Podcast: Mugabe’s murky legacy

Posted on May 19, 2023 by criticalsouthblog

Lawrence Hamilton is the SA UK Bilateral Chair in Political Theory, based at the Universities of theWitwatersrand and Cambridge. He contributes to rethink political theory from and for the Global South. His works include Amartya Sen (2019), Freedom is Power (2014) and The Political Philosophy of Needs (2003).

In this month’s podcast Professor Lawrence Hamilton interviews Professor David Moore on his new book Mugabe’s Legacy: Coups, Conspiracies and the Conceits of Power in Zimbabwe.

Moore talks about modes of production in Africa, corruption, violence and rent-seeking and gives us his views on exceptionalism in Zimbabwe and South Africa.

Robert Mugabe is known as the anchor of Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle and problem child in its post-colonial politics.

But what is the real legacy of his long 37 year rule of Zimbabwe?

Sit back and enjoy!

Africans want consensual democracy – why is that reality so hard to accept?

Posted on February 21, 2022 by criticalsouthblog

Nic Cheeseman is the Professor of Democracy at the University of Birmingham. He was formerly the Director of the African Studies Centre at the University of Oxford. His research addresses a range of questions such as whether populism is an effective strategy of political mobilization in Africa, how paying tax changes citizens’ attitudes towards democracy and corruption, and the conditions under which ruling parties lose power

Sishuwa Sishuwa is a Post-doctoral Research Fellow on Political Parties in East and Southern Africa at the University of Cape Town in South Africa and a Lecturer in African History at the University of Zambia. He holds a PhD in Modern History from the University of Oxford. His scholarship locates current political developments in a historical context, showing that the roots of contemporary democratic politics in Africa lie in the early post-colonial and even late-colonial periods.

King Mswati III of eSwatini, Africa’s last absolute monarch, is facing growing demands for democracy and rule of law. EPA-EFE/Yeshiel Panchia

It has become common to argue that most Africans are not that committed to democracy. Commentators often suggest that Africans care more about development than democracy, and that voters – especially those in rural areas – don’t really understand democracy. They would thus happily trade away their political rights for a “strong man” who can get things done.

This narrative has proved to be durable despite being wrong.

In our new journal article for the Keywords series of the African Studies Review, we investigated three issues. First, is there support for democracy in Africa? Second, what kind of democracy do people want? Third, why are the desires of African citizens so often silenced?

Drawing on survey data collected by the Afrobarometer between 2016 and 2018, we show that strong majorities think that democracy is the best political system for their country.

Contrary to claims that “Western style” democracy is “unAfrican”, we find widespread support for a form of consensual democracy, which combines a strong commitment to political accountability and civil liberties with a concern for unity and stability.

Support for democracy remains strong

Democracy in Africa has come under considerable pressure over the last decade. Satisfaction with the way that democracy is performing has fallen. This is in part due to a decline in public confidence in the quality of elections – how free, fair and credible they are.

We argue that this has only had a modest impact on support for the principle of democratic government, in part because African citizens continue to view authoritarian rule as a worse option. Of the 35 countries surveyed, the proportion of citizens who suggested that non-democratic political systems might be preferable only exceeded 20% in eSwatini and Malawi.

This figure is now likely to have declined in both countries. Malawians faith in democracy was revived by a peaceful transfer of power in 2020. And the people of eSwatini have been protesting against a failing authoritarian regime.

Even in states in which the reintroduction of multiparty politics has been associated with political controversy and conflict, such as Cote d’Ivoire, Togo and Uganda, more than three quarters of citizens say that democracy is preferable.

Consensual democracy

It is, therefore, time to stop doubting that African citizens want democracy, and start asking what kind of democracy people want. We argue that there is widespread demand for a form of consensual democracy, in which a desire for elections and checks and balances on those in power goes hand in hand with a concern to maintain national unity.

Consensual democracy has four main features:

Multiparty elections

We show that the vast majority of Africans support selecting their government through multi-party elections. Three-quarters of those surveyed agreed that

We should choose our leaders in this country through regular, open and honest elections.

Almost 65% also agreed that “many political parties are needed to make sure that (the people) have real choices in who governs them”. Most rejected the idea of one-party rule.

Political accountability

Our article also shows that most Africans want political accountability and the rule of law. Over three quarters of respondents agreed that

The constitution should limit the president to serving a maximum of two terms in office.

Only 34% agreed that the government getting things done was more important than being accountable to citizens.

Civil liberties and political rights

Respondents also wanted to be able to express their own opinions and engage in political activities. Over three quarters (76%) agreed that a citizen’s freedom to criticise the government was “important” or “essential” for a society to be called democratic.

Ugandans in Kenya demand freedom for opposition leader Bobi Wine in 2018. EPA-EFE/Daniel Irungu

This extends to the right of association, with over 60% of individuals believing they “should be able to join any organisation, whether or not the government approves”.

Consensual politics

Strong support for rights, elections and accountability goes hand-in-hand with a concern to prevent “excessive” freedom and competition, lest they lead to disunity and instability. Many citizens worry about violence around elections; they want parties to put aside their differences and work for the common good.

Most respondents were therefore against the use of street protests to settle disputes, even though they often sympathised with protesters’ aims.

The exceptions that prove the rule

There are of course variations in how people feel about these issues, both across the continent and within countries.

Respondents in eSwatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi and Mozambique were less committed to elections, but only in Lesotho did this drop below 50%.

Namibians and South Africans were more willing to trade accountability off against efficiency – perhaps because of majority support for the ruling party.

Yet, what is striking is the consistency of support for the four pillars of consensual democracy across the continent. What does this mean for African politics? Why is this reality not more accepted?

Our article outlines three key episodes in which support for democratic government has been silenced. We also identify vulnerabilities that authoritarian leaders could exploit.

Leaders who can persuade citizens that their country faces a grave risk of violence and instability may be able to legitimise backsliding on democracy – whether or not the risk actually exists. This is a cause for concern because supporters of democracy in Africa don’t always reject all authoritarian alternatives.

Yet, as our study shows, the overwhelming majority of Africans support consensual democracy.

