Interfaith Dialogue and Social Cohesion in South Africa: A Qualitative Thematic Review of Peacebuilding Practices Across Multicultural Communities
Keywords:
Interfaith Dialogue, Social Cohesion, Peacebuilding, Social Justice, Religious Pluralism, South AfricaAbstract
This article synthesizes qualitative scholarship on interfaith dialogue and social cohesion in South Africa to clarify how peacebuilding practices are constructed, what conditions strengthen them, and where their limits lie. A qualitative thematic review was conducted on a corpus of 42 documents drawn from peer-reviewed scholarship, policy reports, and major institutional texts published between 2009 and 2025, with emphasis on South Africa and comparative multicultural societies. The material was coded through reflexive thematic analysis and organized into a conceptual matrix covering dialogical form, relational mechanism, and social outcome. Results: Four recurring patterns emerged. First, interfaith dialogue works best when it is embedded in concrete social practice, such as youth work, community mediation, or civic partnership, rather than staged as symbolic encounter alone. Second, trust grows when dialogue is linked to justice claims, especially around inclusion, participation, and recognition. Third, faith communities contribute most consistently when they act as bridging institutions rather than closed moral enclaves. Fourth, dialogue loses effectiveness when it is detached from structural repair and reduced to elite-level ceremonial consensus. In South Africa, interfaith dialogue is not merely a communication technique. It is a relational governance practice that can support reconciliation only when linked to justice, shared public purpose, and durable institutional collaboration. The review offers a qualitative framework for researchers and practitioners working on peacebuilding in multicultural societies.
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