Interrogating the exclusion(s) of black women from rape law reform processes in post-apartheid South Africa

Abstract

The thesis investigates and analyses the ways in which Black women have been objectively and subjectively excluded from rape law reform processes in post-apartheid South Africa. Exclusion is herein understood to encompass: a) absence or being literally left out from the processes and not being able to access the benefits entailed; b) the experience of being marginalised, undermined or overlooked within the processes; c) choosing to abstain or opt out of the processes. The two broad processes involved in rape law reform are law making or input processes and the implementation or output processes. The thesis focuses on the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences and Related Matters) Amendment Act No.32 of 2007 as the first post-apartheid statute to focus specifically on rape and sexual assault. Using a decolonial feminist lens and a qualitative research design to understand the problem of exclusion that emerges mainly from in-depth interviews with Black women expert-activists, as well as from primary and secondary literature, the thesis proposes three dimensions of exclusion: (i) ontological-cultural; (ii) epistemic-educational; and (iii) economic-spatial. The study’s central finding is that across the above-mentioned layers and dimensions of exclusion, Black women have experienced exclusion on the combined bases of race, culture, sex-gender and class. Black women’s exclusion is a microcosm for understanding the shortcomings in South Africa’s democratisation as well as its cultural, economic and epistemic transformation.