scholarly journals The slippery slope to State capture: cadre deployment as an enabler of corruption and a contributor to blurred party-State lines

2021 ◽  
Vol 25 ◽  
pp. 1-23
Author(s):  
Prof Cornelis F Swanepoel
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Public Power ◽  
Political Policy ◽  
Constitutional State ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Legal Foundation ◽  
State Capture ◽  
Democratic Revolution

Drawing on both legal and political sources, this article scrutinises the policy of cadre deployment that the African National Congress (ANC), the ruling party in South Africa, has implemented, and continues to apply. The analysis begins by recalling and commenting on the only reported judgment in South African jurisprudence that dealt with the political influencing of municipalities' exercise of their public power to make appointments, namely, Mlokoti v Amathole District Municipality & another 2009 (6) SA 354 (ECD). What the Mlokoti case has confirmed is that the legal foundation for the exercise of public power is found in the Constitution and its enabling legislation, and not in party political policy, such as the ongoing practice of cadre deployment. In an investigation of cadre deployment, the article then demonstrates that this ANC policy, particularly judging by its stated purpose, is incompatible with the constitutional State and, instead, enables the rise of the shadow State. Unsurprisingly, therefore, political commentators increasingly observe that, apart from the revelations at the Zondo Commission of Inquiry, State capture in South Africa in fact commenced when the ANC assumed political power in pursuit of the National Democratic Revolution. It is argued that the pursuit of a National Democratic Revolution in South Africa is directly at odds with the vision and goals of the 1994 constitutional pact. Convening a bipartisan national convention on philosophical and other approaches to the fight against corruption may offer a solution. Here, a starting point would be to reconsider the country's anti-corruption strategies to pay proper attention to the ethical causes of this scourge.

South African State Capture: A Symbiotic Affair between Business and State Going Bad(?)

2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kgothatso B. Shai
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
African State ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Undue Influence ◽  
Corporate Influence ◽  
State Capture ◽  
The Republic ◽  
State Relations ◽  
Scholarly Discourse

Since March 2016, the subject of South African state capture has received much attention from the political, business and scholarly community in the country and beyond. The vibrancy of this public and scholarly discourse was reignited by the claims by some politicians from the ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC), that in the recent past, they were approached by the Gupta family (business moguls) for consideration in ministerial appointments. These revelations have since produced a dominant perception that the Gupta family wields an undue influence over the President of the Republic and by extension, the entire state machinery. This extends to the family and friends as well. While the Guptas ‘capture’ the state, ministers and premiers are not directly accountable to them by protocol, but only to the President as a constitutional prerogative to do so. The view on state capture is not uniformly accepted. One notes the discourse is dominated by Euro-American perspectives, purporting to create a misunderstanding of the current trajectory of business–state relations in South Africa. As a theoretical framework, Afrocentricity is adopted and used in this article to answer the following two central questions: (i) Is it a myth or reality that the Gupta family has captured the South African state? (ii) At which point should corporate influence in state affairs be considered as illegal? Methodologically, this is achieved through thematic content analysis on conversations and the prevailing discourses circulating within South Africa.

Stability and Governability the Benign Effects of Party Dominance in South Africa

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-75
Author(s):  
Ainara Mancebo
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
The Other ◽  
Democratic Transitions ◽  
African Countries ◽  
National Congress ◽  
Independence Era ◽  
Party Dominance

A tripartite alliance formed by the African National Congress, the South African Communist Party and the Congress of South African Trade Unions has been ruling the country with wide parliamentarian majorities. The country remains more consensual and politically inclusive than any of the other African countries in the post-independence era. This article examines three performance’s aspects of the party dominance systems: legitimacy, stability and violence. As we are living in a period in which an unprecedented number of countries have completed democratic transitions, it is politically and conceptually important that we understand the specific tasks of crafting democratic consolidation.

Michael Harmel (1915-1974): A South African Communist and His Discourse

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Milan Oralek
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Core Beliefs ◽  
Literary Interpretation ◽  
Nelson Mandela ◽  
Private Correspondence ◽  
National Congress ◽  
Actual Contribution

