Student Number : 0407355G - MSc research report - School of Architecture and Planning - Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment / The re-admittance of South Africa into the community of nations brought opportunities and challenges. South Africa had to adapt and conform to the prevailing global economic architecture and adhere to neo-liberal principles prevailing at the time while at home it had to face a restructuring economy and worsening social conditions for a majority of its people: unemployment, housing and infrastructure backlogs. Policies and programmes where devised and adopted. The EPWP and local economic development programmes are just two of the many programmes meant to deal with unemployment, skills development, inequality and poverty. This report investigates the potential of the EPWP as a tool for local economic development by reviewing the theoretical underpinnings of public works and local economic development; and the intergovernmental relations and planning policies, processes, mechanisms, and institutional arrangements in place to enable the programmes’ implementation. Based on the investigation, findings and recommendations are made.

En el contexto de los sistemas de comunicación virtual, se trata de analizar desde la antropología política las nuevas lógicas de participación social y los mecanismos de apropiación de los recursos, contenidos y significados que circulan en las redes telemáticas. A través de un estudio de caso, se destaca cómo opera y se desenvuelve una protesta globalizada en torno de la producción de una telenovela sudamericana (La Tormenta), retransmitida por Internet. Se observa la capacidad de acción de los usuarios de un foro para convertir la Red en un medio de organización y crítica y para reaccionar de forma colectiva frente a poderes mediáticos. Esta práctica política consigue trascender del campo virtual al mundo real reclamando reconocimientos y derechos. Una sublevación en Red de consumidores de productos culturales que termina transformando los mecanismos convencionales de participación ciudadana, valiéndose para ello de la conexión de relaciones sociales y emocionales que les ofrecen las nuevas tecnologías de la información. / In the context of virtual communication systems, the new rationale of social participation and the mechanisms used for the appropriation of the resources, contents and meanings that are broadcast through telematic networks are analyzed here from a political anthropology viewpoint. A case study is used in this paper to highlight how a globalized protest is developed against the presentation of a South American soap opera, La Tormenta (The Storm), which was broadcast on the Internet. Users’ capacity for action to convert the Network into ameans of organization and critique and collectively react against the power of the media is analyzed here. This political action went beyond the virtual field to the real world, thus allowing the recognition of rights. This uprise in the network of consumers of cultural products has contributed to transform conventional mechanisms of citizen participation, using the social and emotional connections provided by the new information technologies.