Understanding South Africa

Understanding South Africa PDF Author: Martin Plaut
Publisher: Hurst & Company
ISBN: 1787382044
Category : South Africa
Languages : en
Pages : 326

Get Book Here

Book Description
When Nelson Mandela emerged from decades in jail to preach reconciliation, South Africans truly appeared a people reborn as the Rainbow Nation. Yet, a quarter of a century later, the country sank into bitter recriminations and rampant corruption under Jacob Zuma. Why did this happen, and how was hope betrayed? President Cyril Ramaphosa, who is seeking to heal these wounds, is due to lead the African National Congress into an election by May 2019. The ANC is hoping to claw back support lost to the opposition in the Zuma era. This book will shed light on voters' choices and analyze the election outcome as the results emerge. With chapters on all the major issues at stake--from education to land redistribution-- Understanding South Africa offers insights into Africa's largest and most diversified economy, closely tied to its neighbors' fortunes.

Understanding South Africa

Understanding South Africa PDF Author: Martin Plaut
Publisher: Hurst & Company
ISBN: 1787382044
Category : South Africa
Languages : en
Pages : 326

Get Book Here

Book Description
When Nelson Mandela emerged from decades in jail to preach reconciliation, South Africans truly appeared a people reborn as the Rainbow Nation. Yet, a quarter of a century later, the country sank into bitter recriminations and rampant corruption under Jacob Zuma. Why did this happen, and how was hope betrayed? President Cyril Ramaphosa, who is seeking to heal these wounds, is due to lead the African National Congress into an election by May 2019. The ANC is hoping to claw back support lost to the opposition in the Zuma era. This book will shed light on voters' choices and analyze the election outcome as the results emerge. With chapters on all the major issues at stake--from education to land redistribution-- Understanding South Africa offers insights into Africa's largest and most diversified economy, closely tied to its neighbors' fortunes.

South Africans versus Rommel

South Africans versus Rommel PDF Author: David Brock Katz
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 081176608X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 385

Get Book Here

Book Description
After bitter debate, South Africa, a dominion of the British Empire at the time, declared war on Germany five days after the invasion of Poland in September 1939. Thrust by the British into the campaign against Erwin Rommel’s German Afrika Korps in North Africa, the South Africans fought a see-saw war of defeats followed by successes, culminating in the Battle of El Alamein, where South African soldiers made a significant contribution to halting the Desert Fox’s advance into Egypt. This is the story of an army committed somewhat reluctantly to a war it didn’t fully support, ill-prepared for the battles it was tasked with fighting, and sent into action on the orders of its senior alliance partner. At its heart, however, this is the story of men at war.

African Nationalism from Apartheid to Post-Apartheid South Africa

African Nationalism from Apartheid to Post-Apartheid South Africa PDF Author: Ellen WesemŸller
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 3898214982
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 122

Get Book Here

Book Description
With the help of discourse analysis and ideology critique, Ellen Wesemüller establishes a theoretical framework to analyze African nationalism in apartheid and post-apartheid South Africa. Following the constructivist school of thought, the study adopts the assumption that nations are "imagined communities" which are built on "invented traditions". It shows that historically and analytically, there are two distinct concepts of nationalism: "constitutional" and "ethnic" nationalism. These concepts can be retraced in South Africa where they form the central antagonism of black political thought. The study of post-apartheid African nationalism is placed in its historical perspective by focusing on the major milestones of African National Congress' discourse before and during apartheid. It demonstrates that throughout its history, the ANC was characterized by the rivalry between concepts of "constitutional" and "ethnic" nationalism. While the former concept found its counterpart in Charterism, the latter was adopted by African nationalism. Though the ANC in its majority embraced Charterism, it continually played with the appeal of an exclusive, racial nationalism. The theoretical and historical contextualization of the book allows for the investigation of the various dimensions of current ANC discourse on African nationalism. Wesemüller analyses different concepts of nationalism employed by the ANC and compares these models to those discussed in academic literature. She concludes that in post-apartheid South Africa, the historical dichotomy of Africanist and Charterist nationalism persists within the ANC. While early concepts of nationalism like Mandela's "rainbow nation" and Mbeki's "I am an African" paid tribute to Charterism, the discourses on the "African Renaissance" and Mbeki's "two-nation" address at least leave openings for Africanist interpretations. Furthermore, the analysis shows that nationalism is not only a product of discourse but also one of material conditions. The study provides evidence that it is not only the ANC that hijacks African nationalism in order to mobilize their electorate and push through unpopular policy choices. Also, there are compelling material reasons for some South Africans to adopt a nationalist agenda. This is demonstrated by the new "black" bourgeoisie that mediates the gap between rich and poor as well as black and white. African nationalism in this regard serves to legitimate domination and existing relations of inequality. It affirms an African elite while neither uplifting the majority of African poor nor threatening the material privileges of white South Africans. Lastly, Ellen Wesemüller gives an outlook on the political implications of a resurrected nationalism. The effects can be analyzed according to the two promises of nationalism: superiority over "outsiders" and equality between "insiders". Superiority in post-apartheid South Africa is established over other African countries, immigrants and inner South African groups that are considered "foreign".

