Having family in Johannesburg was one such opportunity. Risks were braved to provide access to opportunities that are not available in Mozambique. The study found that Mozambicans applied the concept of risk to Johannesburg, comparing risks to those in Mozambique. The research is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Maputo, Mozambique and Rosettenville, in southern Johannesburg, South Africa. This thesis examines the perceptions and experiences of risk, social capital, and trust of Mozambicans who travel to live and work in Johannesburg. There are high levels of resentment against black immigrants in South Africa, which introduce the risk of violence. This makes detention, deportation, and economic exploitation very real risks. Legislative provisions largely exclude possibilities for long-term settlement and formal jobs for Mozambicans, who are often unskilled and semi-skilled workers. However, Johannesburg is not a welcoming host. They have positive conceptions of the possibilities to be found in Johannesburg in the form of jobs and income-generation, particularly when compared to the opportunities in Maputo. Johannesburg is the destination essential to the long-term plans of many Mozambicans, both men and women.
The countries are joined by long-standing routes of migration, and social networks and positive cultural scripts act to encourage mobility. Mozambican migration into South Africa was a key source of labour for South Africa even before the territories existed as they now do.
In this sense, the book has the great value of opening more questions than giving responses". Recognizing the centrality of informality and the complex hybrid practices of trans-local mobility in shaping cities and territories in Africa, though, should not conceal the deep causes of inequality and the 'networked individualism' that lie behind them. As the book stresses urban mobility 'opens up new ways of thinking the spatial dimensions and the agency embraced in human mobility'.
(.) The entrepreneurial mukheristas who make their living and even prosper by traveling between Maputo and Johannesburg are one specific feature of urbanization in Africa (exactly, the 'mobile urbanity' proposed by the author). The research resulting from the in-depth investigation realized along and on the 'in-between' space that the mukheristas travel from Maputo to Johannesburg and to Maputo back again to sell the goods bought in Johannesburg, adds to the multiple facets of the urban space in Africa. "In a world where change is so rapid and new issues emerge unremittingly, this book contributes to make things even more complex. In a world where change is extremely rapid and new issues emerge unremittingly, 'Mobile urbanity' opens up new ways of thinking the spatial dimensions and the agency embraced in human mobility. A "research on the road" to reflect on the political relevance of informal mobile practices in troubled urban societies, but also on new theoretical concepts and empirical research approaches. After an intensive field work travelling with mukheristas between Maputo (Mozambique) and Johannesburg (South Africa), the author shows the role of complex hybrid practices of trans-local mobility in shaping cities and territories in sub-saharan Africa. As many translocal and cross-border traders, mukheristas cover thousands of miles every week to supply urban markets, thus feeding themselves, their families and the cities they connect.
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