Property, Redress and the Reproduction of Racialised Advantage in Democratic South Africa South Africa’s democratic achievement contains an unresolved contradiction. The country established political equality without dismantling the material order produced by conquest, dispossession and racial hierarchy. It created a common citizenship, but inherited an economy and a geography that [...]
President Thabo Mbeki’s anniversary address offered SAAPAM more than praise: it challenged members to protect the Association’s intellectual integrity, professional standards, and developmental purpose, fostering pride and a shared sense of purpose among members. An honour that also carried an obligation At SAAPAM’s 25th anniversary—marking its institutional lineage as successor [...]
“It is in your hands to make of our world a better one for all.” — Nelson Mandela South Africa’s democracy is not collapsing in one dramatic gesture. It is fraying in the ordinary places where citizens first test whether the state still hears them: the ward office, the municipal [...]
“Historically excluded South Africans…are tired of standing at the touchlines to witness a game that they should be playing. They want to do things for themselves and all by themselves.” Steve Biko, I Write What I Like South African black business leaders have increasingly criticised the post-1994 political settlement for [...]
To my beloved family and dear friends: today, 25th September 2026. I celebrate life with a full heart. My mother told me that I was born on this very date, a Saturday, in the early hours of the morning—at our home, “ko-12715” Itsuseng Street, Mamelodi East, PO Rethabile, 0122. That [...]
State Power, Coalition Accountability and the Burden of Democratic Renewal Abstract: This essay examines the African National Congress as a layered historical formation whose contemporary electoral challenges stem from the unfinished transformation of liberation memory into democratic accountability. It argues that the ANC’s evolution from a petitioning body into a [...]
Summary This rejoinder responds to Dr Zamani Saul’s article, Collapse of COSATU's 15th National Congress is Due to Union Leadership's Political Elitism and the ANC/SACP Gridlock, published on 19 September 2026. While Dr Saul’s article correctly identifies the degeneration of sections of trade union leadership into a political elite and [...]
"He is a dreamer; let us leave him: pass" Julius Caesar. Every political formation has its appointed hour: a moment when accumulated contradictions stop being background noise and become the sound of an approaching rupture. For the Tripartite Alliance, that hour may well be 2029. The warning signs are not [...]
“As long as many of our people still live in utter poverty, as long as children still live under plastic covers, as long as many of our people are still without jobs, no South African should rest and wallow in the joy of freedom.” Nelson Mandela, 26 June 1996. Whether [...]
“It is the episteme of what you are about which makes you sustainable” Steve Biko occupies a singular place in South African political thought because he understood that politics is never only a contest over institutions, policies or offices. It is also a struggle over consciousness: over how a people [...]
