‘If we don’t fight for our future, who’s going to fight for us?’ Sello asks, a week after the third protest in 2011 that turned the busy Beyers Naudé Drive into a no-go zone. ‘If we just sit, this problem is not going to be fixed. We have to fight until we get what we want,’ he continues, insisting that Zandspruit stands no chance of improved service delivery if people do not go to the streets in protest. Sello, whom I met on my first day in Zandspruit, is, like so many residents, angry about the living conditions in Zandspruit and the government’s failure to develop the community. He played a key role in orchestrating the string of protests between March and July 2011 that aimed to reconfigure local government positions and the distribution of resources within the community. These protests were neither the first nor the last time Zandspruit residents close off Beyers Naudé Drive to traffic and implement a stay-away that resembles a general strike. The community has been the site of recurring protests in which unemployed young men consistently emerge as central figures. These uprisings are characteristic of militant local protests that have become a frequent occurrence in informal settlements and townships across the country.

This chapter examines the nexus between these protests, young men’s endeavours to make a life in the settlement, and the settlement’s sociopolitical landscape. Specifically, it focuses on the involvement of men like Sello, whom I call ‘protest brokers’, who play a key role in organising and leading protests. This distinguishes them from a broader group of protestors who take to the streets. Notably, they are insiders with long-standing ties in the settlement and a political claim or stake in its future. Like many of the men explored in earlier chapters, they are for the most part excluded from wage employment and have rarely if ever been involved in collective worker struggles. Their workplace experiences led them to quit or reject low-wage jobs (see chapter 4) rather than organise collectively or bargain with employers. In other words, the community and not the workplace is the central arena for their political engagement and claim-making.