Families and households in post-apartheid South Africa: socio-demographic perspectives

We know that the structures of families and of households have changed in recent decades and that this has had a profound affect on public policy planning and service delivery in South Africa. The institution of the family interfaces with other social institutions in any society, therefore stands to reason that the political, social and economic transformations resulting through colonialism and apartheid in South Africa have affected families and their residential dimension, the household, for all cultural groups. Prior to the democratic transition in 1994, studies of families and households were limited by the political economy of apartheid in general, and more specifically, by inadequate quantitative socio-economic data. Since the transition however, the proliferation of such data has largely overcome this problem, making it possible to undertake more representative, comprehensive studies than was the case in the past. In this research monograph, a group of well-established social scientists from such diverse disciplines as economics, demography, sociology and psychology attempt to explain the myriad changes in families and households in South Africa following the end of apartheid.