NRF-GoJUT (2024-2026) team holds writing workshop in Cambridge ahead of the RGS-IBG conference

Members of the National Research Foundation (NRF)- funded Governing a Just Urban Transition (GoJUT) project met at Sidney Sussex College, University of Cambridge, from 26 to 28 August 2026 for a three-day writing workshop. GoJUT is a project led by the University of the Western Cape (Politics and Urban Governance), with partners at the Universities of Cambridge, Cardiff and Sheffield and the Gauteng City-Region Observatory (GCRO).

^{Front row: Boitumelo Papane, Kurisani Mdhluli, Dr Samkelisiwe Khanyile, Dr Mamokete Modiba and Prof. Fiona Anciano. Back row: Dr SJ Cooper-Knock, Sindisa Monakali and Dr Motshwaedi Sepeng.}

The workshop gave the team dedicated time to move project findings towards publication. Participants shared draft articles and thesis chapters in advance and discussed them in small peer-review groups. Plenaries covered the writing process and how to get published. Structured writing sessions alternated offline writing with walking debriefs, and co-authoring teams planned joint papers. On the final day, the team reviewed its core findings, agreed on priority academic and policy outputs and planned policy engagement events for early 2027. Each participant left with a revision plan and a deadline, supported by accountability partners within the group.

From Cambridge, most of the team travelled to London for the RGS-IBG Annual International Conference, held at the Royal Geographical Society and Imperial College London from 1 to 4 September. The conference theme was “Geographies of inequalities: towards just places”. Seven team members presented GoJUT research. Prof. Fiona Anciano and Dr Christina Culwick Fatti also co-convened a session on just urban transitions with Dr Katrin Hofer and Prof David Kostenwein of ETH Zurich.

GoJUT presentations at the RGS-IBG:

Prof Charlotte Lemanski, Dr Christina Culwick Fatti and Prof Fiona Anciano, “Climate Apartheid: The politics and legitimacy of reappropriating apartheid in climate discourse” (3 September). The paper reflects on how the term “climate apartheid”, mostly used in Global North scholarship, can raise attention to climate injustice. It also warns that the term can dilute the racialised history of apartheid in South Africa.

Boitumelo Papane, “Power and the Production of Space (Mapping and Assessing the Skills Ecosystem in an Informal Settlement in Khayelitsha)” (2 September). This participatory action research with the Intlungu YaseMatyombeni social movement maps skills development initiatives in a Khayelitsha informal settlement. It shows how these initiatives can reproduce unequal power relations and patronage.

Prof SJ Cooper-Knock, “‘You don’t transition in darkness’: Electricity access and municipal divergence in the just transition” (2 September). The paper argues that rules allowing only municipalities in “good financial standing” to buy renewable energy from independent producers' risk widening inequalities between municipalities.

Dr Christina Culwick Fatti, with Prof Fiona Anciano, “Governing a Just Urban Transition” (3 September). The paper examines private solar adoption, sanitation in Khayelitsha, and the Lufhereng housing development to show how power dynamics shape who benefits and who bears the burdens of a just urban transition.

Dr Samkelisiwe Khanyile, “Beyond the grid: Spatial justice and differentiated energy vulnerabilities in Gauteng’s urban periphery” (3 September). The paper finds that energy poverty on Gauteng’s periphery involves affordability, reliability, and uneven transition burdens, dimensions that policy focused on grid extension often overlooks.

^{Dr Samkelisiwe Khanyile, presenting at the RGS 2026. Photo credit: Dr Mamokete Modiba.}

Dr Mamokete Modiba, “Coping with darkness: Energy injustice at the margins of Gauteng’s economy” (3 September). Drawing on the Quality of Life Survey, LiDAR mapping and fieldwork in Setswetla, Alexandra, the paper shows that informal enterprises’ coping strategies for electricity interruptions signal systemic exclusion, not resilience.

^{Dr Mamokete Modiba, presenting at the RGS 2026. Photo credit: Dr Samkelisiwe Khanyile.}

Prof Margot Rubin and Dr Christina Culwick Fatti, “An accidental Just Urban Transition” (3 September). Using Johannesburg and Cape Town as cases, the paper shows how energy stacking and off-gridding by officials, households and businesses add up to just outcomes, even when no one sets out to achieve a transition.

Dr Motshwaedi Sepeng, Dr Mamokete Modiba and Dr Samkelisiwe Khanyile, “Surviving infrastructure gaps: Informal business practices and access to water and energy in Setswetla” (4 September). Using the idea of “people as infrastructure”, the paper shows that small businesses in Setswetla rely on hybrid arrangements of informal negotiation, reciprocity, and irregular links to official infrastructure. It argues that these are systematic practices, not temporary fixes.

Kurisani Mdhluli, “Pragmatic Infrastructural Governance: Informal Water Connections as a Pathway to Water Security in Khayelitsha” (3 September). The paper argues that informal enterprises’ water connections work as a form of pragmatic infrastructural governance, and calls for community-led connections to be formally recognised.