@book{2023:plessing:popular_po,
title = {Popular Politics, Participation and the Elite Gaze in South Africa},
year = {2023},
note = {This book challenges assumptions prevalent among development experts
that participatory forums and mechanisms enhance democracy in a highly
unequal setting. These assumptions ignore the pernicious ways in which
social and economic status and political standing differentiate
citizenship. The book develops a counter-narrative from below,
starting from the manifold ways in which people engage with the state
in a South African township and the structures of power they
encounter. By doing so, it reveals that political participation, as
imagined in the Global North, is a privilege not only of individuals
but also of societies, and (re-)discovers a profound epistemological
gap between elite assumptions and the perspectives of the governed.},
edition = {},
publisher = {Nomos},
address = {Baden-Baden},
series = {Entwicklungstheorie und Entwicklungspolitik},
volume = {26},
author = {Plessing, Julia}
}