<p>This thesis explores the life and work of a South African journalist, editor, and activist Michael Alan Harmel (1915–1974), a political mentor and friend of Nelson Mandela. A resolute believer in racial equality and Marxism-Leninism, Harmel devoted his life to fighting, with “the pen” as well as “the sword”, segregation and apartheid, and promoting an alliance of communists with the African National Congress as a stepping stone to socialism in South Africa. Part 1, after tracing his Jewish-Lithuanian and Irish family roots, follows Harmel from his birth to 1940 when, having joined the Communist Party of South Africa, he got married and was elected secretary of the District Committee in Johannesburg. The focus is on factors germane to the formation of his political identity. The narrative section is accompanied by an analytical sketch. This, using tools of close literary interpretation, catalogues Harmel’s core beliefs as they inscribed themselves in his journalism, histories, a sci-fi novel, party memoranda, and private correspondence. The objective is to delineate his ideological outlook, put to the test the assessment of Harmel—undeniably a skilled publicist—as a “creative thinker” and “theorist”, and determine his actual contribution to the liberation discourse.</p>

Michael Harmel (1915-1974): A South African Communist and His Discourse

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Milan Oralek
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Core Beliefs ◽  
Literary Interpretation ◽  
Nelson Mandela ◽  
Private Correspondence ◽  
National Congress ◽  
Actual Contribution

<p>This thesis explores the life and work of a South African journalist, editor, and activist Michael Alan Harmel (1915–1974), a political mentor and friend of Nelson Mandela. A resolute believer in racial equality and Marxism-Leninism, Harmel devoted his life to fighting, with “the pen” as well as “the sword”, segregation and apartheid, and promoting an alliance of communists with the African National Congress as a stepping stone to socialism in South Africa. Part 1, after tracing his Jewish-Lithuanian and Irish family roots, follows Harmel from his birth to 1940 when, having joined the Communist Party of South Africa, he got married and was elected secretary of the District Committee in Johannesburg. The focus is on factors germane to the formation of his political identity. The narrative section is accompanied by an analytical sketch. This, using tools of close literary interpretation, catalogues Harmel’s core beliefs as they inscribed themselves in his journalism, histories, a sci-fi novel, party memoranda, and private correspondence. The objective is to delineate his ideological outlook, put to the test the assessment of Harmel—undeniably a skilled publicist—as a “creative thinker” and “theorist”, and determine his actual contribution to the liberation discourse.</p>

scholarly journals Facilitation and Mediation in South Africa: Three Case Studies

1998 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hendrik Van der Merwe
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
South African ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
The South ◽  
National Congress

In this paper I discuss three case studies of facilitation and mediation in South Africa: 1) facilitation between the South African apartheid establishment and the African National Congress in exile from 1963 to 1989; 2) facilitation that eventually led to mediation between Inkatha and the United Democratic Front in Natal over 10 months from 1985 to 1986; and 3)mediation between the African National Congress and the Afrikaner Freedom Foundation (Afrikaner Vryheidstigting, also known as Avstig) over 18 months from 1991 to 1993.

South African Foreign Policy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fritz Nganje ◽  
Odilile Ayodele
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
South African ◽  
Foreign Relations ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
The World ◽  
Role Conception ◽  
The Government

In its foreign policy posture and ambitions, post-apartheid South Africa is like no other country on the continent, having earned the reputation of punching above its weight. Upon rejoining the international community in the mid-1990s based on a new democratic and African identity, it laid out and invested considerable material and intellectual resources in pursuing a vision of the world that was consistent with the ideals and aspirations of the indigenous anti-apartheid movement. This translated into a commitment to foreground the ideals of human rights, democratic governance, and socioeconomic justice in its foreign relations, which had been reoriented away from their Western focus during the apartheid period, to give expression to post-apartheid South Africa’s new role conception as a champion of the marginalized interests for Africa and rest of the Global South. Since the start of the 21st century, this new foreign policy orientation and its underlying principles have passed through various gradations, reflecting not only the personal idiosyncrasies of successive presidents but also changes in the domestic environment as well as lessons learned by the new crop of leaders in Pretoria, as they sought to navigate a complex and fluid continental and global environment. From a rather naive attempt to domesticate international politics by projecting its constitutional values onto the world stage during the presidency of Nelson Mandela, South Africa would be socialized into, and embrace gradually, the logic of realpolitik, even as it continued to espouse an ethical foreign policy, much to the chagrin of the detractors of the government of the African National Congress within and outside the country. With the fading away of the global liberal democratic consensus into which post-apartheid South Africa was born, coupled with a crumbling of the material and moral base that had at some point inspired a sense of South African exceptionalism, Pretoria’s irreversible march into an unashamedly pragmatic and interest-driven foreign policy posture is near complete.

