Through a series of intricate informal processes and human-centric institutional arrangements
beneficiaries of South African government-subsidized housing force formally registered
properties into informality. Sandile Mbatha explores the concept of informality in relation to
how such beneficiaries challenge predominant understandings of property relations. These
practices are embedded in complex urban tenure dynamics that prevail in post-colonial societies
societies in which the state's imposition of predominantly western forms of tenure and
property rights ignore the anthropological nature of housing.
