child Support Grant, poverty alleviation, pandemic

Abstract

Sometimes being a mother in tough economic times can be a challenge. Socio-economic demands occasioned by the COVID-19 pandemic have been especially cumbersome for mothers already living under conditions of poverty. Since the beginning of 2020 the pandemic has further exacerbated the daily struggles of the poor during periods of economic uncertainty, disease and death. Conscious of this additional socio-economic pressure and to lessen the financial burden carried by mothers living in poverty, the South African state introduced a COVID-19 relief Child Support Grant to assist during this trying period. This article explores the role played by law in poverty discourse where mothers are concerned. It is suggested here that the conceptualisation of poverty in law, at least where mothers are concerned, is limited by law's neglect of the socio-political identity of women as mothers, which is rooted in history. This failure reaffirms that law is implicated in contemporary socio-economic inequalities

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

  • Pamela Nyawo, Unisa

               

References

Bibliography

Literature

Abrahams Y "The Great Long National Insult: 'Science', Sexuality and the Khoisan in the 18th and Early 19th Century" 1997 Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity 34-48 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/4066151

Albertyn C "Gendered Transformation in South African Jurisprudence: Poor Women and the Constitutional Court" 2011 Stell LR 591-613

Alcoff L "The Problem of Speaking for Others" 1992 Cultural Critique 5-32 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/1354221

Annas G "The Right to Health and the Nevirapine Case in South Africa" 2003 New England Journal of Medicine 750-754 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMlim022737

Austin R and Schneider EM "Mary Joe Frug's Postmodern Feminist Legal Manifesto Ten Years Later: Reflections on the State of Feminism Today" 2001 New Eng L Rev 1-28

Baderoon G "The Ghost in the House: Women, Race, and Domesticity in South Africa" 2014 Cambridge Journal of Postcolonial Literary Inquiry 1-17 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/pli.2014.17

Bohler-Muller N "Some Thoughts on the Ubuntu Jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court" 2007 Obiter 590-599

Bozzoli B "Marxism, Feminism and South African Studies" 1983 JSAS 139-171 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03057078308708055

Briggs L "Mother, Child, Race, Nation: The Visual Iconography of Rescue and the Politics of Transnational and Transracial Adoption" 2003 Gender and History 179-200 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-0424.00298

Broadbent A, Combrink H and Smart B "Covid-19 in South Africa" 2020 Global Epidemiology 1-5 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloepi.2020.100034

Cammett A "Deadbeat Dads and Welfare Queens: How Metaphor Shapes Poverty Law" 2014 Boston College Journal of Law and Social Justice 233-265

Carlitz R and Makhura M "Life Under Lockdown: Illustrating Tradeoffs in South Africa's Response to COVID-19" 2021 World Development 1-8 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105168

Ciotti M et al "The COVID-19 Pandemic" 2020 Critical Reviews in Clinical Laboratory Sciences 365-388 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/10408363.2020.1783198

Davis A "The 'Sexual Economy' of American Slavery" reprinted in James SM, Foster FS and Guy-Sheftall B Still Brave: The Evolution of Black Women's Studies (The Feminist Press New York 2009) 103-128

Fierheller D "'Good' Mothers, 'Risky' Mothers, and Children's Health" 2022 Journal of the Motherhood Initiative 213-226

Fineman M "Images of Mothers in Poverty Discourse" 1991 Duke LJ 274-295 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/1372728

Fineman M "The Neutered Mother" 1992 U Miami L Rev 653-667

Frederick A "Between Stigma and Mother-Blame: Blind Mothers' Experiences in USA Hospital Postnatal Care" 2015 Sociology of Health and Illness 1127-1141 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9566.12286

Gittings L et al "'Now my Life is Stuck!' Experiences of Adolescents and Young People During COVID-19 Lockdown in South Africa" 2021 Global Public Health 947-963 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17441692.2021.1899262

Goldblatt B "Social Security in South Africa: A Gender and Human Rights Analysis" 2014 VRU 22-42 DOI: https://doi.org/10.5771/0506-7286-2014-1-22

Hammonds E "Towards a Genealogy of Black Female Sexuality" in Alexander M and Mohanty C (eds) Feminist Genealogies; Colonial Legacies; Democratic Futures (Routledge New York 1997) 170-183

