Kurisani Mdhluli
Research Fellow
Kurisani Mdhluli is a PhD (Political Studies) candidate in the Department of Political Studies under the Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences at the University of the Western Cape. He is affiliated with the Politics and Urban Governance Research Group forming part of the team working on Governing the Just Urban Transition project. His research interests include African Urbanism, Urban Governance, and Peace, Security and Sustainable Development. His doctoral research focuses on JUT, service delivery, and Urban Governance in the City of Cape Town. Kurisani has five years of work experience in academia and the think tank industry.
Christina Culwick Fatti
Senior Researcher at the Politics and Urban Governance Research Group,
Christina is a Senior Researcher at the Politics and Urban Governance Research Group, University of the Western Cape. With over ten years of experience in policy-facing urban research, she has led various projects related to the intersection between environmental and social systems within cities. She is a geographer by training (Wits and UCT), and her research extends across multiple disciplines, with a specific focus on collaborative knowledge creation and the role of transdisciplinary research for informing policy and practice. Beyond her academic research, Christina holds a postgraduate diploma in teaching (UNISA) and she previously worked as an SABC broadcasting meteorologist.
Michaelyn Cornelius
Masters Candidate in Political Studies, University of the Western Cape
Michaelyn Cornelius is a research administrator for PUG and a Masters Candidate with a special interest in issues related to gender and sexuality. Michaelyn completed her Honours degree at the University of the Western Cape, looking at the qualitative nature of heteropatriarchy and its invasive presence within women-loving women (wlw) relationships. Cornelius also supports and promotes the fourth and sixteenth SDGs of quality education and peace, justice and strong institutions through her volunteerism.
Babongile Bidla
RESEARCHER - DEPT. OF POLITICAL STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF THE WESTERN CAPE
Babongile Bidla is Political Studies Masters candidate at the University of the Western Cape. She is an innovative and creative problem solver with a passion for learning and helping others. Bidla has a strong interest in research, democratic accountability, ICT and respect for human rights. She is passionate about using her skills to make a difference in the world and in her academic studies is currently researching ways different types of technologies can improve public service delivery in South Africa.
Lindokuhle Mandyoli
PhD Candidate & Associate Lecturer, Department of Political Studies, University of the Western Cape
Lindokuhle Mandyoli is an Associate Lecturer, Department of Political Studies, University of the Western Cape with research interests in the capital/race debate in South Africa, democratic constitutional hegemony and the intellectual history(ies) of the South African student movement. He is a recipient of the Centre for Humanities Research PhD Fellowship in the National Research Foundation’s Flagship for Critical African Humanities and the co-lead of the UNESCO Chair Project titled: Universities as Sites of Protection and Activism. He is also a recipient of the Mellon Writing Fellowship at the University of Minnesota’s Interdisciplinary Centre for the Study of Global Change (ICGC). In his PhD research, he is investigating the ways in which constitutional democratic hegemony inevitably reproduces different in form, but similar in essence, socio-political, socioeconomic and cultural problems that were produced by colonialism and apartheid. Drawing a comparison between the 1976 Uprisings and the 2015 #FeesMustFall movement in South Africa, he explores how hegemony manifests itself differently in both these moments, while under a consistent logic in two qualitatively different regimes. He is heavily involved in various working groups and projects featured here.
Boitumelo M. Papane
RESEARCHER - DEPT. OF POLITICAL STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF THE WESTERN CAPE
Boitumelo is a researcher at the University of the Western Cape. Papane holds a Master’s degree in Work-Integrated Political Studies from the University West (HV). She is a scholar of the Mellon Foundation with membership to its affiliated Social Science Research Council. Her research interests include the theories and practice of political participation and informality in community-based organizations. She wishes to conduct research that speaks to the current political climate and produce outputs that reflect her mission towards scholarly activism.
Mmeli Dube
Researcher - DEPT. OF POLITICAL STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF THE WESTERN CAPE
Mmeli Dube is a Postdoctoral researcher at the University of the Western Cape. His research interests include civil society, urban informality and governance, comparative politics, and citizenship and participation. He is heavily involved in various working groups and projects featured here.
Fiona Anciano
Founder, PUG and ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR - DEPT. OF POLITICAL STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF THE WESTERN CAPE
Fiona Anciano is an Associate Professor in Political Studies and founder of the Politics and Urban Governance Research Group (PUG) at the University of the Western Cape, and a Visiting Researcher at University West, Sweden. She is a qualitative researcher with an interest in urban governance, democratisation, citizenship and civil society. Working with student teams, she conducts research in informal settlements on urban democracy. She has managed 11 grant projects in Cape Town over the last eight years and has produced numerous local and international publications, including a co-authored book Democracy Disconnected: Participation and Governance in a City of the South, in 2019 and edited the 2021 book Political Values and Narratives of Resistance: Social Justice and the Fractured Promises of Post-colonial States both published in the United Kingdom by Routledge.