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Going underground in South African platinum mines to explore women miners’ experiences
Abstract
Women have worked underground in South African mines since 2003. Their inclusion has been lauded by some as a step in the right direction – that is, towards gender equality in employment, as well as challenging gender stereotypes about work and women’s abilities. This dominant narrative, however, fails to acknowledge and address the challenges faced by women in mining. Using participant observation, living and working alongside women miners over the course of a year, I explored these challenges, and analysed their implications. I argue that if the mining sector wants to fully include women in mining, it needs to go beyond using quotas to achieve gender parity in numbers of women and men workers. While access to these jobs is important, retention depends on addressing the masculine culture which is deeply embedded in mining, making this a very challenging environment for women workers.
... In the last decade, global mining booms have driven increased attention in both popular media and academic research circles to the challenges facing women miners in a masculinedominated culture (Benya, 2017;Jenkins, 2014;MacPherson, 2017a;Minerals Council of Australia, 2009;Nyabeze, Espley, S., & Beneteau, 2010). This emerging body of gendered mining research originated in Australia where the commodity cycle started its last mining boom in the early 2000s, well ahead of the most recent mining boom that started in Saskatchewan around 2010 (Brier, 2012;Phillips, 2016). ...
... Botha (2016; in times of downturn women may be more susceptible to losing their employment in mining, due to their relatively lower status and seniority within their organizations (Hughes, 2012;Nyabeze et al., 2010). The predominant message from the literature is that a cultural shift is required to attract and retain women in mining (Benya, 2017;Botha, 2016;Hughes, 2012;Lahiri-Dutt, 2015;Mayes & Pini, 2014;Mining Industry Human Resources, 2016). This required cultural shift can be thought of as inclusion, or the acceptance and celebration of differences within an organization. ...
In response to societal pressures and a looming labour shortage, the Canadian mining industry has recently embarked on a journey to welcome gender diversity and inclusion in its male-dominated workforce. The purpose of this two-phase, transformative mixed-methods study was to understand how Canadian mining companies are working to close the gender gap in the industry. In the first phase of the study, a qualitative, rhetorical criticism-based methodology was used to analyze over 75 public documents from ten companies involved in Canadian mining, which represent approximately half of the Canadian mining sector employees (Mining Industry Human Resources, 2017). Rhetorical analysis applied theoretical approaches drawn from cluster, fantasy-theme, generative, and generic criticism (Foss, 2004); continuum analysis (Brummett, 2011); and consideration of the construction of a Second Persona (Black, 1970). Findings from the top-down analysis indicate that some individual mining companies are employing targeted strategies but ultimately companies are at different positions on their journey to create an industry that is reflective of the communities in which they operate.
The bottom-up approach of the second phase, informed by the first phase outcomes, involved an anonymous online survey that was intended to capture perceptions and experiences of current and former workers in the Canadian mining industry. 540respondents completed the survey and responses were analyzed using statistical and rhetorical methods to distinguish differences and similarities. The respondents identified as men (n = 318) and women (n = 220) , and current (n = 459) and former (n = 81) mining workers. Second phase results showed a divide between the primarily positive messaging coming from the top of organizations and the needs of employees. Findings included a lack of open communication, a disconnect to the personal benefits of gender equity strategies, and flaws in the current discrimination and harassment reporting systems.
The industry still has a long way to go to achieve gender equity; however, early signs of culture change are evident, and the goals of inclusion and diversity in the workforce have the potential to be achieved with a multi-fronted communication strategy that encourages shifting mindsets and behaviours.
... Debido a factores asociados a la naturaleza del trabajo minero, principalmente en el socavón; el trabajo minero ha sido tipificado como intrínsecamente masculino (Benya, 2017). Además, los sesgos y prejuicios tradicionales en el sector minero han concebido la presencia de mujeres en las minas como antinatural. ...
... Mining workplaces adopt targets, but chasms between the policy of targets and the reality of women's experiences remain, as does sex-based discrimination (Rolston, 2014). In an exploration of women mineworkers' experiences in South Africa, Benya (2017) shows that although a 2004 Mining Charter introduced a target of 10% women employees, "the assumptions held by workers, the daily practices, and the policies and discourses around mining, are all shaped by male norms" (p. 513). ...
Since the year 2000, an unprecedented commodity boom has been accompanied by intense scholarly attention on the various challenges involving women and gender in extractive industries. However, instead of being a marginal “add-on” area, gender issues are now at the forefront of research mining, and the volume of research has turned the thematic area into a field in its own right. Taking 2006 as the milestone year, this paper reviews the emerging directions in literature on women and gender in both large, industrial-scale mining and informal, artisanal and small-scale mining to draw out the main research threads. It concludes with a discussion of anticipated areas of future research and the theoretical frameworks it might rely upon.
