Quality of Life Survey IV (2015/16): Social Cohesion

GCRO’s Data Brief No. 8, part of a series to be released on the QoL IV (2015/16) survey results, reports on data related to social cohesion in Gauteng. Social cohesion is not something which can be quantified as a whole, but the QoL IV survey does provide several important indications of societal attitudes and behaviours which threaten social cohesion. This is in addition to the variety of perceptions of Gauteng residents gathered in QoL IV, including perceived quality of life, socio-economic circumstances, satisfaction with service delivery, values, psycho-social and political attitudes, etc.

Key findings include the following. First, respondents have quite divergent views for each measure. Some respondents believe there is social tolerance and trust, while others believe there is not. Some provide responses which indicate intolerant attitudes, while others are accepting of difference. Second, there are different trends over time for the various questions that we analyse. There are some notable positive trends regarding improved tolerance between different race groups and towards cross border migrants. Nevertheless there are concerning patterns, such as a percentage of people who endorse violence against foreigners and violence towards gay and lesbian people. Third, those who are intolerant are not distributed evenly across the geography of the province. Finally, different forms of intolerance do not always overlap spatially with one another. For example, some wards have higher proportions of respondents who believe that homophobic violence is acceptable but the same wards do not necessarily endorse xenophobic violence to the same extent.