Lazy argument

The argument that multi-party politics is incompatible with African ways of life stretches back to racist colonial officials. It was also used by nationalist leaders to justify creating one-party states after independence. But it is not true, and has become a lazy excuse for authoritarian regimes that are neither popular nor legitimate.

In a decade in which activists have risked their lives to advance democratic causes in Algeria, Angola, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, eSwatini, Ethiopia, Gambia, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe, it is time to recognise that most Africans do not want authoritarian rule.

It is both misleading and patronising to suggest that democracy has somehow been imposed by the international community against the wishes of ordinary people. Instead, it has been demanded and fought for from below.

Nic Cheeseman, Professor of Democracy, University of Birmingham and Sishuwa Sishuwa, Postdoctoral Research Fellow; Institute for Democracy, Citizenship and Public Policy in Africa, University of Cape Town

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Angola’s Constitution is under review: but a great deal has been left undone

Posted on September 3, 2021 by criticalsouthblog

Albano Augustinho Troco is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow under the SA/UK Bilateral Chair in Political Theory. He holds a PhD in Political Studies from the University of the Witwatersrand. His research interests encompass issues on electoral politics, democratization and autocratization studies, secessionist conflicts and international relations.

President of Angola Joao Lourenco in Berlin, Germany in 2018. The powers of the president remain intact. Photo by Abdulhamid Hosbas/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Angola’s parliament recently approved a bill to review the country’s constitution 11 years after its promulgation.

President João Lourenço used his constitutional prerogative to initiate a review process by sending a proposal for revision to parliament in early March. His justification was that the supreme law of the land needed to be adapted to the current challenges facing the country.

These included the COVID-19 pandemic, the need to clarify some issues in the Constitution and the need to prevent some of the excesses from the presidency of José Eduardo dos Santos, his predecessor.

The revision introduces notable changes to the constitution. These include the clarification of the institutional relationship between parliament and the executive branch when it comes to political oversight. The 2010 Constitution was not clear on this.

Other key change is the institutionalisation of the independence of the Angolan Central Bank. The amendments would turn the bank into an administratively independent entity with regulatory powers separated from the president and the administration. It also includes involving parliament in the process of appointing the governor.

Under the current constitution, the president appoints (and can dismiss) the governor. The Central Bank is also administratively part of government and receives orders from the president in discharging its responsibilities.

Another change involves extending voting rights to Angolans abroad.

The changes also seek to resolve an ongoing bone of contention – how local government officials are selected. At present, the party that wins the general elections gets to appoint all the senior executive officials at national and sub-national levels (provincial, municipal and commune/district).

There have been efforts to change this in recent years. But the process has been delayed mainly by conflicting views between the governing People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), and opposition parties. The MPLA views the process – referred to locally as gradualism – in geographical terms. It envisages that local elections should start in selected municipalities and spread gradually to all municipalities. Opposition parties oppose this because it means that the ruling party will continue to appoint officials at all levels of governance for many years to come.

They argue that local elections should be implemented in all the 164 municipalities simultaneously. But that the transfer of responsibilities from the central government to local entities would take place as they get ready to take them up.

By and large, I think the changes being proposed are good. But I am of the view that the Angolan political elite lost an extraordinary opportunity to improve significantly the country’s constitution. The Constitutional Revision Bill fails to address crucial and divisive political issues effectively.

The most contentious of these is the extensive powers of the president, the method for his election as well as the fact that it leaves intact the way that local government is formed.

The extensive powers of the president

Contemporary constitutionalism emphasises the doctrine of the separation of powers. This means that the three arms of the state (executive, legislative, and judicial) are kept separate, while having certain powers to check and balance the powers of the other branches so that no arm of the state dominates.

Angola’s current political arrangement – as prescribed by the constitution – doesn’t match up to this. A raft of these flaws aren’t addressed in the amendments.

The Angolan constitution ascribes a wide range of executive powers to the president. It gives the position preeminence over the legislative and judicial arms of the state.

For instance, as the head of state, the president is considered to be the custodian of all executive power. Technically, there is no government but the president, who holds all executive powers. Ministers serve at his pleasure, assisting him in fulfilling his executive duties.

He can pass laws by decree, which means that he can bypass parliament in making them.

Additionally, the constitutional revision bill reaffirms a 2013 ruling by the Constitutional Court, which effectively prevents parliament from summoning ministers or other members of the administration without the president’s consent.

This results in a system with minimal or meaningless executive accountability to parliament.

The president has the prerogative to appoint the presiding and the deputy presiding judges of all the highest courts. He also appoints (and can dismiss) the Attorney General, the deputy Attorney General, the prosecutors of the Supreme Military Court, and members of the highest body of the judiciary.

Despite these extensive powers, Angolans don’t elect the president directly. This function is ultimately limited to the vagaries of party politics.

This is just one major flaw in Angola’s electoral system which, as currently constructed, undermines voters’ ability to elect political representatives effectively.

Firstly, it fuses executive and legislative elections, preventing voters from splitting their votes for the presidency and parliament. Secondly, it shields the top executive officer – the president – from the direct judgement of the voters.

Lastly, it bars independent candidates from standing for political office unless they are included in a party list that has been cleared to run in the elections.

Efforts to fix at least one element of what’s wrong – the ability for Angolans to vote for their representatives at all levels of government – have run into the ground. Opposition parties, which hold roughly 38% (70 out of 220) seats in parliament, want to see elections held in all 164 municipalities simultaneously. They also want power and responsibilities to be progressively delegated from the central government. This would include taxation, policing and infrastructure spending.

The government, however, believes that not every municipality is ready to take up these and other responsibilities.

The repeal under the bill on this issue doesn’t solve the imbroglio.

A shrewd political manoeuvre

The president has rejected previous calls for constitutional revision from opposition parties and civil society. His announcement of a review, in early March, caught the country by surprise.

From this perspective, the president’s decision can be seen as a shrewd political manoeuvre by getting changes within timelines that best suit him.

