Black labourers extracting sludge.
on a mine near Johannesburg at the height of apartheid in the 1980s.
David Turnley/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images
The life story of Mandlenkosi Makhoba represents the losers in the new South Africa, showing how inequality is produced and reproduced generationally.
The township of Khayelitsha in Cape Town. South Africa has adopted First World COVID-19 responses for Third World reality.
Glaring capacity gaps aside, the failure to curb COVID-19 is not so much due to a lack of technical know-how but to a particular view of the world.
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The taxi industry carries 75% of commuters daily, yet, unlike bus and train operators, does not benefit from government subsidies.
South Africa has among the worst youth unemployment rates in the world.
Employment programmes cannot replace economic growth in improving youth employability, but they play a crucial role in helping them find work.
Persistent rampant povery has been blamed on the compromises made by the African National Congress during negotiations to end apartheid.
EFE-EPA/Nic Bothma
Book sheds new light on the evolution of the economic policy of the African National Congress, South Africa’s governing party.
The 1820 Settler Monument in Makhanda, Eastern Cape, commemmorates the arrival of 5,000 British colonial settlers.
Hoberman Collection/Universal Images Group/Getty Images
It is not hard to see the roots of 20th century apartheid policies in the legacy of the British settlers.
A police officer at a 24-hour roadblock in Cape Town, South Africa after the country went into lockdown.
Photo by Roger Sedrus/Gallo Images via Getty Images
It is rare for a post-authoritarian society to get two chances to reconcile. This may be just that, for white South Africans in particular.
The reporting of South Africa’s first COVID-19 case sparked a racialised discourse that persists.
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We’d all love to know more about our neighbours – from COVID-19 data, census data and other official data sources – but we shouldn’t.
Per-Anders Pettersson.
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While small businesses will be partially cushioned by government support measures, there’s no support for the most vulnerable workers.
Social grants provide an important cushion amid poverty in South Africa.
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Government policies need to acknowledge individual agency as a mechanism for change, while reducing barriers to income-producing activities.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, left, with his Nigerian counterpart Muhammadu Buhari in late August in Japan.
GCIS/Flickr
South Africa and Nigeria need to lead policy debates on long term measures to address migration in Africa.
An electronic toll gantry on a Johannesburg highway.
Shutterstock/Beate Wolte
Politicians oppose toll roads on Johannesburg’s highways, yet they are textbook example of progressive taxation that favours the poor.
Glen Mashinini, the head of South Africa’s electoral commission announces the 2019 elections results.
GCIS
The recent election has shown again that the extremism which worries democrats in much of the world has little traction in South Africa.
A view of Sandton City, the richest square mile in Africa, towering over Alexandra township, in Johannesburg.
EPA/Kim Ludbrook
In matters of policy-making and governing, understanding the systemic complexity of interrelated forces is crucial to avoiding failure.
Women and children at a Red Cross camp for displaced victims of xenophobic violence in Johannesburg.
EFE-EPA /Kim Ludbrook
The action plan offers no information about budgets, oversight, clear standards for measuring progress or accountability mechanisms.
A man offers his services at a traffic intersection in Cape Town. Almost 55% of South African youth are unemployed.
EFE-EPA/Nic Bothma
A national minimum wage could benefit young people who have jobs and stimulate those who have given up trying to find work. But those without work need additional help.
A large number of poor South Africans live in informal settlements.
EPA/Nic Bothma
Initiatives to boost South Africa’s economy could reinforce structural weaknesses without addressing the high levels of inequality.
Pensioner Katherine Boyi, left, with donated blankets and Agnes Makhubela, with donated maize meal, in Doornkop, Soweto.
EPA/Jon Hrusa
Stories from the ground highlighted the unmet needs of people who are vulnerable and who are left behind.
An unacceptably high proportion of children in South Africa live in poor conditions.
Megan Trace/Flickr
Inequalities in the nutritional status of poor and rich have been mitigated through various social protection policies, but children in South Africa remain at risk of malnutrition.