The apartheid system between South Africa and Palestine

There are many comparisons between the apartheid regime in South Africa and settler colonialism in Palestine. Some of them went to “celebrate” the removal of the former, but American writer Andy Clarno, an assistant professor of sociology and people of color at the American University of Illinois, who spent more than a decade in the Johannesburg and Jerusalem area, has another opinion about it. We see him presenting in his book “Neoliberal Apartheid – Palestine / Israel and South Africa after 1994” (University of Chicago Publications – 2017) a detailed ethnographic study on the subjugation of the poor in the city of Alexandra, in southern Africa on the one hand, and the dynamics of colonialism and the siege in Bethlehem, on the other hand, as well as the growth of fortified suburbs and private security in Johannesburg, and the security coordination system between the Israeli army and the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.

He also addresses restrictions on liberation in South Africa, highlights the impact of neoliberal restructuring in Palestine, and argues that a new form of neoliberal apartheid has emerged in both contexts. Thus, he undermines the misconception that what he calls Israel / Palestine and South Africa took different paths in the 1990s, where the latter became a model of freedom and equality after the elimination of racism. Rather, it shows that the experiences and living standards of poor Palestinians and poor blacks in South Africa are precarious and prone to violence and marginalization.
In his book, Andy Clarino focuses on how racism, capitalism, colonialism and empire intersect in structuring keeping Palestinians and blacks alive in South Africa just between the dual pressures of settler colonialism and racial capitalism, and argues that the new form of “neoliberal apartheid” is characterized by extreme inequality and marginalization. Racism, advanced “securitization” and ongoing crises, depicting the ruling regimes in both post-apartheid South Africa and post-Oslo Palestine / Israel, with dire consequences for ordinary Palestinians and blacks in South Africa. The author drew his analyzes on a mixture of comparative historical sociology and comparative urban ethnography, and the author was involved in more than three years of archival and ethnographic research at both field sites, in addition to more than two hundred interviews.

Sheds light on the impact of neoliberal restructuring in Palestine

The writer organized his book according to two main themes that make up his theory of neoliberal apartheid: first, marginalization and inequality, and second, security and crisis. The author begins with an overview of the history of settler colonialism and ethnic capitalism in both places, with a special focus on the post-1990s neoliberal transition from the apartheid Fordist economy that occurred in Palestine / Israel and South Africa. . Then, in the second chapter “Alexandra: The vulnerability of the poor” and the third “Betlehem: Neoliberal colonization”, he moves to explore the processes of inequality and marginalization in South Africa and Palestine / Israel, and makes a comparison between employment in Alexandra, where South Africa’s marginalized blacks find themselves in A “Ghetto of Exclusion”, as the inhabitants of Bethlehem confront neoliberal attempts to contain the colonized population through siege. He explains that employing Palestinian manpower from stone cutters in some hills in central Palestine for use in building Israeli settlements is a constant humiliation that illustrates the practices of neoliberal colonialism. Second, his consideration of Chapter Four (Legitimate Mafia: Privatizing Security in Johannesburg) is corrected towards security practices, including the emergence of new private safety nets and racist policing strategies that support the unstable practices of neoliberal apartheid in both places. In South Africa, the wealthy neighborhoods of Supporton are hiring out to the SS to wage low-intensity guerrilla warfare against potential black intruders, while Chapter Five (Monopoly Violence ?: Security Coordination in the West Bank) discusses security practices Similar in Palestine / Israel with US imperial projects in the Middle East. Clarno sheds light on the daily life of low-paid workers who work in these security systems, however, they are attracted to the population targeted by these security practices. The contradictory experiences of these black men in South Africa and the Palestinian security forces reveal all the tensions and instability in the capital colonial and ethnic settlement projects and deserve a book of their own. Clarno concludes by “clarifying the concept of neoliberal apartheid, arguing that the excessive focus in the international definition of apartheid ignores the continued functioning of racial capitalism, which helps to explain why the end of apartheid within the state of South Africa did not completely change the life of black South Africans like those whom he met in Alexandra.
Finally, the author points out to readers that outside of South Africa and Palestine / Israel, it is now common to confront aspects of neoliberal apartheid in cities, states and regions around the world. Combinations of neoliberalism and colonialism led to inequality (often with a semblance of equality), marginalization, securitization, and crisis. Neoliberal apartheid regimes, from the US empire to local elites, rely on violence to maintain their power in the face of unprecedented racial inequality and marginalization. Despite the deployment of security forces, these systems remain plagued with instability. Understanding the ways in which Palestine / Israel and South Africa participated in these global processes can contribute to the formation of broader movements against global neoliberal apartheid.

Neoliberal Apartheid: Palestine / Israel and South Africa after 1994- University of Chicago Press

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