We are concerned in this chapter with better understanding the ways in which skills development can support livelihoods gained in the informal sector. We apply Carswell and De Neve’s (2018) broadened concept of labour agency in the informal sector and draw on Katz’s “3 Rs” of resistance, reworking, and resilience to understand the agency of informal sector workers. From a longitudinal study of 40 young people who made their livelihood (or part thereof) in engineering-related areas in two urban townships in South Africa, we present a typology of five different types of survivalist entrepreneurs. Our typology underscores the diversity, complexity, and messiness of work as it is lived in the informal sector. It discusses the different ways in which workers use their labour agency to make a livelihood for themselves and their families; the different aspirations that they have for work in the informal and formal sectors and for education and training; and the different attitudes that they hold towards their engineering trade. For some, skills development will be better achieved through easier access to formal learning, but there is evidence of social learning networks that are largely outside the formal system. Any meaningful skills intervention would depend on acknowledging, strengthening, and enhancing the social relationships and skills formations that underpin existing patterns of knowledge flow. © 2025 selection and editorial matter, Lesley Powell, Adam Cooper, Trent Brown and Simon McGrath; individual chapters, the contributors. All rights reserved.
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