South Africa’s governing ANC has always seen economic growth as the driving force for change. This was wishful thinking as the damage done by apartheid will take far more to undo.
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Articles on South African politics
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Democracy and good governance require politicians to engage in reasoned debate, informed decision making and measured judgements. This presupposes rationality. Is this always true?
To honour the legacy of Nelson Mandela, South Africa could do with its citizens becoming more active in driving development - particularly efforts to tackle poverty an inequality.
South Africa’s governing ANC appears to have lost claim to being a leader of society. This is clear from the outcome of its policy conference.
The policy conference of South Africa’s governing ANC will be remembered for a party in disarray, plagued with internal dissent.
Policy conferences of South Africa’s governing ANC have been about economic policy matters. But more recently organisational renewal has also dominated, as the party loses support.
Has South Africa’s constitutional project failed? Is the country’s constitution an obstacle to meaningful redistribution and land reform?
The possibility that South Africa’s ruling ANC could lose power in 2019 runs like a tragic thread through its policy conference documents. It agrees that its actions have repelled many supporters.
Documents released ahead of the policy conference of South Africa’s embattled governing ANC show it hasn’t the guts or internal balance of forces, for self-correction and renewal.
With the ANC in crisis, the Democratic Alliance seemed to be getting it right. But then came a flurry of inexplicably tactless tweets.
South Africa’s National Prosecuting Authority has failed to pursue members of the executive. But a separate prosecuting body assigned only political cases could be the answer.
Recent events suggest that South Africa’s government may be resorting to short-term measures to pacify anger over lack of housing. But what’s needed is a major overhaul of the housing policy.
The state of democracy isn’t looking good in southern Africa – but these countries’ Western ‘partners’ don’t really seem to care.
The internal processes of South Africa’s ruling ANC for electing the president is distorted by money, patronage, factionalism and vote-rigging. It negates the democratic legitimacy the party claims.
South Africa’s Constitutional Court has the difficult task of deciding whether MPs can have the protection of a secret ballot when voting whether to fire President Zuma or not.
President Jacob Zuma’s grounds for appeal are surreal. He invokes the meaning of a rule set by the apartheid context he ferociously fought against, to justify his executive action in a democracy.
Protests in South Africa are about more than just service delivery of basic services such as water and electricity. They reflect a wider crisis about the failure to build a more equitable society.
Although South Africa has taken steps to rid itself of the apartheid-era view of marriage as only heterosexual and monogamous, discrimination against religious marriages persist.
A civil society organisation, OGOD, wants South Africa’s public schools to stop calling themselves Christian and to outlaw their religious practices.
Today’s ANC is in terrible shape – but it wasn’t Jacob Zuma who put it on the wrong track.
Top contributors
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Political Scientist, University of the Western Cape
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Professor in Political Science, University of South Africa
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Professor of Sociology, University of the Witwatersrand
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Professor of Public Affairs, Tshwane University of Technology
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Professor of Political Studies, University of Johannesburg
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Professor of World Politics, SOAS, University of London
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Visiting Professor and Professor Emeritus, University of the Witwatersrand
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Emeritus Associate Professor in Public Law, University of Cape Town
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Professor and Head of Department of Political and Conflict Studies, Nelson Mandela University
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Chief Research Specialist in Democracy and Citizenship at the Human Science Research Council and a Research Fellow Centre for African Studies, University of the Free State
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Lecturer in Politics and International Relations, University of Leicester
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Professor of Urban Governance, University of the Witwatersrand
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Distinguished Reserach Professor, Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, University of the Witwatersrand
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Professor of Digital Society, University of Glasgow
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Associate Professor: Department of Systematic Theology and Ecclesiology, head of the Unit for Moral Leadership, Stellenbosch University
