The Moving Line Between State Benevolence and Control: Municipal Indigent Programmes in South Africa

‘Municipal indigents’ are a category of poor citizens who qualify to receive certain municipal services for free in South Africa. Having registered as municipal indigents, the poor not only gain access to free basic services but also embark upon a voyage into a bureaucratic underworld where policies are changed and eligibility criteria and sanctions are unevenly applied. Various preconditions and limits on services, as well as social surveillance of indigent households, has turned indigency programmes into a ‘regime’. The policy has swung from hard cost recovery (mass disconnections) during the period 1994–2000 to ‘free’ basic services and, more recently, to social-shaming and criminalisation. This paper provides a thematic account of recent municipal indigent processes in order to explore the ‘moving boundary’ between benevolence and control regarding this crucial citizen–state interface. Based on recent interviews with government officials, a review of relevant government documents, and describing the administrative complexities, the paper reveals aspects of what the poor confront in day-to-day experiences of the state. It is argued that there are lessons for all municipalities seeking a more sustainable and democratic path to citizenship rather than an ongoing low-level war with poor citizens.