True, reliable and valid? : data and community experience in the case of the janitorial service social audit

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dc.contributor.advisorOldfield, Sophieen_ZA
dc.contributor.authorRossouw, Jareden_ZA
dc.date.accessioned2016-06-23T14:52:43Z
dc.date.available2016-06-23T14:52:43Z
dc.date.issued2015en_ZA
dc.description.abstractAcross South Africa, poor and working class people are rising up in violent protest because of poor delivery of basic services. The frustration and rage is palpable and points to the high expectations that South Africans have in the post-apartheid state. At the same time municipalities are struggling to facilitate meaningful participation. As a result, citizens are using creative new ways to engage government in invented participatory spaces. Social audits aim to empower communities to gathering evidence and verify the delivery of basic services and present their findings at a public hearing and have the potential to valorise and legitimise community experience, making it legible to government officials, ensuring participation, accountability and the realisation of human rights. I present a case study of a social audit conducted by the Social Justice Coalition in the City of Cape Town on a janitorial service for full flush toilets in informal settlements. Given the City's previous vociferous attacks on the process, I focus on attempts to improve the legitimacy of the social audit through improvements to the data collection method. I describe, the messy reality of data collection and how despite these efforts, the City officials followed a clear agenda to deny the findings, attack the data and blame the residents for poor service delivery. Although there is some evidence that the social audit had some impact in terms of advocacy, I argue that our reliance on data resulted in lost opportunities for capturing and articulating community knowledge and experience. It is hard to know whether this was inevitable given the City's track record on meaningful participation, leaving us with unanswered questions as to how social auditing can result in accountability and justice. Despite this foundations have been laid for the growth of social audits nationally, presenting further opportunities for comparative scholarship and case studies.en_ZA
dc.identifier.apacitationRossouw, J. (2015). <i>True, reliable and valid? : data and community experience in the case of the janitorial service social audit</i>. (Thesis). University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Department of Sociology. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/11427/20114en_ZA
dc.identifier.chicagocitationRossouw, Jared. <i>"True, reliable and valid? : data and community experience in the case of the janitorial service social audit."</i> Thesis., University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Department of Sociology, 2015. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/20114en_ZA
dc.identifier.citationRossouw, J. 2015. True, reliable and valid? : data and community experience in the case of the janitorial service social audit. University of Cape Town.en_ZA
dc.identifier.ris TY - Thesis / Dissertation AU - Rossouw, Jared AB - Across South Africa, poor and working class people are rising up in violent protest because of poor delivery of basic services. The frustration and rage is palpable and points to the high expectations that South Africans have in the post-apartheid state. At the same time municipalities are struggling to facilitate meaningful participation. As a result, citizens are using creative new ways to engage government in invented participatory spaces. Social audits aim to empower communities to gathering evidence and verify the delivery of basic services and present their findings at a public hearing and have the potential to valorise and legitimise community experience, making it legible to government officials, ensuring participation, accountability and the realisation of human rights. I present a case study of a social audit conducted by the Social Justice Coalition in the City of Cape Town on a janitorial service for full flush toilets in informal settlements. Given the City's previous vociferous attacks on the process, I focus on attempts to improve the legitimacy of the social audit through improvements to the data collection method. I describe, the messy reality of data collection and how despite these efforts, the City officials followed a clear agenda to deny the findings, attack the data and blame the residents for poor service delivery. Although there is some evidence that the social audit had some impact in terms of advocacy, I argue that our reliance on data resulted in lost opportunities for capturing and articulating community knowledge and experience. It is hard to know whether this was inevitable given the City's track record on meaningful participation, leaving us with unanswered questions as to how social auditing can result in accountability and justice. Despite this foundations have been laid for the growth of social audits nationally, presenting further opportunities for comparative scholarship and case studies. DA - 2015 DB - OpenUCT DP - University of Cape Town LK - https://open.uct.ac.za PB - University of Cape Town PY - 2015 T1 - True, reliable and valid? : data and community experience in the case of the janitorial service social audit TI - True, reliable and valid? : data and community experience in the case of the janitorial service social audit UR - http://hdl.handle.net/11427/20114 ER - en_ZA
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11427/20114
dc.identifier.vancouvercitationRossouw J. True, reliable and valid? : data and community experience in the case of the janitorial service social audit. [Thesis]. University of Cape Town ,Faculty of Humanities ,Department of Sociology, 2015 [cited yyyy month dd]. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/20114en_ZA
dc.language.isoengen_ZA
dc.publisher.departmentDepartment of Sociologyen_ZA
dc.publisher.facultyFaculty of Humanitiesen_ZA
dc.publisher.institutionUniversity of Cape Town
dc.subject.otherSociologyen_ZA
dc.titleTrue, reliable and valid? : data and community experience in the case of the janitorial service social auditen_ZA
dc.typeMaster Thesis
dc.type.qualificationlevelMasters
dc.type.qualificationnameMPhilen_ZA
uct.type.filetypeText
uct.type.filetypeImage
uct.type.publicationResearchen_ZA
uct.type.resourceThesisen_ZA
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