The Limits of “Good Law”: Civil Society Regulation in South Africa and Ethiopia

At the end of apartheid, the South African government adopted laws regulating civil society that are widely seen as “good” laws: laws designed to encourage and facilitate a thriving civil society sector. In 2019 the Ethiopian government repealed the repressive, decade-old Charities and Societies Proclamation and replaced it with a much more open and permissive regulatory system, also aimed at facilitating a thriving civil society sector. This article compares South Africa's post-apartheid civil society organization (CSO) laws with Ethiopia's 2019 law, to examine the different and overlapping ways in which these regimes attempt to advance the interests of CSOs against an historical background of state oppression. In doing so, it examines what “good” regulation of CSOs constitutes in practice and finds that there are significant limits to the effectiveness of regulatory change in addressing the many, complex problems CSOs face, especially in the wake of political and legal oppression.

Implementation of Big Data Analytics for Government Enterprise

Within the South African government, there is an increasing amount of data. The problem is that the South African government is struggling to employ the concept of big data analytics (BDA) for the analysis of its big data. This could be attributed to know-how from both technical and nontechnical perspectives. Failure to implement BDA and ensure appropriate use hinders government enterprises and agencies in their drive to deliver quality service. A government enterprise was selected and used as a case in this study primarily because the concept of BDA is new to many South African government departments. Data was collected through in-depth interviews. From the analysis, four factors—knowledge, process, differentiation, and skillset—that can influence implementation of BDA for government enterprises were revealed. Based on the factors, a set of criteria in the form of a model was developed.

International patent applications and innovation in South Africa

Background: Experts recommend support to patents for stimulating innovation. Also, the South African government supports patents, in particular, international patents. In this paper it is examined how this strategy can be designed to successfully trigger economic progress.Aim: The present South African activities in patents are investigated in this paper and areas identified where an intensification of patenting looks promising for economic progress.Setting: The patent activities since 1985 are analysed and compared to the annual export–import balance from 2009 to 2018, in order to identify starting points for improving economic structures. The data are linked to current suggestions to the National Advisory Council on Innovation (NACI) for future technologies.Methods: The analysis of patents is performed, using the international patent database PATSTAT, as well as the analysis of the export–import balance at the WITS database of the World Bank.Results: The patent analysis reveals a low level of South African domestic patents, with a focus on less complex goods and a stagnation period of 35 years. The data on the export – import balance show negative figures for consumer goods and even more so for capital goods.Conclusion: Economic progress can be accelerated by stimulating patent and economic activities to produce more complex consumer and capital goods. However, it may be necessary to focus on certain areas at the beginning in order to achieve a sufficient critical mass of competence and international competitiveness. In any case, the support of patents is only successful when it is closely linked to a strategy regarding technology.

South Africa and the Fourth Industrial Revolution

The Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) is widely predicted to transform what have been manual-labour-dominated sectors in the production of goods and offering of services while driving wages down. South Africa is largely no exception, although we also note some unevenness and contradictory trends in this chapter. 4IR also presents numerous opportunities for the South African government, businesses, and consumers in terms of economic growth, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness. We conduct a review of recent trends in the 4IR worldwide and focus on such trends in South Africa through wages, key sectors, corporate sentiment, as well as government expenditure in research and development. There is indication that the country has a mismatch in the skills being produced and those required by the 4IR, while its GERD is substantially below the global average for 4IR leadership and equitable participation. 4IR Commission recommendations propose reforms, but over them looms the slow rate of implementation due to past poor execution of other plans in the digital and communications spheres.

Measuring the Effectiveness of Environmental Education Programmes in Promoting Sustainable Living in Secondary Schools

Environmental education has been contemplated as the field of study enabling people to live a sustainable livelihood. In recent years, the South African government took an initiative to integrate Environmental Education into all learning areas or subjects. Despite such inclusion, a gap still exists between what is learned in class and what learners are actually doing in their daily activities. Alexander and Poyyamoli, (2014: 1) suggest that Environmental Education is an essential advancement to encourage learners to save, protect and improve the local environment. As a result, the present paper seeks to examine the effectiveness of environmental education programmes in enforcing sustainability behaviours in school children and how it fosters the acquisition of knowledge and understanding, skills, attitude and behaviors compatible to sustainability. The paper employed sustainable indicators as an instrument to evaluation the effectiveness of environmental education programmes in promoting sustainable livelihood. Questionnaires were distributed to teachers, principals and learners from twenty schools in the district. Participants were subjected to pre-test, innovative sustainable living programmes, and post-test assessment. The results of the pre-test portrayed a gap of learners' knowledge, skills and attitude towards their environment, whereas the post-test results confirmed that EE promotes sustainable living when forged with EE programmes.

TAXATION OF HOLDING COMPANIES IN THE NETHERLANDS: A SOUTH AFRICAN OBSERVATION

The South African government has expressed an intention to market itself as a gateway to investment in Africa. This will be achieved inter alia by redesigning certain aspects of the tax laws in order to encourage investment into South Africa in the form of headquarter companies as a special kind of holding companies. The Netherlands has over time adjusted its tax regime to achieve the same goal, viz, to attract holding companies for investment into European countries and globally. Specifically, the Dutch participation exemption and the advance-tax ruling system have been hailed as the key tax instruments that are instrumental in attracting foreign residents to setup holding companies in the Netherlands. Furthermore, the intentional absence of various tax instruments such as controlled foreign-company provisions and exchange-control regulations further enhance the Netherlands’ suitability to host holding companies. In light of the South African government’s intentions to attract holding companies, it is important to study the Dutch system applicable to holding companies to see what attributes, if any, South Africa could also adopt.