The role of women as mineworkers and as household workers has been erased. Here, we challenge the masculinity associated with the mines, taking a longer-term and a global labour history perspective. We foreground the importance of women as mineworkers in different parts of the world since the early modern period and analyse the changes introduced in coal mining in the nineteenth and early twentieth century, the masculinization and mechanization, and the growing importance of * This thematic issue is based on the two sessions on "Women
The underground—for decades the invisible ‘other’ of landscape and terrain in geography—has emerged in political ecology literature as the source of ‘stuff’, or material things, resources and commodities that are not deemed intrinsically valuable until extracted. As a corrective, this paper offers a feminist political ecology perspective that brings subaltern women’s voices to the forefront, and argues that the underground is co-constituted as a gendered space by gendered humans. As evidence, I take the readers on a journey into the belly of a coalmine where humans labour, and bring out women’s voices that narrate their experiences and imaginations to create the underground as a space teeming with social life. These alternative and gendered narratives reinstate the diverse, complex, and secret lives of this netherworld, draw attention to the politics of imagining space, and potentially shift geographers’ focus to interpreting the underground as a gendered social space.
With Murdoch University’s commitment to quality research and teaching in public policy at both national and international levels, the Commission and its reports are exercises in applied public policy informed by rigorous scholarly research and analytical thinking.
'The Third Murdoch Commission: Inclusive Transactions on the Continent of Africa' is a peer-reviewed Research Report commissioned and published by Murdoch University in 2021, under the leadership of Mr David Doepel and Mr Maximillian Jarrett.
Chapter 2: The Blue Economy in Africa, contains section (3) 'Fulfilling the Promise of Aquaculture in Africa' which was led by Dr Ben Roennfeldt. The section focuses on methods for improving the sustainable production and use of seafood produced by artisanal aquaculture farming, to improve the livelihoods of Africa's growing population.
From its beginnings, the sociology of work in South Africa has been preoccupied with three enduring themes: skill/deskilling, racism in the workplace, and Fordism/racial Fordism. With the advent of democracy in the 1990s there was a shift away from studying the labour process. We argue in this article that there has been a return to taking seriously the ways new forms of work in this postcolonial context pose new questions to the global study of work. A central preoccupation in the study of work has been the racialised reinscription of post-apartheid workplace orders, now in the context of new dynamics of externalisation and casualisation of employment. Another important theme is the shift away from studies of the formal sector workplace and toward the broader implications of the precarianisation and informalisation of labour. This focus coincided with the growth of new social movements by mostly unemployed (black) township residents around state services provision. This includes studies on working-class politics more broadly, with attention focusing on questions of organising and mobilising. More recently this interest in precarious labour has grown into studies of the gig economy, returning to earlier themes of technology and skill, as well as new forms of waged labour and wagelessness. We argue for the ongoing salience of labour process studies for understanding the specific issues of the securing and obscuring of value, and through the articulations of ‘racial capitalism’ offered by the long tradition of labour studies in South Africa.
The role of women as mineworkers and as household workers has been erased. Here, we challenge the masculinity associated with the mines, taking a longer-term and a global labour history perspective. We foreground the importance of women as mineworkers in different parts of the world since the early modern period and analyse the changes introduced in coal mining in the nineteenth and early twentieth century, the masculinization and mechanization, and the growing importance of women in contemporary artisanal and small-scale mining. The effect of protective laws and the exclusion of women from underground tasks was to restrict women's work more to the household, which played a pivotal role in mining communities but is insufficiently recognized. This process of “de-labourization” of women's work was closely connected with the distinction between productive and unproductive labour. This introductory article therefore centres on the important work carried out in the household by women and children. Finally, we present the three articles in this Special Theme and discuss how each of them is in dialogue with the topics addressed here. Many thanks also to Marie-José Spreeuwenberg for her invaluable engagement.
Dans le présent article, l’auteure soutient que l’approche fondée sur les droits, telle qu’appliquée dans le contexte minier, s’appuie sur une interprétation limitée du concept des femmes. Les femmes sont généralement pensées comme étant en dehors du secteur minier et comme des victimes de l’oppression patriarcale. Une vision aussi incomplète du genre va à l’encontre d’une perspective féministe qui est nécessairement holistique, tout comme elle est éclectique dans son traitement des problématiques touchant les femmes. Pour justifier cet argument, l’auteure discute des résultats de recherches-actions menées dans des mines de charbon en Indonésie et en Inde orientale. Elle démontre comment l’approche fondée sur les droits, lorsqu’elle s’appuie sur une conception incomplète du genre, aliène la figure de la femme qui, bien que travaillant comme citoyenne économique à l’intérieur du secteur minier, généralement tout au bas de l’échelle, n’en est pas moins asservie.