Going to University

Going to University PDF Author: Case, Jennifer
Publisher: African Minds
ISBN: 1928331696
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 178

Get Book Here

Book Description
Around the world, more young people than ever before are attending university. Student numbers in South Africa have doubled since democracy and for many families, higher education is a route to a better future for their children. But alongside the overwhelming demand for higher education, questions about its purposes have intensified. Deliberations about the curriculum, culture and costing of public higher education abound from student activists, academics, parents, civil society and policy-makers. We know, from macro research, that South African graduates generally have good employment prospects. But little is known at a detailed level about how young people actually make use of their university experiences to craft their life courses. And even less is known about what happens to those who drop out. This accessible book brings together the rich life stories of 73 young people, six years after they began their university studies. It traces how going to university influences not only their employment options, but also nurtures the agency needed to chart their own way and to engage critically with the world around them. The book offers deep insights into the ways in which public higher education is both a private and public good, and it provides significant conclusions pertinent to anyone who works in – and cares about – universities.

Performing South Africa's Truth Commission

Performing South Africa's Truth Commission PDF Author: Catherine M. Cole
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253353904
Category : Apartheid
Languages : en
Pages : 265

Get Book Here

Book Description
South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commissions helped to end apartheid by providing a forum that exposed the nation's gross human rights abuses, provided amnesty and reparations to selected individuals, and eventually promoted national unity and healing. The success or failure of these commissions has been widely debated, but this is the first book to view the truth commission as public ritual and national theater. Catherine M. Cole brings an ethnographer's ear, a stage director's eye, and a historian's judgment to understand the vocabulary and practices of theater that mattered to the South Africans who participated in the reconciliation process. Cole looks closely at the record of the commissions, and sees their tortured expressiveness as a medium for performing evidence and truth to legitimize a new South Africa.

Apartheid

Apartheid PDF Author: Edgar H. Brookes
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000624412
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 190

Get Book Here

Book Description
Originally published in 1968, this volume traces the history and growth of Apartheid in South Africa. The acts which enforced Apartheid – the Group Areas Act, Population and Registration Act are given in full. The book also includes documents which reflected reaction to these measures: Parliamentary debates, newspaper reports and policy statements by the leading political parties and religious denominations. The documents are headed by a full historical and analytical introduction.

How Long Will South Africa Survive?

How Long Will South Africa Survive? PDF Author: Richard William Johnson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 1849045593
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 282

Get Book Here

Book Description
The most up to date and frank account of the developing South African crisis. An analysis of the criminalization of the South African state. A unique perspective on likely future developments there.

South Africa's War Against Capitalism

South Africa's War Against Capitalism PDF Author: Walter Edward Williams
Publisher: Greenwood
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 184

Get Book Here

Book Description
Written for students, laypersons, and scholars who seek a deeper understanding of the roots of apartheid in South Africa, this book focuses upon the relationship between apartheid and capitalism. The author argues, in contrast to prevailing views held both in South Africa and the West, that rather than resulting from capitalism, apartheid is the antithesis of capitalism. In short, Williams asserts, the evolution of apartheid can be seen as a struggle against market forces in order to confer privilege and status on South African whites. Williams begins with a brief overview of South African history, the racial and ethnic diversity of its peoples, and the development of thinking about apartheid. He then highlights some of South Africa's legal institutions, particularly its racially discriminatory laws, and traces the historical forces behind racially discriminatory labor law. Subsequent chapters apply standard economic analysis to apartheid in business and the labor market and consider market challenges to apartheid and governmental responses. Finally, Williams summarizes recent changes to apartheid laws and offers a general discussion of the lessons about racial relations that can be drawn from the South African experience.

Whiteness Just Isn't What It Used To Be

Whiteness Just Isn't What It Used To Be PDF Author: Melissa Steyn
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 079149005X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 272

Get Book Here

Book Description
Winner of the 2002 Outstanding Book Award presented by the International and Intercultural Communication Division of the National Communication Association The election of 1994, which heralded the demise of Apartheid as a legally enforced institutionalization of "whiteness," disconnected the prior moorings of social identity for most South Africans, whatever their political persuasion. In one of the most profound collective psychological experiences of the contemporary world, South Africans are renegotiating the meaning of their social positionalities. In this book, Melissa Steyn, herself a white South African, grapples with what it means to be white, reflecting on events in her past that still resonate with her today. Her research includes discourse with more than fifty white South Africans who are faced with reinterpreting their old selves in the light of new knowledge and possibilities. Framed within current debates of postcolonialism and postmodernism, "Whiteness Just Isn't What It Used To Be" explores how the changes in South Africa's social and political structure are changing the white population's identity and sense of self.

A Country Unmasked

A Country Unmasked PDF Author: Alex Boraine
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780195718058
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 466

Get Book Here

Book Description
The remarkable story of South Africa's "Truth and Reconciliation Commission" chronicles that country's journey towards national unity in the wake of Apartheid.