The first factor here is that the ruling MPLA currently has the necessary majority to approve any constitutional review alone. But that might not be the case after the general elections scheduled for 2022 when most expect the ruling party to lose its qualified majority, thereby losing its ability to approve the constitution alone.

The second factor is that Angolans will have to wait for at least five years – a condition set out under the constitution – until any further reviews of the constitution can be initiated.

This means even further delays in Angolans being able to craft a constitution capable of uniting them around a common project of society.

This article was first published by The Conversation on August 11, 2021.

Angola’s peculiar electoral system needs reforms. How it could be done

Posted on July 19, 2021 by criticalsouthblog

Angola has a unique electoral system. Its main peculiarity is that it involves voters electing the president, deputy president and members of parliament simultaneously with a single mark on a single ballot paper.

This has a negative impact on the quality of the country’s representative democracy. It prevents voters from voting differently for the president and members of parliament. And it reduces the ability of voters to hold elected representatives to account besides keeping them in office, or voting them out every five years.

Hence, the need for reform.

An alternative electoral system would have the following components. It should provide for the direct election of the president. And it should allow for the representation of Angolan communities abroad. In addition, seats in the legislature should be allocated through direct election of representatives from constituencies combined with compensatory seats for political parties in proportion to their overall outcome.

How does the system work?

Angola uses a closed-list proportional representation electoral system. Voters cast ballots for lists of candidates drawn up by political parties. Parties are then allocated seats in the legislature in proportion to the share of votes that they receive at the polls.

This electoral system is used widely elsewhere. Examples include South Africa and Portugal.

The specific variant used in Angola is outlined in the country’s current constitution. It was approved in 2010 to replace the interim constitution, which had been in effect since 1992.

The constitution states that the individual occupying the top position on the list of the political party or coalition of parties that receives the majority vote is appointed president. The individual next on the same list becomes the deputy president.

The 220-member National Assembly is elected on a two-level constituency: 130 candidates from a single national constituency and 90 candidates from 18 provincial constituencies (five per province). The national assembly is unicameral.

Advantages and weaknesses

There are several advantages to the closed-list proportional representation system.

One is its simplicity. The design of ballot papers allows even illiterate voters to make effective choices. It is also fair in that political parties get seats according to the proportion of votes that they receive at the polls.

It also promotes inclusiveness. It ensures that political, gender, ethnic and other minorities are not excluded from the legislature.

But, as a political scientist and a student of Angolan politics, I am of the view that the current system undermines voters’ ability to elect political representatives effectively.

Firstly, fusing executive and legislative elections prevents voters from splitting their votes for the presidency and parliament. This forces them to choose a president and a deputy president from the party with the majority in the national assembly.

Secondly, the electoral system prevents voters from electing the president directly. Yet Angola has a presidential system of government with an all-powerful presidency that exercises executive powers without effective checks and balances.

Here Angola deviates from the norm. In countries that adopt presidential systems of government, the executive does not get its legitimacy from the legislature. That is why it is elected directly by the voters.

Thirdly, voters cast ballots for party lists rather than individual candidates. This arrangement privileges political parties rather than individuals in the political process. This means that, once elected, representatives are not personally accountable to the electorate because they aren’t directly linked to any territorial constituency. Rather they are beholden to party leaders who hold the power to compile the party list.

This results in a massive accountability deficit in the political system.

In addition, the use of party lists bars independent candidates from standing for political office unless they are included in a party list that has been cleared to run in the elections. But giving effect to this is extremely difficult. Realpolitik prevents parties from choosing independent candidates at the expense of party members in good standing.

There is also the practical use of the two-level constituency – provincial and national – instead of a single national constituency.

The adoption of the 18 provincial constituencies, which goes back to 1992, is premised on the idea that all provinces need to be represented at the national assembly. But this does not make sense, as Angola is a unitary state, with a unicameral parliament.

Among Lusophone countries, which inherited this system from Portugal, Angola is the only country that introduced the national and provincial level constituency system.

There are no provincial legislatures and no functional or formal distinction between parliamentarians elected at the provincial level and those elected at the national level. They all represent the whole nation, and should all be be elected from a single national constituency.

An alternative system

The broad literature on electoral systems acknowledges that there is no single best electoral system.

There are several types of electoral systems and each has advantages as well as disadvantages.

A system that best serves democracy in one country might not work in another country. Hence, the best electoral system for a country must be informed by its particular history, social cleavages and political realities.

In the case of Angola, this means breaking with the past to end the persistence of adverse practices. These include the unchecked executive power, concentration of state resources in the hands of a small politically connected elite, widespread corruption, a culture of impunity in which those in authority get away without being punished, and a government that is not responsive to the needs of the population.

In my view, the best way to address these issues is reforming the current system. This would require a return to the direct election of the president by voters and the reinstatement of a constituency for the representation of Angolan communities abroad. This was stipulated in the Constitutional Law of the Republic of Angola, an interim document revoked in 2010.

In addition, the 18 provincial-level constituencies should be scrapped. There is no practical reason for their existence. A constituency element should be added to ensure the direct election of deputies and compensatory seats introduced for the representation of political parties in proportion to their share of the votes.

The resulting mixed electoral system would promote accountability through the direct election of representatives from constituencies. It would also ensure the proportional representation of political parties.

This article was first published by The Conversation on July 5, 2021.

Land evictions and the real power of City rulers

Posted on July 14, 2020 by criticalsouthblog

Laurence Piper is a Political Scientist at the University of the Western Cape interested in urban governance, democracy, and informality in South Africa and comparatively. His latest book is Democracy Disconnected:Participation and Governance in a City of the South, Routledge, 2019, with Dr Fiona Anciano. He is a past President of the South African Association of Political Studies (SAAPS) 2016-8, and a founding member of the Association for Political Theory in Africa (APTA).

The current spate of housing evictions in Cape Town, Johannesburg and eThekwini seems especially malicious, not only because it is winter, but because of the assurance by national government that no evictions would happen in South Africa during the Covid-19 lockdown. City authorities argue that these are not evictions but rather efforts to stop land invasions initiated during the lockdown – a position that national government has endorsed. Whatever one thinks of this defence, it is cold comfort to those like Bulelani Qholani, yanked naked out of his home and left without shelter in the Cape winter rains.