HUMAN RIGHTS AND THE ORIGIN OF MYTHS OF POST-APARTHEID SOUTH AFRICAN FOREIGN POLICY

2020 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Pablo De Rezende Saturnino Braga
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Cold War ◽  
South African ◽  
World Order ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Iconic Image

The foreign policy narrative of South Africa is strongly grounded in human rights issues, beginning with the transition from a racial segregation regime to a democracy. The worldwide notoriety of the apartheid South Africa case was one factor that overestimated the expectations of the role the country would play in the world after apartheid. Global circumstances also fostered this perception, due to the optimistic scenario of the post-Cold War world order. The release of Nelson Mandela and the collapse of apartheid became the perfect illustration of the victory of liberal ideas, democracy, and human rights. More than 20 years after the victory of Mandela and the first South African democratic elections, the criticism to the country's foreign policy on human rights is eminently informed by those origin myths, and it generates a variety of analytical distortions. The weight of expectations, coupled with the historical background that led the African National Congress (ANC) to power in South Africa, underestimated the traditional tensions of the relationship between sovereignty and human rights. Post-apartheid South Africa presented an iconic image of a new bastion for the defence of human rights in the post-Cold War world. The legacy of the miraculous transition in South Africa, though, seems to have a deeper influence on the role of the country as a mediator in African crises rather than in a liberal-oriented human rights approach. This is more evident in cases where the African agenda clashes with liberal conceptions of human rights, especially due to the politicisation of the international human rights regime. 

American Opposition to South African Apartheid

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
David L. Hostetter
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
African American ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
South African ◽  
Economic Sanctions ◽  
The United States ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Apartheid Regime

American activists who challenged South African apartheid during the Cold War era extended their opposition to racial discrimination in the United States into world politics. US antiapartheid organizations worked in solidarity with forces struggling against the racist regime in South Africa and played a significant role in the global antiapartheid movement. More than four decades of organizing preceded the legislative showdown of 1986, when a bipartisan coalition in Congress overrode President Ronald Reagan’s veto, to enact economic sanctions against the apartheid regime in South Africa. Adoption of sanctions by the United States, along with transnational solidarity with the resistance to apartheid by South Africans, helped prompt the apartheid regime to relinquish power and allow the democratic elections that brought Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress to power in 1994. Drawing on the tactics, strategies and moral authority of the civil rights movement, antiapartheid campaigners mobilized public opinion while increasing African American influence in the formulation of US foreign policy. Long-lasting organizations such as the American Committee on Africa and TransAfrica called for boycotts and divestment while lobbying for economic sanctions. Utilizing tactics such as rallies, demonstrations, and nonviolent civil disobedience actions, antiapartheid activists made their voices heard on college campuses, corporate boardrooms, municipal and state governments, as well as the halls of Congress. Cultural expressions of criticism and resistance served to reinforce public sentiment against apartheid. Novels, plays, movies, and music provided a way for Americans to connect to the struggles of those suffering under apartheid. By extending the moral logic of the movement for African American civil rights, American anti-apartheid activists created a multicultural coalition that brought about institutional and governmental divestment from apartheid, prompted Congress to impose economic sanctions on South Africa, and increased the influence of African Americans regarding issues of race and American foreign policy.

Parastatals and economic transformation in South Africa: The political economy of the Eskom crisis

2020 ◽  
Vol 119 (476) ◽  
pp. 395-431
Author(s):  
Andrew Bowman
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
South African ◽  
Developmental State ◽  
Economic Transformation ◽  
African National Congress ◽  
Business Elite ◽  
High Profile ◽  
State Capture ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Strategic Procurement

ABSTRACT This article analyses the causes, outcomes, and political significance of the inter-connected operational, financial, and governance crises afflicting Eskom, South Africa’s electricity parastatal. These crises emerged in the context of African National Congress initiatives to turn Eskom and other key parastatals into instruments of an envisaged South African developmental state, through increased investment and strategic procurement to support economic transformation goals. Instead, Eskom’s spiralling costs, procurement irregularities and inability to translate increased investment into functional new infrastructure meant it impeded these goals. Its indebtedness became a severe macro-economic risk, making Eskom a precarious nexus for the circulation of public funds, while the cost and unreliability of electricity has undermined South Africa’s energy-intensive industrial core. Intertwined with this were multiple high-profile corruption scandals associated with the ‘state-capture’ controversies of the latter stages of Jacob Zuma’s presidency. The article argues that Eskom’s extreme dysfunctionality results from long-running, and as yet unresolved, contestation of the parastatal and electricity policy more broadly by various interest groups, in a context of an increasingly fragmented political and business elite. This created a range of incoherent distributional pressures and institutional constraints. Rather than a straightforward outcome of corruption and ‘state capture’, this reflects deeper tensions in the post-apartheid political economy.

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