AFFECTING FACTORS OF SISTER CITY COOPERATION BETWEEN DENPASAR GOVERNMENT AND MOSSEL BAY GOVERNMENT IN 2019

This study aims to analyze the factors behind the establishment of sister city cooperation between the Denpasar City Government and the Mossel Bay Government since the end of 2019. The author conducted qualitative research to achieve this aim. Thus, this research is expected to enrich other research tools in matters relating to sister city cooperation or paradiplomacy in Indonesia, especially Denpasar. The main data analyzed in this study were obtained through semi-structured interviews with the Head of the Sub-Section for Foreign Cooperation of the Denpasar City in 2020 at the Secretariat of Denpasar. In addition, other types of data that support this research were obtained from the official local government website, several books, journals, reports, and online news sites which reliable and suitable for the content of the research. The focus of this research is to comply with the concept of paradiplomacy and south-south cooperation in identifying the motives behind this sister city cooperation, especially from the side of the Denpasar City Government. As a result, five motives were found that could encourage the Denpasar City Government to accept the sister city cooperation offered by the Mossel Bay Government in 2019, including the international market, tourism and culture, establishing the identity of international partners, the status of government administration, and most importantly, the bilateral relationship between the Indonesian government and the South African government, which in this regards, is an example of the implementation of the South-South Cooperation (SSC) concept. Abstrak Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menganalisa faktor-faktor yang melatarbelakangi terjalinnya kerjasama sister city antara Pemerintah Kota Denpasar dengan Pemerintah Teluk Mossel pada akhir tahun 2019. Penulis melakukan penelitian kualitatif untuk mencapai tujuan ini. Sehingga, penelitian ini diharapkan dapat memperkaya perangkat penelitian lainnya dalam hal-hal yang berkaitan dengan kerjasama sister city atau paradiplomasi di Indonesia khususnya wilayah Kota Denpasar. Data utama yang dianalisis dalam penelitian ini diperoleh melalui wawancara jenis semi terstruktur dengan Kepala Sub Bagian Kerjasama Luar Negeri Kota Denpasar tahun 2020 di Sekretariat Kota Denpasar. Selain itu, jenis data lain yang mendukung penelitian ini diperoleh dari situs resmi pemerintah daerah, beberapa buku, jurnal, laporan, dan situs berita online yang dapat diandalkan dan sesuai dengan isi penelitian. Fokus penelitian ini adalah menggunakan konsep paradiplomasi dan kerjasama selatan-selatan dalam mengidentifikasi motif dibalik kerjasama sister city ini, khususnya dari sisi Pemerintah Kota Denpasar. Sebagai hasilnya, ditemukan lima motif yang dapat mendorong Pemerintah Kota Denpasar untuk menerima kerjasama sister city yang ditawarkan Pemerintah Teluk Mossel pada tahun 2019 antara lain pasar internasional, pariwisata dan budaya, membentuk identitas mitra internasional, status administrasi pemerintahan, dan yang terpenting, hubungan bilateral antara pemerintah Indonesia dengan pemerintah Afrika Selatan yang dalam hal ini merupakan contoh implementasi konsep Kerjasama Selatan-Selatan (KSS).

TRANSFORMATION OF GOVERNANCE IN STATE-OWNED COMPANIES: THE CASE OF SOUTH AFRICA AS A DEVELOPING COUNTRY

The basis of this article is an article published by Thomas (2012) whose objective was to track over a two-year period the performance of five strategic South African state-owned enterprises with regards to issues of governance. These enterprises were ESKOM, South African Airways (SAA), South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), Telkom, and Transnet. The paper revealed that there were serious transgressions in these entities and recommendations were made to address these. The aim of this article therefore was to establish whether or not the transgressions reported by Thomas are still happening within these entities. The data was collected from the 2014/2015, 2015/2016, 2016/2017, and 2017/2018 financial reports of these entities. The study revealed that the transgressions are still taking place. With regards to issues of sustainability SAA and SABC continue to make loses, with SAA continuing to be bailed out by the South African government against the will of the South African general public. Fruitless and wasteful expenditure increased in all the five entities mentioned above and no serious action has been taken by the South African government to hold the people responsible accountable. While Telkom, Transnet and Eskom were making profits these profits are not at the envisaged level.

On the mathematical modelling and analysis of Listeriosis from contaminated food products

Listeriosis is a foodborne disease caused by a bacterium known as Listeria monocytogenes. Humans can be infected by consuming contaminated food products. A transmission can also occur through contact with infected animals or people, however to a less extent. In this paper, a mathematical model for Listeriosis dynamics was developed. The steady states and their stability of the model system were determined and analyzed. The result shows that the disease free equilibrium is asymptotically stable if the bacteria growth rate is less than its removal rate, and also the growth rate of food contamination is less than its removal rate. It was further observed that we can still have Listeriosis driven by the contaminated food products even if the Listeria bacteria population in the environment is very small. The results indicate that Listeriosis can be effectively controlled by removing contaminated food products, which was the policy adopted by the South African government during the recent Listeriosis outbreak.

The Design and Practice of African Constitutionalism

This chapter explores and examines how legal syncretism as a result permeates the design and practice of African constitutionalism. By seriously considering the constitutional structures and rights, as well as their practical applications, the chapter attempts to decrypt the identity, nature, and texture of African constitutionalism through legal syncretism. The chapter explicates the nature of the African state and its various modalities of organization, examines the African government architecture, and investigates the constitutional rights regime. Through a closer look at the texts and contexts of constitutions and constitutionalism in Africa, and building on legal, constitutional, social, political, and international relations theory, the chapter aims to reveal the distinctive features of African constitutionalism. The overarching objective of this chapter is to underscore why appreciating the syncretic features of African constitutionalism is necessary for understanding, improving, and fostering constitutionalism on the continent.