Based on data analysis and group interviews with miners and their families, the paper explores fa... more Based on data analysis and group interviews with miners and their families, the paper explores factors behind the persistent workplace conflict in the South African platinum mines. It concludes that low wages could not explain the prolonged strikes in the platinum belt, since miners were far better paid than most South African workers. Rather, they arose because of the failure to develop adequate human settlements around new mining areas that emerged as a result of the commodity boom; the profound inequalities, which meant miners did not trust employers' arguments for wage restraint as the commodity boom came to an end from 2011; and the failure to address the hierarchical, oppressive and deeply unequitable work organisation entrenched under apartheid.
Based on data analysis and group interviews with miners and their families, the paper explores fa... more Based on data analysis and group interviews with miners and their families, the paper explores factors behind the persistent workplace conflict in the South African platinum mines. It concludes that low wages could not explain the prolonged strikes in the platinum belt, since miners were far better paid than most South African workers. Rather, they arose because of the failure to develop adequate human settlements around new mining areas that emerged as a result of the commodity boom; the profound inequalities, which meant miners did not trust employers' arguments for wage restraint as the commodity boom came to an end from 2011; and the failure to address the hierarchical, oppressive and deeply unequitable work organisation entrenched under apartheid.
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