Thesis (PhD)--Stellenbosch University, 1981. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: No abstract available / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Geen opsomming beskikbaar

Poverty, unemployment and inequality constitute the three main challenges to the attainment of universal socio-economic development within the Republic of South Africa. The government is the Republic of South Africa is grappling to alleviate and eradicate poverty since the dawn of freedom in April 1994. Further, poverty and inequality is historically racially biased due to the segregation which non-whites suffered during the pre-freedom era. The Eastern Cape Province has been regard as the poorest of all the nine provinces in South Africa. The war on poverty in the province has been intensified through the utilisation of social grants as social safety nets under an inclusive social security system. Despite of this poverty alleviation intervention, the prevalence rates of poverty the province remains alarmingly high.

Masters in Public Administration - MPA / Social welfare services are essential for development of human capital and eradication of poverty in South Africa generally. Social welfare plays a pivotal role in enabling the impoverished and vulnerable communities and households to lead their lives through provision of care, social relief, stability and human resource development. Non-Governmental Organisations form an integral part of the welfare system through their formal and informal welfare and residential and non-residential welfare services. The role of the NGOs becomes imperative precisely because of their inherent empathy and proximity to the communities they serve. Government itself has been engaged in the process of transformation and the same challenges of transformation, governance, and effectiveness still profound the NGO sector. Notwithstanding the contribution of the NGOs in the welfare system, it is crucial to scrutinise the nature of their work and the rate of transformation to flourish in the democratic dispensation. To enhance the process of transformation in the NGO sector, government passed a plethora of policies and legislative requirements, inter alia, White Paper for Social Welfare 1997, Non-Profit Organisations Act of 1997. The intent of this research therefore, was to establish the significance of transformation and inherent issues of governance, effectiveness and efficiency in service delivery and sustainability of the nature of social welfare services rendered by the NGO sector in the Western Cape, particularly the Worcester district. / South Africa

This thesis examines the processes of policymaking in South Africa, as expressed through the shifts in income maintenance policy. The thesis focuses on the processes leading to the establishment of the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA), as its case study. SASSA is the institutional framework for the delivery of social grants. Our intention is to test the efficacy of what we have called ‘state learning’ in the South African context. Therefore, the overall aim of the study is to assess the capacity of the ‘state to learn’ in the process of policymaking as expressed through the shifts in social grant administration and the institutional framework of social welfare in South Africa. The subsidiary goals of the research includes mapping changes in the system of social grants administration since 1994 in order to assess the sources of the shifts in its institutional framework; to assess processes and responses within the state that result in policy shifts and the extent to which these can be considered dimensions of state learning; to assess the power of ideas in the policymaking process and to assess the influence of non-state agencies/actors in policy contestation and learning processes. This is essential, because social policy, especially welfare policy research in post-apartheid South Africa, has focused on the economic value of policies and not the political processes in policymaking. For the framework of analysis the study draws on theories of learning, especially at the organizational or institutional level. We start from the perspective that policymaking and implementation cannot be reduced to a neatly ordered schema (Lamb: 1987:6). Further, that policy change and policymaking are “iterative, haphazard, and highly political processes, in which the apparently logical sequences of decision-making, may turn out to be the reverse” (Lamb, 1987:6). This is mainly because state building is a complex affair and a contested terrain; policy learning and making are neither benign nor do they involve the state working in isolation (Sabatier, 1998). To understand processes of policymaking in South Africa, we rely on content analysis of primary and secondary materials or documents and in-depth interviews with key informants involved in the policy process. The documentary sources include records of parliamentary debates, green and white papers on social welfare, ANC party documents, presidential task force reports, newspapers, magazines and court judgments. The study reveals that the establishment of SASSA lends itself to the idea of ‘state learning’. Learning is indicated in South Africa by the capacity and ability of the state to stimulate ideas, debate ideas to establish ideational matrixes as well as paradigms that have informed the development of policy, take ideas and implement them to try and solve mismatches between the intention of the state and the outcomes and the ability of the state to produce policy.

This study seeks to investigate the efficiency and effectiveness of the process for providing government social grants to people with disabilities in the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) Amathole District Municipality in order to determine the need for any improvement measures. Taylor’s scientific management theory and the Total Quality Management (TQM) concept were used to interpret efficiency in the functional activities of the officials working in the Disability Grant Unit in Amathole District. The study also sought to answer the question of whether exit programmes existed that were designed to assist the beneficiaries to support them and cater for their needs related to their disabilities. The study followed a qualitative method. Face-to-face interviews were conducted and the sample of this study consisted of ten participants who are working at Grant Administration. These participants included one General Manager; one District Manager; one SASSA doctor; one Head of Grants Administration in the district and six officials who are at lower levels of the hierarchy at Amathole District Municipality in East London service office. Thematic analysis was used to identify themes from the interviews. The findings of this study revealed that the majority of the respondents experienced challenges such as lack of assessment doctors, turn around-time, corruption, poor consultation, lack of managerial commitment and doctors regarding the assessment of applications. In this regards, the study made a set of recommendations on the measures and strategies that could improve efficiency in the provision of this service.