Nevertheless, there is a point to the state’s case. Local government is much more concerned about the loss of land than illegal housing, and these evictions offer an important insight into the kinds of power at the heart of city rule in South Africa and beyond.

As argued in the recent book, Democracy Disconnected, city rule does not work like national government because city authorities are not sovereign over the people and places of the city. Rather they form part of a larger system of government where other spheres directly control key aspects of daily life. When the neighbourhood watch reports a crime to the police, it is engaging with national government. In turn, provincial government is responsible for the hospitals we go to for Covid-19.

It is really only over some basic services such as local roads, refuse collection, and street lighting that municipalities have complete control. Even then, the supply of electricity depends on the national parastatal, Eskom (enough said!). Furthermore, on the issues of greatest importance to most neighbourhoods around the country – jobs, crime, health, education and transport – local government is a bit player. The real policy-making power that impact on residents where they live does not lie with City Hall.

At the same time, our everyday democratic institutions such as neighbourhood associations, ward committees, ward councillors, city officials are connected to local government, which is great if the problem is fixing a pothole or refuse collection, but of little use if the issue is more important. Not having ward based politicians in provincial or national government further exacerbates this disconnect. Hence, in this everyday sense, local democracy is disconnected from the ‘power over’ the neighbourhoods in which people live.

But there is more to city rule than the divisions of powers between national, provincial and local government. In the analysis so far we have been thinking of political power as sovereignty in the western tradition – as the highest authority to make decisions over people and places. Following Thomas Hobbes and Max Weber, this conception of ‘power over’ law and policy is closely associated with having a monopoly on coercive capacity. It is the army and the police that ultimately back up the rule of law, and cities have limited powers over most laws and policies, and a small police force if any.

However, there is another way to think about power that is more relevant to municipalities, and that is the idea of power as a productive force – the ‘power to’ make society, and in the case of City rulers, the power to build houses, roads, harbours, airports, factories, communication infrastructure and so on.

This idea of power as productive is well made in many traditions of political thought, and a famous example is Foucault’s distinction in western history between state sovereignty as coercive control over citizens and state biopower as managing populations to enhance their biological wellbeing. If the destruction of shacks illustrates the former, educating people in social distancing and wearing masks to reduce the transmission of Covid-19 is an example of the latter.

However, in the context of city rule under conditions of democratic capitalism, loosely framed, Clarence Stone offers a more specific and empirically informed account of the centrality of ‘power to’, illustrating that the real challenge of city rule is generating and co-ordinating resources to literally build the city. As Stone argues, in a competitive capitalist system, government does not have all the resources to make the city on its own, and must seek out partnerships with business to build new houses, or malls, or ports, or factories, and so on. Economic policy thus profoundly shapes the distribution or resources among state and non-state actors, creating a massive co-ordination challenge. Consequently, a successful City Hall is one that can create mutually beneficial partnerships with other spheres of state, capital and residents to generate and coordinate the resources to make the city.

And so we return to the issue of evictions. In brief, ownership and control of city land is an important resource, and therefore a key source of productive power for City Hall to ‘steer’ the urban environment. This is especially pronounced across the Global South as high levels of urbanisation mean that cities must grow the built environment to accommodate a burgeoning population. Land is a source of productive power for City rulers in three ways.

First, control of city land also gives cities important influence when it comes to engaging provincial and national government over the building of new schools, hospitals, police stations, power stations and the like. This often takes the form of negotiating the exchange of land or changing land use rights. So important is keeping control of land that the City of Cape Town changed its practice to allow any department to veto the sale of city land, even against the wishes of the executive. This was intended to prevent possible short-term collusion between politicians and their business partners (Helen Zille, interviewed by author 26-09-2017).

Second, rents in the form of local taxes (rates) are a key source of income for the metropolitan municipalities in South Africa, alongside the sale of services, for example electricity charges. A case in point: the City of Cape Town earns about a quarter of its revenue from electricity sales, and about a fifth from property rates. Third, zoning policy offers municipalities a means of expressing productive power by controlling what various groups can do with land in the city – especially through offering commercial or industrial rights for business. (This may be an important, if informal, source of revenue for political parties too).

These three reasons are why land matters so much to cities. It is an important source of much of their power, now conceived in productive rather than coercive terms. Of course, coercive power remains important – not least to protect City control over land as shown by the recent evictions – because it is the access to productive power enabled by controlling land that matters most in the growing urban South.

In conclusion then, as tempting as it is to blame the evictions in Cape Town on the anti-poor attitude of the DA-led City (and to be fair they have some form here), the fact that it is also happening in ANC-run municipalities reveals a deeper cause. City rulers need land for rental income, to create partnerships with business to attract investment to add value to land and to create jobs, and as a key resource in engaging other spheres of the state in building the city. Only once we understand the importance of land to the power of City Hall, and rethink power in terms of production rather than coercion, can we understand the political will to evict poor people from land in the winter cold and during a pandemic.

South Africa in lockdown: COVID-19 information and its inconsistencies

Posted on June 4, 2020 by criticalsouthblog

Candice Bailey is a Political Studies PhD candidate at the University of the Witwatersrand looking into the Promotion of Access to Information Act and how it enables democracy.

SOUTH AFRICA enters a new phase of its ongoing COVID-19 fight this week, loosening the grip on a variety of regulations introduced in mid-March to try and contain the spread of the deadly virus. The latest stage of the lockdown takes place as South Africa marks more than 30 000 COVID-19 cases and close to 700 deaths.

Level three means that most of the economy opens up, a large cohort of workers return, previously forbidden goods such as alcohol go on sale and the night-time curfew is lifted. Social distancing is still a must, as is wearing masks in public and so is vigorous handwashing. Staying home as much as possible is still the best course of action and interprovincial travel remains prohibited, with the exception of business travel and those attending funerals of close relatives.

At this time the government is relying on the public to take collective responsibility for the management of the virus. Providing definitive guidance and information to the citizenry is more important now than ever before. One critical issue is the need for people to understand the severity of this pandemic, how easily it can spread and the fact that even the simple day-to-day tasks we carry out can put us at risk of contracting the virus.

