Manufacturing Conflicts between Multiculturalism and Women’s Rights: Polygamy in South Africa

Scholars have proposed a range of solutions for resolving conflicts over multiculturalism and women’s rights. Few, however, have systematically investigated how and why policy conflicts over multiculturalism and women’s rights emerge and the role minority women play in these conflicts. This Paper does just that by investigating customary marriage reform in South Africa. Using grounded theory, discourse analysis, and process tracing, I find that the African National Congress (ANC) framed polygamy as a conflict between multiculturalism and women’s rights and insisted that the government must resolve it. As the policy reform process unfolded, women living under customary law fought hard to bring an end to polygamy. ANC elites, however, argued that for the good of the nation white rule must be put to rest by endorsing African tradition, including polygamy. That endorsement helped them to obstruct a potential minority rights alliance between whites and chiefs, and secured them the allegiance of chiefs who could deliver millions of votes. The South African battle over customary marriage suggests that politicians in liberal democracies sometimes manufacture policy conflicts over multiculturalism and women’s rights for electoral gain and that minority women struggle to shape public policy that is about them.