LLM / Department of Mercantile Law / Scholarship on the subject of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) highlights its four components: economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic responsibility. In South Africa, while the economic, legal and ethical components of CSR are regulated and attract punitive measures for erring corporations who fail to adhere to such demands, the application of the philanthropic aspect of CSR is problematic. The application of philanthropic responsibility suffers normative, institutional and accountability deficiencies in South Africa. Hence, corporations do not conscientiously direct philanthropic responsibility towards achieving core socio-economic needs of their host communities. In the light of international human rights standards relevant to CSR, this research attempts to examine domestic laws which regulate the practice of CSR in South Africa and advance how the philanthropic aspect of CSR can be developed to achieve the realisation of socio-economic rights, in particular, the rights to access to health care, water and social security, education, housing and clean environment. The argument is made that through the formulation and application of an appropriate legal framework, philanthropic CSR can play a contributory role to the realisation of socio-economic rights recognised under the 1996 South African constitution. The implications are that in appropriate cases socio-economic rights do not only bind the state and consequently apply to the "vertical" relationship between individuals and the state, but could also apply "horizontally", in respect of the relationship between private entities. This is a controversial issue and its full implications have not yet been resolved.

This thesis focuses on the Afrikaans Christian Women's Organisation (ACVV), placed within the context of Afrikaner nationalist activity, and traces the variety of ways in which white, Afrikaans, middle-class women sought to construct a racially exclusive 'Afrikaner' people. Stereotypical portrayals of Afrikaner women as passive followers of an ideology constructed by men are challenged. The gendered construction of nationalism is initially examined by tracing the transition from a religious, evangelical, late nineteenth century gender discourse to an increasingly explicit Afrikaner nationalist discourse in the early twentieth century. The ACVV participated in the construction of a popular Afrikaner nationalist culture that portrayed Afrikaans women as mothers of the people or volksmoeders. The first ACVV leaders were acutely aware of the 'New Women' who abandoned conventional notions of femininity - they tried to construct a public, political identity for Afrikaans women that met the challenges of the 'modern' world, yet remained true to Afrikaner 'tradition'. The ACVV sought to fashion Afrikaans whites into 'Afrikaners' through philanthropic activity. At first, this was especially true of rural branches, but from the early 1920s, Cape Town's ACVV also responded to the growing influx of 'poor whites' by focusing specifically on social welfare work. One particular concern was the danger that women working together with blacks posed for the volk. Research on the ACVV's philanthropy is complemented by a study of the lives of landless and impoverished whites in the Cape countryside and Cape Town. Archival material and 'life history' interviews are used to explore the working lives of white, Afrikaans-speaking women who moved from rural areas to Cape Town during the 1920s and 1930s. Complex and contradictory strands made up the private and political lives of female Afrikaner nationalists. During the 1920s, they sought to create a political role for themselves by constructing a 'maternalist', nationalist discourse that articulated the notion of separate spheres for men and women -but extended vrouesake (women's issues). In many ways these were conservative women - yet they adjusted, even challenged, conventional gender roles in Afrikaans communities. In the 1930s, the four provincial Afrikaans women's welfare organisations sought to shape state-subsidised social welfare programmes. The ACVV and its sister organisations had increasingly fraught dealings with Afrikaner nationalist men in the state and church. who did not share the women's vision of female leadership in social welfare policy.

Thesis (Ph. D. (Social Work)) -- University of Limpopo, 2021 / Refer to the document / National Research Foundation (NRF) and National Research Foundation - Centre in Indigenous Knowledge Systems (NRF- CIKS)

Thesis (MPA.) -- University of Limpopo, 2019 / The aim of this study was to investigate the working conditions of social workers at Makhado Municipality in Limpopo Province by focusing on the provision of resources, supervision and caseload. The qualitative research approach was used face-to-face, semi-structured interviews were utilised as a data collecting method from participants. Purposive sampling was used as a sub-type of non-probability sampling. The study was conducted at Makhado Municipality in Vhembe District in Limpopo Province. Data was collected from social workers working under Makhado Municipality and analysed through thematic analysis. It was found that social workers are not provided with adequate resources to render quality social work services, and that lack of availability of transport and office space is a serious challenge. It was further found that social workers are working without enabling trade tools such as computers, printers, photocopying machines, fax machines and cell-phones. It was further found that social workers are not getting quality supervision, and supervisors are not taking supervision as seriously as it shall be. Moreover, it was found that social workers have high caseloads, which is negatively affecting service delivery. The study recommends that the Department of Social Development prioritise the provision of trade tools such as transport, computers, cell-phones, printers, photocopy machines and stationery. The study further recommends that the Department of Social Development employ more supervisors, social auxiliary workers and social workers to reduce high caseloads. Moreover, the study recommends that the Department of Social Development increase the infrastructure budget and ensure that it builds more offices for social workers.

The release of ex-president Nelson Mandela on 10 February 1990, introduced transformation in South Africa. The road to transformation, in a post apartheid era, placed pressure and demands on the social work profession and the professionals. Change was inevitable (Lesnik 1997:164) while the inequities and the disparities of the past had to be eliminated and replaced with transformed services. This study explores the transformational challenges experienced in contemporary social work practice at The Department of Social Development, Johannesburg, South Africa. A non-probability sample was selected (Babbie and Mouton 2004:166). A combination of the qualitative and the quantitative approaches, with more emphasis on the quantitative approach was utilized. Questionnaires were used for data collection and analysis was done according to the framework as described by Tesch in De Vos et al., (1998:343). The transformational challenges were identified and guidelines are drafted to assist in addressing the identified challenges. / Social Work / M.Diac. (Social Work)