Hassim S "Gender Equality and Developmental Social Welfare in South Africa" 2006 Gender and Social Policy in a Global Context 109-129 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230625280_5

Helmrich C "Equality-oriented Horizontal Policies in South African Public Procurement" 2014 APPLJ 60-106 DOI: https://doi.org/10.14803/1-1-7

Hunter M and Hodgson TF "Ms Elsie Klaase and the Constitutional Court's Missing Women" 2017 CCR 283-305 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2989/CCR/2016.0010

Hutchinson D et al (eds) Wille's Principles of South African Law 8th ed (Juta Cape Town 1991)

Heywood M "South Africa's Treatment Action Campaign: Combining Law and Social Mobilization to Realize the Right to Health" 2009 Journal of Human Rights Practice 14-36 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/jhuman/hun006

Katiyatiya LM Substantive Equality, Affirmative Action and the Alleviation of Poverty in South Africa (LLD-thesis University of Stellenbosch 2014)

Kteily-Hawa R et al "Understanding the Epidemiological HIV Risk Factors and Underlying Risk Context for Youth Residing in or Originating from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region: A Scoping Review of the Literature" 2022 PLoS ONE 1-24 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260935

Kuri E and Fierheller D "Social Work and Mothering: Mapping the Intersections of Social Work and Matricentric Feminism" 2022 Journal of the Motherhood Initiative 7-29

Liebenberg S "South Africa's Evolving Jurisprudence on Socio-Economic Rights: An Effective Tool in Challenging Poverty?" 2002 LDD 159-191

Lone S and Ahmad A "COVID-19 Pandemic: An African Perspective" 2020 Emerging Microbes and Infections" 1300-1308 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/22221751.2020.1775132

Maart R "Black Consciousness and Feminism" 2013 Frank Talk 7-12

Mabaso M et al "HIV Prevalence in South Africa Through Gender and Racial Lenses: Results from the 2012 Population-based National Household Survey" 2019 International Journal for Equity in Health 1-11 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-019-1055-6

Mackett O "The Effects of COVID-19 on Women in South Africa: An Analysis Using the Social Provisioning Framework" 2021 African Safety Promotion 1-26

Magubane Z "Attitudes Towards Feminism Among Women in the ANC, 1950-1990: A Theoretical Re-interpretation" in Ndlovu S (ed) The Road to Democracy in South Africa. Vol 4, 1980-1990 (Unisa Press Pretoria 2010) 975-1036

Mbunge E "Effects of COVID-19 in South African Health System and Society: An Explanatory Study" 2020 Diabetes and Metabolic Syndrome: Clinical Research and Reviews 1809-1814 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dsx.2020.09.016

Modiri JM "The Colour of Law, Power and Knowledge: Introducing Critical Race Theory in (Post-)Apartheid South Africa" 2012 SAJHR 405-436 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/19962126.2012.11865054

Myburgh H et al "Implementing 'Universal' Access to Antiretroviral Treatment in South Africa: A Scoping Review on Research Priorities" 2021 Health Policy and Planning 923-938

O'Reilly A "'Trying to Function in the Unfunctionable': Mothers and COVID-19" 2021 Journal of the Motherhood Initiative 7-24

O'Reilly A 21st Century Motherhood: Experience, Identity, Policy Agency (Columbia University Press New York 2010)

Padhan R and Prabeesh K "The Economics of COVID-19 Pandemic: A Survey" 2021 Economic and Policy Analysis 220-237 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eap.2021.02.012

Philip K "Inequality and Economic Marginalisation: How the Structure of the Economy Impacts on Opportunities on the Margins" 2014 LDD 1-28

Pokrhel S and Chhetri R "A Literature Review on Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Teaching and Learning" 2021 Higher Education for the Future 133-141 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/2347631120983481

Ranchhod V and Daniels R "Labour Market Dynamics in South Africa at the Onset of the Covid-19 Pandemic" 2021 South African Journal of Economics 44-62 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/saje.12283

Rich A Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution (WW Norton New York 1976)

Roberts D "Racism and Patriarchy in the Meaning of Motherhood" 1992 Am U J Gender Soc Pol'y & L 1-38

