South African Women Making Change

GIF of South African women leaders over time. It includes images of Dulcie September, Albertina Sisulu and Winnie Mandela. It also includes protest images.

On 9 August 1956, twenty thousand South African women marched on the Union Buildings, the seat of the apartheid government, to protest the imposition of passes, which were documents designed to limit the places where Black people could live and work. Presenting a formidable presence, the women sang the now-famous words, “Wathint’ abafazi, wathint’ imbokodo”— “You strike a woman, you strike a rock.”

Theirs was a remarkable act of courage and defiance, part of a long line of women’s leadership and activism against the apartheid regime. Previous generations marched against similar pass restrictions in the 1920s; and in the decades following the 1956 march, women like Ma Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, Albertina Sisulu, Dulcie September and countless others, continued to lead the struggle against apartheid. Some of them, including Ms. September ultimately lost their lives in the struggle, paying the ultimate price for our shared freedom. 

Today, women in South Africa continue to contend with many-layered struggles. Like their peers across the world, they bear the burden of unpaid care work. Pre-pandemic income inequities, which saw women earning 30 percent less than men, have only been made more stark given that women account for two-thirds of pandemic-related job losses. And incidents of gender-based violence have also spiked with the pandemic.

Like their forebears, contemporary women in South Africa are tackling these injustices with courage and conviction. In honour of Women’s Day, we spotlight five pieces of media—made by, with or about AFRE’s South African women leaders—that provide keen, multidimensional insight into the liberation work that remains before us.


women walking on a road that appears to be rural, bearing a load of twigs on her head.

Nuancing justice in land rights struggle
For decades, Senior Fellow Constance “Connie” Mogale has worked to build power within rural communities to reclaim land stolen under apartheid rule. Restitutive land reform remains a pressing racial justice issue and has profound ripple effects on food access, economic security, climate justice and more. The 1994 Constitution calls for land reform, but the process has been slowed by several factors, including questions about the appropriate institutions to represent the interests of rural communities.

In an op-ed published by Daily Maverick, Connie troubles assumptions about trust in traditional political institutions and probes the nature of political representation for contemporary rural communities.


Co-powering with women miners
Like their male colleagues, women mineworkers in South Africa face difficult work and living conditions. In addition, gendered injustices, such as sexual harassment, compound those conditions. To support their organising efforts around these issues, Senior Fellows Asanda Benya and Stha Yeni collaborated with women miners to create feminist schools. These were women-only spaces designed to help the workers develop shared language for their shared difficulties. Asanda, who is a sociology researcher and lecturer, studies social life around mining, including the ways women’s unpaid care work maintains the industry. In this chapter excerpt, edited and published by New Frame, she writes about the different notions of femininity carried by women mineworkers as they move between their workplaces and their homes.


image of We See You in a home in the Camps Bay.jpg

Shifting the conversation on housing rights
As the seriousness of the COVID-19 pandemic emerged in 2020, its worsening effects on South Africa's housing crisis also became evident. In response, #WeSeeYou, a collective of women and queer artists, including Senior Fellows Kelly-Eve Koopman and Sarah Summers, and 2021 Fellow Xena Scullard, decided on an unusual protest action—they occupied a large, scenic house in Cape Town’s Camps Bay neighbourhood. It was an effort to shift the conversation about land and housing rights, to turn the focus on the wealthy by drawing attention to the many lavish holiday rentals and vacation homes that remain empty while many South Africans face housing insecurity.

In a recent episode of the "Think African" podcast, Kelly-Eve clarifies the thinking behind #WeSeeYou’s tactics and reflects on the intersecting nature of social concerns. Listen here.


image of women in SJC.jpg

Building power in informal settlements
AFRE board member Mandisa Dyantyi leads the Social Justice Coalition (SJC), a membership-based social movement that works to advance the rights of people living in informal settlements. In a conversation on the “Equity Rising” podcast, Mandisa talks with TraeAnna Holiday, a U.S.-based activist, about the history of apartheid spatial planning, reflects on the slow pace of change since the fall of apartheid, and shares SJC’s history of grassroots organising. She also offers crucial insights on the importance of centring Black women’s lives in policymaking for social change. Listen here.


Graphic that reads Race Beyond Borders. It show's a woman in dark sunglasses, looking outward beams of yellow and purple shooting out from her eyes. She is against a starry background.

Expanding notions of race
Sebabatso Manoeli, AFRE’s Senior Director for Strategic Programmes, hosts our in-house podcast “Race Beyond Borders” (RBB), which raises new questions about race and racialised inequality beyond familiar divides. In Season One, Sebabatso talks with thinkers across fields of knowledge and practice as far-flung as hip hop, biomedical engineering, sociology, and political theory. Start exploring RBB from our most popular episode featuring hip hop artist, Akua Naru who shares her vision of Afro-diasporic solidarity. Or dive deep into a Marxist reading of contemporary South African politics offered by sociologist Mosa Phadi, Ph. D. (A note: We're excited to share that the second season of RBB launches later this year! Follow us on Instagram or Facebook to stay connected.)


This Women’s Day and always, we celebrate women leaders in South Africa and beyond for their courage and tenacity, their unique perspectives and experiences, and their work that’s leading us to a world in which all people are treated with dignity, respect, care and compassion.

In solidarity,
The AFRE Team

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**Correction: The email version of this post did not include a reference to Senior Fellow Sarah Summers and 2021 Fellow Xena Scullard’s roles in #WeSeeYou.