The Cape Area Study (CAS)

The CSSR is committed to conducting surveys in the Cape Town area as part of what we originally called the "Cape Area Study" (or CAS, all too easily confused with our panel study, CAPS). These surveys have covered and will continue to cover a wide range on topics. Over time, however, the Cape Area Study will have a quality that is unique in South Africa (and perhaps Africa as a whole), in that there will be a accumulation of data on a focused social setting across a span of time such that the 'whole' is substantially more powerful than the 'sum of the parts'. The Cape Area Study is modelled on the Detroit Area Study, conducted annually for over fifty years by the University of Michigan, and is linked to area studies run in other cities around the world through the 'Social Hubble' project.

The first surveys in the Cape Area Study series were:

CAS1: A survey focused on labour market behaviour conducted in parts of Cape Town in 2000 (the 'Khayelitsha/Mitchell's Plain Study')
CAS2: A household survey conducted as part of wave 2 of CAPS in 2002
CAS3: A small survey of social and political attitudes and behaviour in 2003
CAS4: Re-interviews with many of the KMPS respondents in 2004

The CSSR is committed to putting data from the Cape Area Study series into the public domain as quickly as possible, so as to facilitate better research and informed policy-making in Cape Town.

We are currently planning CAS5, which will comprise a further survey of social and political attitudes and behaviour, conducted in association with the Belo Horizonte Area Study in the Brazilian city of Belo Horizonte (as part of the Social Hubble project). The survey will also include modules examining perceptions of colour and race, crime and security. The survey will probably go into the field at the beginning of 2005.