ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to share insights on South Africa’s trajectory from formalisation to greater informality with a gendered perspective; and considers how the South African government has sought to bring in processes to formalise the informal economy to address the challenges brought about by this shift. The legal and policy frameworks will also be interrogated to evaluate their intent and extent to which they have facilitated meaningful benefits particularly for women workers in the informal economy. Street vendors are a mixed group of workers dominated by women who operate in public spaces and are generally categorised as “self-employed.” There are an estimated 200,000 waste pickers in South Africa, but because they are dominantly informal workers, the exact number is not known. A study on waste reclaimers in the Durban metro showed how these policies impacted on the workers. There is a lot of uncertainty about whether the benefits to be derived through formalisation would actually be realised by domestic workers.
