Professor Lochner Marais
Professor Lochner Marais is a Professor of Development Studies at the Centre for Development Support at the UFS. He is also an honorary professor at the Sustainable Minerals Institute, University of Queensland, Australia. He serves on the editorial board of Habitat International and Sustainable Cities and Society. His research interests include housing policy, small cities and towns (mining and renewable towns and cities) and public health, focusing on children. In addition to concentrating on these themes separately, he focuses on integrating them. The main contribution of his work has been to improve the understanding of the social consequences of mine closure, mining's role in creating place attachment and the relationship between mine closure and social disruption. His work emphasises the role of migration freedom as a response to mine closure. He is the first researcher to link mine closure and social disruption; he warns against dependencies on mining booms and identifies mine closure as the sixth phase of boomtown development.
Research interests
- Housing policy
- Small cities and towns (mining and renewable-energy towns)
- Mine closure and social disruption
- Public health, with a focus on children
Selected publications
- Mokoena, M., Marais, L., Masithela, N., Venter, A. (2025) 'Governing housing megaprojects in a South African metropolitan area: The case of Mangaung', Area Development and Policy, 10(1), pp.126-147.
- Ntema, J., Marais, L., et al. (2025) 'The housing market, mine closure and urban management in Welkom', Extractive Industries and Society, 23, 101674.
- Matebesi, S., Marais, L. and Nel, V. (eds) (2024) Local Responses to Mine Closure in South Africa: Dependencies and Social Disruption. London: Routledge.
- Marais, L. (2023) The Social Impacts of Mine Closure in South Africa: Housing Policy and Place Attachment. London: Routledge.
- Marais, L., Cloete, J., Lenka, M. (2022) 'The plight of mining cities in South Africa: planning for growth and closure', Cities, 130, 103965.
- Subramanyam, N. and Marais, L. (2022) 'Making Mangaung Metro: The politics of metropolitan reform in a South African secondary city', Urban Studies, 59(14), pp.2893-2911.
- Marais, L. and De Lange, A. (2021) 'Anticipating and planning for mine closure in South Africa', Futures, 125, 102669.