But the concern here is that the government’s track record over the last 9 to 10 weeks with providing definitive guidance hasn’t been great. This may have disastrous consequences for the South African government which should be seen as the most reliable authority on COVID-19 guidelines.

President Cyril Ramaphosa’s initial address announcing lockdown measures put everyone at ease. The public felt informed and in control. But as the lockdown has progressed, Ramaphosa and members of his cabinet have created scenarios of pandemonium. At certain points there has been clear definitive communication on the lockdown rules. On other occasions the public has been left in pockets of vast uncertainty caused by inconsistent messaging and uncoordinated communication. Sometimes the goalposts have shifted. At other times critical statistical information has been left out when engaging with the public.

Some government officials have made about turns mid-regulation, while other ministers have bordered on an authoritarian approach, threatening the public about regulations. There are countless examples. The to-ing and fro-ing of when exactly public schools would reopen, is a case in point. The sale of cigarettes and tobacco products is another. The actions of some soldiers when implementing enforcement can be added to the list. And a clear explanation on why the Western Cape has higher figures than the rest of the country and why its engaged in a different testing model is another question that has not been convincingly addressed.

The other worrying trend emerging is the seemingly reluctant stance of Provincial Government officials in the Western Cape to adhere to national decisions, creating confusion.

Although there are mechanisms that the public could use to comment on regulations, this has also been a clouded issue. It’s still generally unclear how the public can comment on the regulations. Is there a central place where the public can lodge their comments? And what about those in rural areas – with limited access to electronic communication – how do they make sure their voices are heard?

We are in unchartered territory – and to a certain degree the government must be commended for rolling with the punches and taking definitive action very early on in the pandemic’s cycle. But there are times that they have gotten it very wrong. The good thing is that they were able to admit when in practice certain regulations were just not workable and they needed to be amended accordingly. The decision not to sell baby clothing in level 5 is a clear example of how one sector of the citizenries needs were completely overlooked.

COVID-19 will be around for a long time and the only way citizens are going to survive it is if they get information they need – and are able to make informed choices about the issues that affect them.

Renowned Indian economist and philosopher Amartya Sen has published one of the most notable discussions within modern democratic theory on the need for information in democracy. In the time of COVID-19, we need to remember these words and ensure that the information we receive is not only provided consistently, but also that it is reliable and above all accurate. In his seminal work The Idea of Justice, Sen discusses the role that the media plays in society, drawing on the links between the media and public reasoning. He speaks of an informational role the media play in disseminating knowledge, allowing critical scrutiny and facilitating public reasoning. He also emphasizes the importance of “general information” about what is happening where. One of Sen’s poignant illustrations is that of famine. He argues that “famines do not take place in functioning democracies” – and that the media have an important role in this because it points to the protective power of political liberty. Sen says: “When a government is accountable to the public, and when there is free news-reporting and uncensored public criticism, then the government too has an excellent incentive to do its best to eradicate famines.” Sen was speaking about the Bengal famine of 1943 where an estimated 3 million people died.

The COVID-19 pandemic cannot be compared to the Bengal famine. But it is an unprecedented global health crisis with more than 6 million people infected and more than 370 000 people dead. The estimates are that in South Africa, at least 45 000 people will die from this virus.

There are two important points that Sen makes. Firstly, public dialogue about the calamity can make the fate of the victim a powerful political issue which ultimately has an impact on voting. But it is also able to make people take an interest in the matter through public discussion. The second point concerns the informational role, which provides the public with knowledge. What this suggests is first and foremost that democracy has a role in creating informed citizens, and mechanisms such as freedom of access to information can be used by the media to effect accountability.

The ruling of the Pretoria High Court this week shows that the judiciary also has a role to play in ensuring the dissemination of clear and precise information. It must do this by admonishing the government when it errs in drafting or enforcing regulations. The court’s decision to send the government back to the drawing board and focus on drafting level 3 and 4 regulations that are in line with South Africa’s constitution is an indication that its democracy is alive and well.

If the South African government wants the support of the public, they need to clean up their communication act. South Africans expect them to provide clear precise and well considered communication. And they need to remember that in a democracy you need to subscribe to a brand of governance that is citizen-centred. People need to feel considered and listened to. The public don’t want their concerns to fall on deaf ears. They want to feel like democracy is functioning in the face of the global health crisis.

The expectation of the electorate as a collective is not that each individual’s preferences and requests be met, but that the needs of the citizens are dutifully engaged and considered when decisions are made. South Africa has a mixed participatory and representative democracy, but for citizens to truly participate, they need to be well informed. Accurate information gives citizens the ability to effectively live their lives. If the status quo remains and the government fails to adequately share information, our democracy and our freedoms, such as access of information that holds it together, will be on a slippery slope.

Political voice in a changing world

Posted on July 4, 2019 by criticalsouthblog

Manjeet Ramgotra teaches political theory in the Department of Politics and International Studies at SOAS University of London. Her research, teaching and writing focus on decolonising political theory and reinterpreting republicanism in both the history of western ideas and twentieth-century anti-colonial thought.

How we use language and participate in politics has transformed democratic notions. Today democracy is understood in terms of diversity and inclusivity. Yet, although executive and legislative institutions are open to a greater diversity of citizen, the institutions through which we conduct our political lives have not been reconceptualized to reflect contemporary social relations between individuals of different cultures, genders and class.

Many have reclaimed their place within political spaces, yet their voices are often muted and marginalized, especially if they challenge the predominant structures. Often diverse voices are either co-opted into the existing system of power or silenced. Moreover, as executive power becomes increasingly centralized, it stifles voices of change in an effort to maintain the status quo. Nevertheless, those who question the abusive use of privilege are speaking out. Me Too and Black Lives Matter movements unsettle the locus of power and traditional use of authority. This produces conflict in which the powerful use their position to censor and the less powerful talk back.

