Let’s Talk Land
In May 2018, the Common Ground Rondebosch AM congregation hosted an insights evening on the topic of land. They invited in a range of speakers to guide, inform and spark discussion. These four videos capture the heart of the evening and will help you grapple with land and what can be done for the future of South Africa.
Intro to the conversation
Dr Sharlene Swartz
Dr Swartz sets the scene for the conversation about restitution, drawing information from her book, Another Country. Watch to see how the topic of land is tied up with inequalities and restitution. She proposes something called “Everyday social restitution” as part of responding to these complex issues.
Dr Sharlene Swartz is a research director at the Human Sciences Research Council in South Africa, an adjunct Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Cape Town, and an occasional visiting fellow at Harvard University and the University of Cambridge. Her expertise centres on youth development and social justice for young people in adversity, and on restitution and redress in the South African context and elsewhere.
Justine Burns Interviews Professor Ruth Hall from PLAAS
Professor Ruth Hall is a professor at the University of the Western Cape at PLAAS (Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian studies) which she joined in 2002. A political scientist by training, she specialises in the politics and the political economy of agrarian reform, land redistribution, and poverty. In this video, she covers some of the historical progress since 1994, the political dynamics in the conversation about expropriation without compensation, examples of various countries and the role of the church.
Q&A with Dr Sharlene Swartz, Prof Ruth Hall and Brian Koela
Questions posed by the audience, engaging a range of personal, practical and thorny topics. Brian Koela is a seasoned pastor in South Africa and cross-cultural ministry and works with various church leaders with The Warehouse.
Land restitution – how can we respond? Dr Sharlene Swartz
Dr Swartz proposes a list of practical things that you can be doing in the sphere of land restitution. Rather than waiting for the courts to ‘sort things out’, what can individual Christ-followers do in this sphere? She breaks it into two categories: hard to do, and very hard to do.
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