Sibanda S "Not Purpose-made! Transformative Constitutionalism, Post-Independence Constitutionalism and the Struggle to Eradicate Poverty" 2011 Stell LR 482-500

Smart C "Law's Power, the Sexed Body, and Feminist Discourse" 1990 Journal of Law and Society 194-200 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/1410085

Stevens C "The Body of the Mother in Contemporary Black Women Narratives (Re)Writing Immanence Towards Transcendence" 2015 IIha do Desterro: A Journal of English Language Literatures in English and Cultural Studies 93-101 DOI: https://doi.org/10.5007/2175-8026.2015v68n2p93

Sujee Z "The Need for Feminist Approaches for Housing Cases in South Africa" 2021 PELJ 1-26 DOI: https://doi.org/10.17159/1727-3781/2021/v24i0a9590

Swart S '''Motherhood and Otherhood' - Gendered Citizenship and Afrikaner Women in the South African 1914 Rebellion" 2007 African Historical Review 41-57 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17532520701786160

Tamale S "Researching and Theorizing Sexualities in Africa" in Corrêa S, De La Dehesa R and Parker R (eds) Sexuality and Politics: Regional Dialogues from the Global South (Sexuality Policy Watch Rio de Janeiro 2014) 16-62

Terreblanche S A History of Inequality in South Africa 1652-2002 (Juta Cape Town 2003)

Thusi I "Policing Sex: The Colonial, Apartheid, and New Democracy Policing of Sex Work in South Africa" 2015 Fordham Int'l LJ 205-243

Walker C "Conceptualising Motherhood in Twentieth Century South Africa" 1995 JSAS 417-437 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03057079508708455

Wing A "Brief Reflections Toward a Multiplicative Theory and Praxis of Being" 1990 Berkeley Women's LJ 181-201

Case law

Government of South Africa v Grootboom 2001 1 SA 46 (CC)

City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality v Blue Moonlight Properties 39 (Pty) Limited 2012 2 SA 104 (CC)

Dladla v City of Johannesburg 2018 2 SA 327 (CC)

Hugo v President of the Republic of South Africa 1997 4 SA 1 (CC)

Khosa v Minister of Social Development; Mahlaule v Minister of Social Development 2004 6 SA 505 (CC)

Minister of Health v Treatment Action Campaign (No 1) 2002 5 SA 703 (CC)

Legislation

Contagious Diseases Act, 1864

Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996

Native Trust and Land Act 18 of 1936

Natives Land Act 27 of 1913

Social Assistance Act 59 of 1992

Internet sources

Köhler T and Bhorat H 2020 Covid-19, Social Protection, and the Labour Market in South Africa: Are Social Grants Being Targeted at the Most Vulnerable? http://www.dpru.uct.ac.za/sites/default/files/image_tool/images/36/Publications/Working_Papers/DPRU%20WP%20202008.pdf accessed 21 September 2022

Rosenbury L 2018 Postmodern Feminist Legal Theory: A Contingent, Contextual Account https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id DOI: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781786439697.00015

=2834664 accessed 21 September 2022 DOI: https://doi.org/10.32964/TJ21.9

Roxbury Latin School 2020 Dr Zine Magubane, Smith Scholar, on Race and Gender https://www.roxburylatin.org/2020/04/29/dr-zine-magubane-smith-scholar-on-race-and-gender/ accessed 31 June 2021

Statistics South Africa Date Unknown Poverty and Inequality http://www.statssa.gov.za/?cat=22 accessed 21 September 2022

Wills G et al 2020 Household Resource Flows and Food Poverty During South Africa's Lockdown: Short-term Policy Implications for Three Channels of Social Protection https://cramsurvey.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Wills-household-resource-flows-and-food-poverty-during-South-Africa%E2%80%99s-lockdown-2.pdf accessed 21 September 2022

Published

23-03-2023

Issue

Section

Articles

How to Cite

Nyawo, P. (2023). Law, South African Mothers Living in Poverty and the COVID-19 Pandemic. Potchefstroom Electronic Law Journal, 26, (Published on 23 March 2023) pp 1 - 27. https://doi.org/10.17159/1727-3781/2023/v26i0a13146

Similar Articles

1-10 of 1157

You may also start an advanced similarity search for this article.