State of the Nation, South Africa 2005-2006 (review)

South African history since the end of the Cold War has been interpreted in several volumes. Some, like Lodge (2002), have dealt mostly with the internal dynamics of politics; others have set themes like constitutional order or ethnic and racial identity against the background of regional and global philosophical discourses; still others, like Marais (2001), have developed the conversation by locating myriad themes within a context of international political economy. The distinct advantage of State of the Nation is that it also locates the specific themes relevant to South Africa within global dynamics that are changing economic structures, class politics, and the character of governance and the state everywhere. This arrangement makes the volume potentially valuable to scholars and activists in the geopolitics of energy and global financial markets, the symbolic politics of sport, the transnational sociology of Chinese diaspora, and other fields. It presents rich and recent data on empirical trends in the aspects of the reality that are vital for watchers of South Africa. In some chapters, the contributors connect their data to scholarly debates and bibliographies pertaining to other parts of the world.

Chapters on the protection of human rights (Govender), the informal economy (Devey, Skinner, and Valodia), trends in labor (Buhlungu and Webster), guns and social order (Cock), Chinese communities of South Africa (Wilhelm), and the political economy of the scramble for energy in Africa (Daniel and Lutchman) could contribute conceptually and empirically to global and comparative studies of other parts of the world economy. However, the central problem posed in this collection is the response of the state to the twin pressures of globalized markets and production, and the urgent demands of workers, unemployed, and marginalized women and men for the realization of the material benefits of democracy. Southall points in his introduction to the debate within South Africa on the prospects for the emergence of a developmental state, given the strongly democratic features of the South African constitution. He examines the historical context of the emergence of such states elsewhere, particularly in Asia, noting the absence of democratic constraints in those places during the Cold War. He identifies the social forces behind an apparent consensus from different ideological perspectives, about such a role for the democratic state in South Africa, and doubts that economic growth and social equity could be achieved together in that model. Besides, inadequacies in the human resources necessary for technocratic leadership of the economy by the state present limits, as highlighted by the chapters on the labor market (Moleke; Buhlungu and Webster), scientific research capabilities (Kahn and Blankley), and the state of mathematics and science education (Reddy).

This analysis raises questions for comparison elsewhere in Africa, and for other times in South Africa itself. For example, do oil revenues in countries like Angola, Gabon, and Nigeria forestall the discipline that seems to be a prerequisite for the emergence of a developmental state? Regarding South Africa, what makes the state shift its orientation to the economy? What is producing the call for a developmental state so soon after the shift to neoliberalism in 1996 and from a corporatist state between 1994 and 1996? This question is not explicitly raised, and so is not explained. Gleanings throughout the volume could contribute to a convergent analysis that would also help to anticipate future orientations of the South African state.

Southall identifies a shift in the pattern of ownership in publicly listed companies, from corporate to institutional investors, or from CEO to fund-manager control of key decisions. This ownership frustrates the state's capacity to steer the economy using incentives, industrial policy, or bargains with firms. It limits the penetration of policy initiatives like Black Economic Empowerment beyond a few black elites. Moreover, as Buhlungu and Webster demonstrate, the whole structure of production in South Africa is changing because of the opening of the economy to global markets, and this opening is changing the basis of...