The need for housing developments in South Africa has grown significantly over that last
12 years. On the one end of the scale there is the desperate need for housing by the
homeless and on the other end there is substantial growth of the middleclass indicating
better buying power and the explosion of the property market that made investment in
housing very attractive. Examples of these two parallel levels of housing are the
Sipumulele low cost housing development that is situated in the eThekwini Municipality
and was developed by government. On the other side of the scale is the upmarket
Koelwaters residential development situated on the South Coast of KwaZulu Natal in the
Hibiscus Municipality and was developed by a private developer. In conjunction with this
demand for housing there is also international pressure to comply with sustainable
develop guidelines and approaches.
Both these developments are situated on ecological sensitive land. As legal
requirements both these developments were required to do scoping reports to assess
their environmental impacts. In South African, Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA)
for various new developments has been formally required in terms of Legislation for the
last 8 years, although the legislation has been in place for the last 16 years. Is this
legislation assisting in securing more sustainable development? It is agued that
sustainable development should be founded on ecological justice principles. This
research explores the concept of ecological justice and how it is linked with sustainable
development. It identifies ecological justice principles that should be used in the
compilation and assessment of EIAs.
The field research explored how decision makers in practise are using the current
legislation and if they are at all considering ecological justice in their decision making.
This is done though a serious of interviews with the critical decision makers with regard
to EIA's and key role players in the development process of specifically the two above
mentioned housing projects. During the interviews qualitative questions were asked
relating to the developments, the EIA process and ecological justice. There was a focus
on interpreting the awareness of decision makers regarding development and layout and
on improving developments to determine to what level they follow ecological justice
principles. In the broader sense this research is contributing to the understanding of
ecological justice and the clarifications of ecological justice principles. It also contributes
to understanding the South African housing development context and the movement of
South African Developments towards sustainability. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2006
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:ukzn/oai:http://researchspace.ukzn.ac.za:10413/10796 |
| Date | 30 May 2014 |
| Creators | Chamberlain, Linda. |
| Contributors | Oelofse, Catherine. |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | en_ZA |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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