An Acute Crisis Adds to Unresolved Chronic Crisis Penelope Engel-Hills 1 and Nicola Engel 2 1 Faculty of Health and Wellness Sciences, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Cape Town, South Africa 2 International School of Cape Town, South Africa engelhillsp@cput.ac.za Abstract: Residents in a community in the South Peninsula of the Western Cape, South Africa live with the reality of unresolved challenges. The women and children of this community face a burden from the prevailing inequality and structural violence that plays out in their daily lives as high levels of unemployment, substance abuse, violence in many forms, food insecurity, high school dropout rates and teenage pregnancy. The complexities of living in this community were exacerbated by the arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic and the resultant lockdown regulations that destabilised all previous notions of normality. The pre-existing social challenges can be viewed as the residents’ experiences of hazards and stressors that have been in place for years in the unequal social structures of South Africa (The World Bank 2022). In this environment, of what can be interpreted as a community in chronic crisis (Dekker et al., 2021), the addition of the acute crisis of the pandemic, posed further cumulative effects on households that impacted more seriously on those who are already the most vulnerable. This paper presents reflections on the stories of women talking about their experiences of the global pandemic to this coastal community. We aim to show the impact on their lives as members of families within their community. The analysis will utilise the phases of a crisis (Emergency Management, 2022) where the pre-crisis or prodromal phase was recognised as life in the chronic crisis of structural violence. The acute or crisis phase of the pandemic became a lens for the effects of an existing long-term crisis compounded by the. The response or chronic phase of the acute crisis was again found to be exacerbated by the existence of a long drawn-out response phase to the chronic crisis. This paper is a window into the innovative attempts by this community to cope with the immense challenges of Covid-19, followed now by the post-crisis (resolution) phase that reflects the ongoing efforts to rebuild the community in the face of the cumulative effects of the pandemic, as but a temporary diversion from the challenges of a continuous chronic crisis. The post-crisis phase remains incomplete, however, a deeper understanding of crisis upon crisis provides knowledge that can assist those implementing social interventions in this community to tackle challenges as a state of chronic crisis for residents. Keywords: Structural violence, Covid-19 a crisis, Social challenges, Burden on women, Crisis on crisis 1. Introduction A community in the South Peninsula of the Western Cape, South Africa faces the daily reality of the injustices related to inequality that exists in South Africa (The World Bank 2022). The challenges faced by those in this community follow the national trend to include, high levels of unemployment, poverty, substance abuse, and various forms of violence including personal and structural violence. Although the girl friendliness index (GFI) positions South Africa as having a government amongst the more friendly in Africa (Fambasayi, 2020), it is also reported that this country has amongst the worst statistics for abuse of children, with rape at levels of more than 25 000 per year and indications that one in three girls experience some type of sexual abuse before the age of majority of 18 years of age (Munyati, 2017). In this national landscape, the women of the community reported on here, carry a collective burden of the added impact of gender inequality and abuse. They experience all forms of gender-based violence, teenage pregnancy, and statutory rape that in South Africa has risen by close to 50% as demonstrated by the number of girls between 10 and 14 years old delivering at state health facilities (Barron et al., 2022). The social challenges existed and then Covid-19 arrived and, as in other contexts across the globe, the challenges of living in this community were exacerbated by the social impact of the pandemic and the regulations imposed. The strict lock down put in place to manage the health care infrastructure and curb the spread of the virus was harshest on those already at risk (Barron et al., 2022). In this paper our narrative analysis represents women’s expressions of the impact of the pandemic and the related structural response on their own lives, their families, and the community. We acknowledge that the existing social challenges are experienced as hazards and stressors that have remained unresolved for years. Through reflection we come to the realisation that this can be interpreted as a community existing in a state of chronic crisis (Dekker et al., 2021). In this already tenuous environment, Covid-19 emerged as an extreme period of disruption which our reflections highlighted as an additional acute crisis, posing further cumulative effects on households already at risk. The stories gathered support the notion that those women and children who were already the most vulnerable in this community were further unjustly impacted by the pandemic. What is not yet fully known is how the recovery phase will play out, what the longer-term impact of the pandemic will be on this community and how this will be experienced by the women as they endeavour to regain some sort of stability in the face of the ongoing challenges of living in chronic crisis. 99 Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Gender Research, 2023