This essay examines the connection between violence and masculinity that leads men to appoint themselves the protectors of racialized communities and that constitutes its own interracial brotherhood linking lawbreakers and law enforcers. Feminists are familiar with the concept of "gender violence," but this term is usually used to denote violence by men against women. Yet exploration of the violence in the criminal justice system begins to reveal the extent to which masculine identity is shaped by relations of repulsion and desire between men. Indeed, this community of violence extends to state actors within the criminal justice system, most notably the police. Disrupting the cycle of gender violence both inside and outside the state is a race issue and a gender issue, as well as a criminal justice issue.
Contrapower sexual harassment occurs when the target of harassment possesses greater formal organizational power than the perpetrator. Traditional conceptualizations of power underlying sexual harassment have either focused on location within organizational hierarchies or sociocultural status differences between men and women. We suggest the utility of simultaneously considering the influence of gender, race, and class on power dynamics at organizational, sociocultural, and interpersonal or individual levels. Using qualitative data obtained from 8 focus groups, 20 interviews, and 1 in-depth case study, we examine how gender, race, and class influence varied sources of power available to perpetrators and targets in workplace contrapower situations. We argue that the exploration of the dynamics involved in contrapower sexual harassment can illuminate broader processes of doing gender and power in the workplace.
Women's experiences with sexual harassment were analyzed with three types of variables: occupational and workplace sex ratios, organizational policies and procedures for dealing with sexual harassment problems, and women's cultural status (age and marital status). Regression analyses revealed that extent of contact with men was a key predictor of incidence of harassment, number of different types of harrassment, sexual comments, sexual categorical remarks, and sexual materials. Gender predominance was a significant predictor of physical threats and sexual materials. Informational methods were less successful than proactive methods in reducing incidents of sexual harassment. The analyses support two generalizations. The “contact hypothesis” tested and verified by Gutek and her colleagues provides a substantive understanding of our findings on workplace and occupational numerical predominance. Second, organizations that take a variety of steps to address sexual harassment are more apt to be successful in curtailing the problem than those relying mainly on “get out the word” techniques. Peer Reviewed http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/68224/2/10.1177_0891243298012003004.pdf
In the last three years the migrant labor hostels of South Africa, particularly those in the Transvaal, have gained international notoriety as theaters of violence. For many years they were hidden from public view and neglected by the white authorities. Now, it seems, hostel dwellers may have chosen physical violence to draw attention to the structural violence of their appalling conditions of life. Yet we should not lose sight of the fact that the majority of hostel dwellers are peace-loving people who have over the years developed creative strategies to cope with their impoverished and degrading environment. In this challenging study, Dr. Mamphela Ramphele documents the life of the hostel dwellers of Cape Town, for whom a bed is literally a home for both themselves and their families. Elaborating the concept of space in its many dimensions-not just physical, but political, ideological, social, and economic as well-she emphasizes the constraints exerted on hostel dwellers by the limited spaces they inhabit. At the same time, she argues that within these constraints people have managed to find room for manoeuvre, and in her book explores the emancipatory possibilities of their environment. The text is illustrated with a number of black-and-white photographs taken by Roger Meintjes in the townships and hostels.
In the history of the modern industrial world the Witwatersrand stands out in four key respects. First, the size of the workforce which grew from around 200,000 men in 1910 to over 400,000 in 1940; second, the longevity of an industry that has continued almost uninterrupted for well over a century; third its geographical concentration; and fourth, its exclusively male demographic character. All four of these features suggest that we need to pay very close attention to an important question: What kinds of masculinities, to use Connell's term, were forged on the South African gold mines? A succinct answer does spring to mind. The gold mines fashioned explicitly racial masculinities and an intensely monitored legal, economic and geographical boundary between them. Between 1900 and 1950 and probably for some time thereafter, the definitive encounter between white and black men in South Africa was underground on the gold mines. The evidence that we have on the relationship suggests that it was characterised by high levels of personal violence. This article explores worker relationships, and argues that the reason that violence was so common on the mines was that both black and white men celebrated the capacity for personal violence as a key element of masculinity.
This article examines the use of gender in constitutions and its significance for gender equality. New democracies, and some older ones, are increasingly including gender provisions in their constitutions. What is the impact of these provisions on women's political and economic status? Does constitutionalizing gender serve to empower women? If so, what kinds of provisions have an empowering effect and under what conditions? To address these questions, we trace the political use (legislation, policy, and judicial interpretation) of gendered constitutional provisions in Botswana and South Africa, countries that differ substantially with respect to how they have “constitutionalized” gender. The case studies demonstrate how constitutional provisions provide a legal basis and legitimacy for women's rights advocacy and how they influence the content of legislation and judicial review of laws and policies.
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