City of Cape Town should work with and not against the building's residents, say urban researchers
Instead of portraying residents as criminals and building "hijackers", the mayor and his administration should take every opportunity to engage the Cissie Gool House community and collectively co-design the site for inclusive development.
The future of the old Woodstock Hospital, also known as Cissie Gool House, is uncertain. The City of Cape Town wants to sell the site to a private party for a mixed-use development that would include social housing.
Residents of Cissie Gool House have objected to a development plan that would potentially result in their mass displacement. Many residents will likely not qualify for the social housing planned for the site.
The City has recently concluded its statutory public participation process regarding the sale of the site and has commenced with a further participation process facilitated by a third party.
As urban scholars and researchers, we believe Cissie Gool House offers an unprecedented opportunity to make Cape Town more inclusive. In our submission to the City, which received the support of over 100 academics from across the world, we call on the City to pursue a "development without displacement" approach that centres co-production and co-design to determine the future of the site.
Based on our research, we argue that redeveloping the site with its current residents is not only possible, as evidenced by international experience and best practices, but also more just, equitable and efficient than displacing or relocating them.
Criminalising housing poverty
Cissie Gool House is a local illustration of what is at stake in cities around the world. Within failing housing systems, poor and working-class families are struggling to keep a roof over their heads, while real estate wealth is soaring, contributing to displacement and segregation.
The City itself acknowledges the depth of its housing and segregation crisis, and the resulting growth of informal housing. According to the City's own estimates, more than 50% of all new dwellings per annum between 2020 and 2040 will be informal.
Yet while it is firmly entrenched in policy documents and strategic frameworks that informal settlements (which are land occupations) should be upgraded, the residents of building occupations, like Cissie Gool House, have often been labelled as criminals and queue jumpers.
An insistence that the "unlawful occupiers" of Cissie Gool House cannot be engaged to co-develop the site seems therefore contradictory, given the City's policy towards informal settlement upgrades.
Criminalising and creating a false binary of deserving and undeserving poor, ignores the structural and economic drivers of urban occupations. It ignores how residents are intertwined with historical and ongoing processes of exclusionary urban development and the limited availability of well-located affordable housing.
Woodstock and Salt River have experienced significant pressures of gentrification and displacement in recent decades. While primarily driven by private-sector investments, gentrification is directly linked to state policies, in particular urban development zones and associated tax breaks for private developers.
There have been genuine efforts in recent years to fast-track well-located social and affordable housing, but actual progress has been much slower than anticipated.
Cissie Gool House is a place of care
Cissie Gool House started as a political tactic to protest the sale of the Tafelberg site in Sea Point, but it has since become a home for more than 300 families. The abandoned hospital has housed people who would otherwise be homeless and living on the streets, or in state-constructed Temporary Relocation Areas on the periphery of the city far away from social amenities.
There is a strong collective governance structure within Cissie Gool House, designed to support the repair and maintenance of the building, make decisions about internal needs, engage with outside stakeholders, and seek ways to develop the building inclusively.
The Cissie Gool House leadership has played an essential role not only in decision-making, but supporting collective life, conflict resolution and disciplining antisocial behaviour. It should be recognised by the City as a real asset.
Of course Cissie Gool House is not immune to social ills and challenges, which reflect the reality of Cape Town and South Africa. Importantly, the leadership and its task teams have tried to address these challenges, at times working with law enforcement, other state agencies and civil society organisations.
The leaders and residents spend significant time and resources in their commitment to the movement and the house, often sacrificing their own family time and well-being.
International precedents
The City could take inspiration from progressive governments around the world that have demonstrated how to work with occupier communities in making informally constructed places dignified and liveable.
In our submission, we briefly present four examples (São Paulo, Bogotá, Vienna and Barcelona) where states collaborated with informal occupiers to co-design developments that did not result in large-scale displacement, but strengthened citizenship rights, improved housing quality, and promoted spatial justice.
The case of São Paulo, Brazil, is particularly relevant. The Brazilian constitution explicitly recognises the right to housing and the social function of property, and the municipality of São Paulo has developed an institutional framework that emphasises a participatory approach to remodelling underutilised and occupied buildings into adequate housing.
Technical assistance organisations support the refurbishment processes, while housing movements play a key role in governing the occupations. The state provides tenure security, upgrades bulk infrastructure and, depending on the specific housing programme, supports occupiers in accessing affordable finance.
One example of such a participatory refurbishment process is the Elza Soares occupation (Lord Palace Hotel), which started as an occupation of 200 families in 2012 and was collectively managed by the housing movement "Frente de Luta por Moradia" (FLM). In 2018, refurbishment started, and in 2022, families began to move back in.
Co-designing a way forward
The City formally acknowledges the violent history and ongoing legacy of segregation and forced removals, as well as the urgent need to promote well-located affordable housing to undo apartheid spatial geography. This expressed commitment must be held at the centre of efforts to re-imagine and re-make the city, including the future vision advanced for Cissie Gool House.
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The City's Metropolitan Spatial Development Framework encourages partnering with communities: "A partnership approach is important to ensure that communities are engaged and support the spatial vision. This will include how the spatial plans will impact on their current surroundings and co-creating a future where more people in the city have access to opportunities, transport and affordable housing".
Yet the leadership of Cissie Gool House has for years reached out to the City to discuss opportunities for collaboration and partnering, to no avail.
Meanwhile, residents have been engaging in a co-design process to advance an inclusive housing model for the site. This process should be supported.
An approach that prioritises "development without displacement" would demonstrate a commitment to improving access to well-located affordable housing, realising socio-spatial transformation, and halting historical and ongoing cycles of displacement.
Dr Suraya Scheba is a Senior Lecturer in the Environmental and Geographical Science Department of the University of Cape Town.
Dr Andreas Scheba is a Senior Research Specialist at the Human Sciences Research Council and Associate Professor at the Centre for Development Support at the University of the Free State.
The authors write in their personal capacities.
Views expressed are not necessarily those of GroundUp.