This article examines how free speech operates in a changing political environment and calls for a rethinking of the institutions that govern, not simply to make them more inclusive but to redress the activity of politics and representation to better reflect the agency of the many groups of people who comprise our society. It argues that the language of diversity does not adequately challenge institutional structures and sees difference stripped of its racial, gender and cultural specificity. Decolonisation, on the other hand, repudiates the language of diversity and calls for a fundamental shift in power and knowledge structures. This includes dismantling power structures that are symbolized in statues, supported through educational curricula and actualized in gender, racial and social relations. How we see power and its embodiment, how we are formed to know truth and authority and how we relate to each other together construct part of the nexus of power and knowledge to which we are subject.

It is not surprising that these are the points at which many currently challenge the foundations of power. Rhodes Must Fall, broadening the educational curricula to include the female and non-white voices that have often been suppressed by the ‘white male voice’, Black Lives Matter and Me Too are all movements that question and speak out against our current power structures. Moreover, each of these expose various articulations of white male power in the public space, in our ideas, in racial and sexual relations. The call for change is thus structural. It is not just about opening up to and including others but actually calling out oppressive practices, reimagining public spaces so as to not venerate historical figures who supported oppression and reading theoretical ideas of the canon critically, especially when women and people of colour are accorded inferior intellectual and rational capacities so that the ruling classes maintain patriarchal and imperial structures. The point is not to take Aristotle or Kant off the curriculum, but rather to interrogate their ideas, to ask what is knowledge and to learn other sources of knowledge as well.

What is the difference between diversity and decolonising?
These two languages shape how we participate in the public space and how we think of democracy. When we use them, we invoke two understandings of contemporary politics: one that expands yet maintains institutional structures and the other that reclaims political voice and transforms.

Although people who enter politics as a result of diversity and inclusion may want to change structures, they can be co-opted into existing structures. Their voice and agency become shaped by structures or silenced. Often they are excluded through techniques that ridicule, consider as lightweight and don’t take seriously. For instance, Diane Abbott a long-standing and successful British MP is constantly ridiculed in the press and abused on social media. Their diversity gets muted and does not effect any real change.

This process reflects the view that the offices and institutions of politics construct power to keep it from becoming corrupt and abusive. The offices remain over time, whereas office-holders don’t. Hence politicians are shaped by the office. Their interests and personalities are meant to be held in check by the structures of power. Political office and institutions mirror a certain type of power and authority embodied in the ideal type citizen who tends to be the white propertied man. Such power controls and dominates change to maintain stability as well as privilege. The process of adapting to the institutional environment reflects the need to be part of a system to advance personal ambition and self-interest. In this system, individuals are rational, calculated and compete against each other, rather than work together in solidarity (Collins, 1994, p.93). This can lead to corruption and neglect of the public interest, whatever that may be at this time of uncertainty as we question our collective values.

The language of diversity shapes the ‘liberal face’ of democracy and inclusion. The language of decolonisation, in contrast, presents a more radical politics of democratisation that gives marginal voices the capacity to change the direction of politics through the recognition of their positionality and epistemic outlooks.

Rather than imposing a liberal universalist model to which one must conform, a decolonised politics would listen to difference and recognize the various needs. As such it would create the space for different voices to speak and be heard without necessarily conforming to a particular model of power. There is an anarchist element to the decolonising project, but at the same time the idea is to evaluate power structures in order to reconstruct them to be more fair and open. In part, decolonising occurs through the recognition that these institutional structures are predicated on a particular masculinist embodiment and understanding of power, that is both patriarchal and imperialist.

These ideas of power are deeply rooted in western thinking and were reiterated in the Renaissance. Power was conceptualized in terms of virtue which derived from the Latin ‘vir’ emphasized manliness, the capacity to rule and (to a lesser extent) be ruled. Machiavelli reconceptualized it as ‘virtù’ and promoted the virile, virtuous and authoritative prince who possessed the rational, strategic and physical capacities to dominate over irrational, unpredictable and constantly changing circumstances. These capricious and volatile circumstances were associated with the feminine and embodied in the Goddess Fortuna. In this understanding of power, domination of the masculine over the feminine gets played out in gender, class and racial relations where women, lower classes and the non-white are seen to be irrational, unruly and volatile. Decolonising seeks to uproot these power structures that try to mute and dominate change.

Those who hold power never want to give it up, as Machiavelli observed long ago. There is conflict. The powerful use their clout to censor and silence. The less powerful talk back. For instance, Me Too has empowered women to speak out about sexual exploitation in the work place within socio-political contexts that take them seriously and hold men to account. Through this dialectic change may occur. Indeed, to a certain extent it is occurring as new institutions that address people’s needs and take representation seriously are conceptualized (Hamilton, 2014; Williams, 1998). These move beyond the simple structure of a single MP authorised through elections to act on behalf of thousands of constituents. They are discursive institutions through which the needs of everyday citizens and constituents can be voiced.

The popular voice and political institutions
To be sure, people today have more clout. They are empowered by the internet and technology. More women and people of colour run for office and are changing the demographic of the legislature, but as this happens the executive power is becoming more centralized. Those who theorised about the doctrine of the separation and balance of powers worried that not only could the power of one become absolute, but also that the legislative power as the voice of the people had the tendency to become despotic.

Thinkers such as Montesquieu therefore argued for an executive veto over both branches of the legislative power to ward against the abuse of power. To Montesquieu, individual freedom could be secured only if the executive and legislative branches of power were completely separated as institutions and an independent judiciary were established. In this manner, power would be neither absolute nor arbitrary. The executive power would execute laws that were established by the upper chamber of the legislature and ratified by the lower chamber. In the absence of contestation, the people’s representatives who occupied the lower chamber were considered to consent to the laws. This separation of executive from legislation power guaranteed the individual liberty to live in security and as one wants within the bounds of the laws. It provided the political conditions for the freedom of speech.

This configuration of power maintained the social hierarchy between the landed aristocratic classes and the wealthiest ranks of the popular social classes. The nobles sat in the upper legislative chamber and the people in the lower chamber. The institutions were structured to accommodate the propertied social classes. After much struggle, the working classes, men of colour, and, finally, women got the vote. Although the structures eventually accommodated people on the margins, these had been built on a particular understanding of political power. They were established in part to regulate class relations and social conflict between the nobles and people.

