Formalising urban informality: micro-enterprise and the regulation of liquor in Cape Town

In early 2012, South Africa's Western Cape Province enacted new alcohol control legislation amid mounting concern with the costs of alcohol-related harms. This has focused on urban shebeen closure to control the informal, unlicensed trade and the harms it generates through crime, violence and injury. In contrast to policy discourse, this paper contends that rather than existing outside regulation, the city's shebeeners embrace multiple (self and collective) regulatory strategies to manage the inherent risks of their own informality. Drawing on novel empirical data including a ‘business census’ and interviews with the police and liquor traders across four Cape Town case study sites, the paper adds new depth to contemporary engagements with the appropriate and equitable regulation of the South African informal liquor trade.