The metropolis as incubator: Small-scale enterprise development in Johannesburg

The upgrading and development of the small business economy, and more especially of black-owned enterprises, is a high priority area for post- apartheid reconstruction. The aim in this paper is to examine the urban formal small enterprise economy, presenting new research findings which point to the important and changing role of the metropolis as incubator for developing small enterprise. Historically, apartheid legislation determined that the only beneficiaries of the incubator role assumed by the central areas in South African cities would be white small-scale enterprise. One aspect of the deracialization of space is the recent growth of a wave of incipient black-owned small enterprises functioning in rented premises in the zone of the inner city. A key policy and planning issue is to develop support mechanisms to incubate and assist this new group of black enterprises.