Today, our social and political relations are more complex. Our institutional structures do not adequately mediate conflictual relations that arise from racial, gender and social difference. Rather we aim to minimize difference so that it does not matter as we are all equal and blind to difference. The voices of the marginalized get suppressed or are less well regarded and heard in the light of the grammar of white male power and authority. In my view, this is the case because our institutions from the family to the state are proving to be incapable of dealing with difference and relinquishing power.

Free speech and silence
The need for decolonisation is pertinent in struggles for liberation where different voices get pitted against each other and absorbed into existing power structures rather than finding opportunity to dismantle those structures and construct them anew.

I was struck by an observation that bell hooks made regarding black American women who in the nineteenth century reclaimed their public voice and fought for the right to vote. Unfortunately, white feminist and black men’s movements for suffrage alienated these women. Black women were part of neither movement for to be on the side of women was to abandon the struggles against slavery and racial oppression. To be on the side of the men was to support the patriarchy and abandon women’s struggles. Neither movement sought to secure the rights of black women. Yet black women were activists, writers and thinkers. Their activism and voice were silenced. In her book Ain’t I a Woman? bell hooks asks why are black women silent? She eloquently relates this to the silence of the oppressed, which is a “profound silence engendered by resignation and acceptance of one’s lot” (hooks, 1982, p.1). Resignation indicates the feeling of powerlessness against the structures and systems of power and acceptance indicates passive obedience, which maintains the predominant system in place. To bell hooks, this is an indication of the “sexist, racist socialization” that made black women feel that their interests were not worth fighting for, that the only option they had was submission (hooks, 1982, pp.7-9). This is an extraordinary conclusion and powerful reflection of how the struggles of others took precedence over those of some, how sexist and racist oppression have the effect of making black women feel so powerless as to not talk back to power.

I end on this note to reiterate that the object of decolonisation of power and knowledge structures is not make our world more colourful, as it were. Rather it is to give voice to those who have been silenced and oppressed by the structures and institutions that uphold white upper-class masculinist powers. These include the visible manifestations of their power in the statues of public squares, the theoretical voices that pervade our systems of knowledge and education and the assumption that by virtue of their epistemic and authoritative status, they can exploit and dominate the less powerful.

Speech is shaped by the language and discourse we use to construct meaning. As such it is not free. If we want freedom of thought and expression, we must decolonise to reconstruct our democratic institutions to share power and voice across different genders, races and classes according to egalitarian and non-dominatory concepts of power and knowledge.

Acknowledgement I wish to thank Catherine Davidson, Dick Blackwell, Alison Scott-Baumann, Michael Elliott and Lawrence Hamilton for constructive and thought provoking comments.

References

Collins, Patricia Hill (1994) “The Social Construction of Black Feminist Thought” in ed. Mary Evans, The Woman Question. London: Sage Publications, pp.82-103.
Hamilton, Lawrence (2014) Freedom is Power: Liberty through Political Representation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
hooks, bell (1982) Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism. London: Pluto Press.
Williams, Melissa (1998) Voice, Trust, and Memory: Marginalized Groups and the Failings of Liberal Representation. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Let’s not kill all the populists

Posted on April 24, 2019 by criticalsouthblog

Bright Nkrumah is a Postdoctoral Researcher whose research interests include populism, constitutionalism, socioeconomic rights, peace and security, good governance, resistance, freedom and democratization.

Why we need to address the challenges that come with an upsurge of populism in the Global South

Dick the Butcher is one of the lesser known characters in the second part of Shakespeare’s trilogy about Henry VI. As a member of the gang of Jack Cade, who is a pretender to the throne, Dick often makes amusing and highly comedic statements. As a Grade 5 pupil, he lobbies his mates for class prefect position, promising shorter class days and delicious lunches. Cade (in the comic relief part of the play) makes vain boasts about how he’d provide free food and drinks for everyone, how drinking light beer would be a crime and a penny would buy seven half-penny loaves. Dick’s ultimate sell is: ‘The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers’. To this henchman, this is the best way to address societal problems and improve the country.

This claim of the mutually intrinsic linkage between lawyers and lawlessness is significant in the context of populist movements. To some they are seen as a threat to democracy and the primary source of social disintegration (Canovan 1999; Canovan 2004). Thus, in light of this negative connotation, should the Global South heed the advice of Dick and ‘kill’ all populists with moral condemnation and demonization? No!

To reverse the populist evolution, it is vital to adopt an analytical viewpoint and cast aside the simplistic account of the media that presents populism as simply irrationality, utopian thinking or mob rule.

Populism can simply be defined as a means of constructing a political frontier by dividing society into two antagonistic groups: the ‘people’ against corrupt ‘elite’. To be exact, it is the rhetoric of ‘us’ versus ‘them’. Given that the composition of both groups is not clearly delineated, it is vital to distinguish between the different kinds of populism.

The rise of populist movements in the Global South should be seen against the backdrop of contemporary liberal-democratic politics. This was triggered by the compromise reached between the parties of the centre-left and centre-right on the notion that neoliberal globalization has no other substitute. By complying with the demands of international financial institutions such as the IMF’s structural adjustment programmes, key democratic concepts such as parliamentary sovereignty and popular sovereignty, which allows people to influence public policy, have not only been drastically watered down but abandoned. In recent years, any reference to ‘democracy’ in the Global South merely refers to the protection of human rights and conduct of elections. These developments (marked by a form of regulation of Capitalism) has resulted in massive poverty and glaring inequality. It is, thus, not far-fetched to say the Global South has been plunged into a state of oligarchisation.

Since political and social crisis can be seen as fertile ground for populist appeal, several populist movements have sprouted claiming to represent the interest of the people being ignored by the elites. Notwithstanding some of the strategies these movements adopt, it is vital to acknowledge some of the legitimate democratic ideals some aspire to restore. In South Africa, the belligerent character and combative tone of populist party, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has somewhat eliminated concerns that dominant party syndrome (of the ruling African National Congress) will undermine the constitutional mandate and diminish the independence of strategic institutions such as the National Assembly. It is the lack of a narrative capable of providing a distinct terminology to construct the struggles against our contemporary society that shows that populism resonates in several sectors of our political and social order.

