We discussed how to assess whether proposals for housing and urban development would change the patterns people live with or simply reproduce them.

Okay, so I'm sure it's already been mentioned before, but obviously local government represents the primary connection with the state.

So it's like the people experience the state primarily through the interaction with local government.

And I think that the way in which this interaction works tells us a lot about what is at stake in local government.

So basically, you know, in these elections, how do people belong and who has been recognized as a citizen and how? And I know these are sort of like classic questions, but I feel that they're very important when we try to look at, you know, state-society relations and the spatial inequality.

And obviously, you know, what is at stake in this regard is not simply who is recognized as deserving, who is not recognized as such.

And this is also linked really to where people live.

How would we be able to gauge whether these proposals that are being put on the table by political parties would actually challenge South Africa's inherited spatial inequalities or reproduce them in many ways?