South Africa has become a nation defined by its protests. Protests can, and do, bring societal problems to public attention in direct, at times dramatic, ways. But governments the world over are also tempted to suppress this right, as they often feel threatened by public challenges to their authority. Apartheid South Africa had a shameful history of repressing protests. The architects of the country's democracy expressed a determination to break with this past and recognise protest as a basic democratic right. Yet, today, there is concern about the violent nature of protests. Protest Nation challenges the dominant narrative that it has become necessary for the state to step in to limit the right to protest in the broader public interest because media and official representations have created a public perception that violence has become endemic to protests. Bringing together data gathered from municipalities, the police, protestor and activist interviews, as well as media reports, the book analyses the extent to which the right to protest is respected in democratic South Africa. It throws a spotlight on the municipal role in enabling or mostly thwarting the right. This book is a call to action to defend the right to protest: a right that is clearly under threat. It also urges South Africans to critique the often-skewed public discourses that inform debates about protests and their limitations. 

Protests and state repression: an international perspective
2. Understanding the right to protest in South Africa
3. The legislative and policy context for the right to protest in South Africa
4. The right to protest in repressive contexts: the cases of the Mbombela and eThekwini Municipalities
5. Political diversity and the right to protest in metropolitan municipalities: Johannesburg and the Nelson Mandela Bay Metro
6. The Rise and fall of social movements: The Makana and Lukhanji Municipalities 7. Protests and political shifts in rural areas: the Blue Crane Route, Witzenberg, Langeberg and Breede Valley Local Municipalities
8. Dying by degrees: activist experiences of the right to protest
9. The police and the right to protest 10. Riot porn: media coverage of protests in South Africa
11. Organic crisis: trends emerging from the protest data.