Kudakwashe Vanyoro

University of the Witwatersrand | wits · Department of Anthropology

The Global Compact for Migration and the Global Compact on Refugees are based on binding international law instruments whose provisions they complement with “best practice” standards related to the treatment of refugees and other migrants. Although the Compacts are non-binding, they provide for review mechanisms to promote compliance with Compact s...

We are honoured to present this special issue of the Refugee Survey Quarterly on the contemporary role of the global refugee regime in Africa. The five articles offer diverse and distinctive perspectives on the impact of the global regime on the lives of forced migrants on the African continent. We are particularly thrilled to have collaborated wit...

This article’s purpose is to analyse the political work of binaries used in both domestic and global migration governance responses with a particular focus on Zimbabwean “survival migration” at the Zimbabwe–South Africa border. This article finds that there is peculiar complementarity between South Africa’s domestic migration governance framework a...

This article explores how temporal disruptions at international borders shape immobile bodies’ experiences and modes of waiting by focusing on irregular Zimbabwean migrant men at the Zimbabwe-South Africa border who have arrived in South Africa but are restricted in moving further into the interior. It argues that waiting is a component of both gov...

It has become “common sense” to assert that access to public health care services for foreign migrants is de facto exclusionary. Conceptual tools for assessing these experiences are relatively absent and limited to “medical xenophobia.” This article deploys suspicion as a heuristic to explore the practices that health care providers in South Africa...

Why do European delegates presume there can be quick (humanitarian) fixes to counter migration from Africa to Europe—by addressing the “root causes” of migration and displacement— without necessarily addressing the systemic causes of oppression? Why has no one taken responsibility for the deaths and disappearance of migrants in detention and at sea...

This article explores tensions in the ways in which non-governmental activism, as represented by trade unions and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), frames the concerns of migrant domestic workers (MDWs) living in South Africa. It analyses how seemingly polarised trade unions and NGOs involved in struggles on behalf of MDWs adopt singular disco...

This paper brings together insights from scholarship on time, migration and critical border studies to propose a research thematic framework for a temporal approach on African migration. Through a case study of Zimbabwe-South Africa migration, it builds on previous studies of time, migration and borders to demonstrate how a temporalised approach to...

Relying on the experiences of migrant patients, research on migration and health in South Africa has documented a particular concern with public health care providers as indiscriminately practicing ‘medical xenophobia’. This article argues that there is more complexity, ambivalence, and a range of possible experiences of non-nationals in South Afri...

Health policy and systems researchers (HPSRs) in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) aim to influence health systems planning, costing, policy and implementation. Yet, there is still much that we do not know about the types of health systems evidence that are most compelling and impactful to policymakers and community groups, the factors...

This article unpacks notions of humour, vulgarity, and allegory in social media discourses during the trial of Oscar Pistorius by analysing the dynamic interactions between South Africa’s judicial system and multiple discourses on Facebook and Twitter. It explores whether social media, in this instance, provided a platform for citizen-led conversat...

The migration of migrant domestic workers, who are mainly female, from Zimbabwe to South Africa is shaped by a number of agents and processes, even though the women exercise substantial individualism and agency in their migration decisions. It is influenced by generational, gendered and economic circumstances, as well as by intermediaries who facil...

This policy brief outlines the key findings of a Migrating out of Poverty migration industry study and the complexities these suggest for advocacy and policy. It makes recommendations for the Department of Labour and Department of Home Affairs to consider in the development of their upcoming Labour Migration Draft Policy Framework. It also makes re...

Very little is known about activism, as it relates to the issue of migration in South Africa. Yet, migration policy and migration governance are increasingly becoming important to states like South Africa, which, 22 years into democracy, finds itself being home to the second highest number of migrants in Africa. This paper fills this gap by explori...

There is a longstanding 'mobilisation structure' for domestic workers which begins from the view that African women in South Africa are oppressed in three ways: oppressed as blacks, oppressed as women, and oppressed as workers. However, women do not constitute a homogenous category politically or otherwise and do not necessarily share or perceive '...

Recurring xenophobic attacks on perceived foreign immigrants stand out as one of the major setbacks on South Africa's envisaged 'rainbow' nation discourse. These attacks remain a topical issue in, academic, media, social, economic and political circles. While a significant body of literature explores the coverage of migration and xenophobia issues...

This brief explores the research uptake and advocacy experiences of researchers and activists working on three unpopular and politically contentious causes; immigration, human trafficking and sex work in South Africa.

Research can generate evidence that can make a vital difference if utilised in decisionmaking, and policy or civil society practice. However, despite a considerable amount of optimism about research uptake in the Global South, little is known about the interface between research and policy in these settings. While campaigns or resistance on populis...

This paper draws on Pécoud’s international migration narratives (IMN) as an analytical framework to examine the Global Forum on Migration and Development’s Civil Society Days (GFMD-CSD). We analyse the narratives both produced and challenged at the GFMD-CSD, suggesting that while the GFMD-CSD poses a gentle challenge to existing IMN, it falls short...

South Africa is generally regarded as a ‘rainbow’ nation due to a number of different races residing in the country. However, forging a common South African national identity has remained elusive (Alegi, 2010; Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2011) as the country can best be understood as a developing idea (Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2011). Of late, xenophobic attacks conti...