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Time to rethink the punitive approach to homelessness of Cape Town’s Safe Spaces

17 Dec 2024

Homelessness and addiction cannot be dismissed as personal failings or mere ‘urban decay’. Safe Spaces should not be places of control but places of care that meet the needs of the people they aim to help.

Every day, we pass people living on the streets of Cape Town. For most of us, this is a fleeting encounter – a brief moment of discomfort as we grapple with their visible need and our perceived inability to help. But for those living on the street, this is their daily reality: an unrelenting struggle for survival, dignity and hope.

For the City of Cape Town, however, homelessness often seems like a problem to be managed, rather than lives to be transformed. The latest evidence of this approach is found in the Safe Space shelters and the rules they enforce. At Ndifuna Ukwazi, we recently filed a counter-application on behalf of our clients being evicted from Hope Street, Buitenkant Street and Wesley Street, Gardens, who are homeless and battling chronic substance use. The counter-application challenges two key rules: requiring abstinence from substances to access the shelter, and locking out residents during the day and those who are not inside by 8pm.

These rules are emblematic of a wider punitive approach to homelessness – one that fines individuals for sleeping on the streets and carries out illegal evictions, often disregarding the deep-seated issues that lead to homelessness. Instead of addressing root causes, these measures punish the symptoms of a systemic failure.

What’s striking is how many of our clients have been homeless for a decade or more. This chronic homelessness is not a temporary situation or a passing misfortune; it is the result of enduring cycles of trauma, violence and abandonment. When you consider this, it becomes clear that interventions like Safe Spaces, with their rigid rules and punitive measures, are not designed to address the realities of people who have been excluded from society for so long.

For our clients, substance dependency is a disease, not something they can switch off because a shelter requires it.

This chronic nature of homelessness makes it harder to pass judgement on individuals, and easier to see their experiences as part of a broader, parallel world that exists with our own. It shifts the narrative from seeing homelessness as a temporary blight on a privileged world to understanding it as a deep, systemic failure that demands thoughtful, compassionate, if not radical, solutions.

Take the abstinence rule, for instance. The City assumes that substance use is simply a choice that can be turned on or off. But for our clients, many of whom are chronic users, substance dependency is a disease. It’s not something they can switch off because a shelter requires it. Substance use disorders often stem from poverty, trauma, mental health struggles, or a breakdown of social support systems – issues that these shelters are ostensibly designed to address. Yet the demand for immediate sobriety becomes a barrier, keeping the very people who need shelter the most, out in the cold.

For those who have endured decades of homelessness, the experience is not just about lacking a roof. It is about surviving in an environment of constant uncertainty, danger and exclusion. These layers of trauma and vulnerability heighten the need for interventions that are supportive, inclusive and understanding.

For many homeless individuals, Safe Spaces are not a refuge but a place of unease. Residents liken them to prisons, where strict curfews and an absence of personal freedom strip away dignity rather than restoring it. Imagine having to choose between a roof over your head and keeping your recycling materials, which make up your livelihood. Imagine being barred from shelter because you couldn’t meet a curfew, even though you were working late to earn a meagre income.

We are not opposed to Safe Spaces, and despite what some members of the public might believe, we do not advocate for homeless people to remain on the streets. This is also not just about rules; it’s about failing to see homelessness for what it really is: a complex intersection of a traumatised society; of poverty, mental health issues, family breakdowns, and the lasting legacy of apartheid. Substance use is one example of how these complexities play out. Requiring immediate abstinence fails to see the reality of alcohol and drug use in a context of despair and systemic inequality. It ignores evidence-based approaches like harm reduction and housing-first models, which have transformed lives across the world.

Homelessness and addiction cannot be dismissed as personal failings or mere ‘urban decay’.

Harm reduction offers an alternative that meets people where they are. Rather than demanding abstinence as a precondition, it provides support to manage substance use safely, reducing harm to both the individual and the community. Housing-first programmes, meanwhile, recognise that stable housing is not something to be earned but the starting point for addressing the challenges of homelessness. By giving people a place to live without preconditions, these programmes could create a foundation for recovery, employment and reintegration into society.

Cape Town’s punitive approach, by contrast, often exacerbates the trauma of homelessness and places heavy emphasis on family reunification: this carries the danger of opening wounds where many people have escaped abuse, violence and trauma in their family homes.

Read more: WATCH: Life adjacent – The narrow gap between those with homes and those without

Read more: ‘Trauma is the problem’ — unpacking the factors behind homelessness in Cape Town

To truly address homelessness, we must shift from punishment to partnership. Homelessness and addiction cannot be dismissed as personal failings or mere “urban decay”; they are a moral indictment of those in power and a reflection of society’s collective failure. We need to stop criminalising poverty and start tackling its causes. Harm reduction and housing-first models offer a way forward – one that prioritises dignity, health and inclusion.

It’s time to rethink Safe Spaces, not as places of control but as places of care that meet the needs of the people they aim to help. Because no one chooses to live on the streets. And no one should have to choose between their survival and their dignity. DM

Dr Jonty Cogger is a lawyer committed to using the law to challenge inequality and push for the redistribution of land and resources. Based at Ndifuna Ukwazi, Jonty focuses on making housing and urban land more accessible and fighting for justice in how property is owned and shared.

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