To this end, populism should be conceptualized in a progressive way. It should be seen as a force that enhances and consolidates the neoliberal project rather than one that simply dismisses the issues they have put on the agenda. One would agree that the growing number of supporters for movements such as the Black Management Forum (BMF), the Black First Land First (BLF), the Decolonisation Foundation and the EFF demonstrate that ‘killing’ the populist through moral chastisement has not been effective in countering right-wing populism, especially as it reinforces the anti-elitist sentiments among the popular classes. What is lacking, and urgently needs to be done, is to address the issues they raise, like poor service delivery and state looting. These need different responses, one which is capable of rallying support towards social justice and equality. The best remedy to oppose existing right-wing populist movements and forestall the emergence of new ones is through the development of a real left-wing populist movement.

When the EFF first emerged in 2014, it was often described as left-wing populist (Buccus 2019). But in hindsight this is obviously incorrect. The party’s populism has demonstrated to be more of the right – a mixture of the authoritarian decrees of its 2019 manifesto banning the private sector from owning land and lavish lifestyle of its ‘firebrand’ leader Julius Malema. The feasible grounds to construct a real-left populist movement will be the new social forces that have sprouted from the shack settlements and trade unions outside the ruling party. Besides deepening democracy, this project’s focus should be the constitution of a collective that creates synergy between the multiplicity of political forces and social movements.

Despite these promises, there is a missing link – there is no visible charismatic leader who could unite these forces and progressively articulate the democratic demands existing in contemporary South Africa, or the countries in the Global South. If this challenge is addressed, there is a prospect for this collective to become hegemonic and have a transversal character, especially since several social sectors have been hammered by financialised capitalism.

Contrary to the anti-populist narrative of political commentators and the media who see populism as an affront to democracy, the most suitable political force to recapture and expand democratic ideals in contemporary South Africa and the Global South is left-wing populism.

Buccus, I. 2019. ‘Imraan Buccus: What chance does the ‘left’ have in the 2019 elections?’, First Thing
Canovan, M. 1999. ‘Trust the People! Populism and the Two Faces of Democracy’ Political Studies, 47(1): 2-16.
Canovan, M. 2004. ‘Populism for political theorists?’ Journal of Political Ideologies, 9 (3): 241-252.

What is the point of political theory?

Posted on April 3, 2019 by criticalsouthblog

Lawrence Hamilton is the NRF British Academy Research Professor in Political Theory, Wits and Cambridge. He contributes to rethinking political theory from and for the Global South. His works include Amartya Sen (2019), Freedom is Power (2014) and The Political Philosophy of Needs (2003)

If politics is about who rules whom and how, theorizing about politics seems like a luxury, especially in the Global South, where many live precariously in the daily struggle to survive. Democratic political rule can seem secondary to more pressing needs, such as securing enough water, food, shelter and security. But this is wrong. Politics determines the extent to which ‘basic’ needs can be met, and under democratic conditions it is where ordinary citizens collectively select their representatives who determine the more complex needs that constitute their lives and livelihoods.

If we ignore or remain passive vis-à-vis politics, we vacate the space within which it is decided ‘who does what to whom for whose benefit’ (Lenin 1972; Geuss 2008). This is perilous, for citizen passivity allows the more fortuitous, wealthy, voracious and venal quickly to fill the space and dictate our politics. Our politics then becomes not about our collective, if often plural and competing, needs, interests, powers and ideas, but about the lives of those who thus capture the state. This is no mere theoretical threat, as Zuma’s South Africa, Chavez’s Venezuela and Bolsonaro’s Brazil make graphically clear; as do Trump’s America, May’s Brexit and so on. Populism is a dangerous byproduct of our passivity as citizens. By contrast, if our focus is on the quality of our lives and the powers to secure and improve them, democracy remains the only real contender. It is impossible to see this and improve it without political theory.

This is the case because political theory is the means through which we marshal or invent concepts, norms, ideas to comprehend and thus contest our politics. Like most other things that involve language, politics cannot proceed without concepts and ideas to overcome pressing practical problems: how to hold to account our political leaders; which collective goods require public provision; how best to engage with global political power relations; and so on.

In other words, because politics involves judgements within a particular concrete context regarding our agency, power, needs and interests (Hamilton 2009, 2014a), the existing theoretical framework for our judgements heavily affects how we collectively conceive of the associated power relations, benefits, penalties and priorities. The practical, historical context of concept formation is therefore of utmost importance in politics. In South Africa today, for example, the fact that we use human rights as the main means of thinking about or formatting politics is relatively new. It is also a very bad idea. This is only apparent if we look carefully into the history and deployment of human rights and the deleterious effects they have had on our political power, agency and imaginative capabilities (Moyn 2018; Geuss and Hamilton 2013).

‘What is the point of political theory?’ is therefore a practical question. It is about working out how best to proceed at a particular moment in local, national and global contexts. This is about comprehension, orientation and judgement about our lives’ central questions, facts and values. For this we require knowledge of where we are and where we would like to end up; and judgement as to how best to get there. We also need to understand why we are where we are.

This is no easy feat. It requires capacities that constitute the art of good judgement in politics: a view of the world that acknowledges how our individual well-being and freedom is linked to our collective well-being and freedom (Hamilton 2014b); a willingness to deliberate about everyday facts and deeply held values; the timing and courage to find ways of judging collectively under conditions of likely disagreement; the capacity to persuade others of the collective worth of a proposal; and so on. In sum, the skill individually and collectively to decide when and how to act and what to prioritize. This is not easy, nor is it parochial, something the existential threat of our current global climate crisis exemplifies.

Political theory is the framework through which we acquire these skills and practices. Contrary to received theoretical opinion, this is not just a matter of conceptual or normative clarification. It is about learning to acquire and pass on the craft of political judgement. One of the reasons that democracy stands out in the modern world is because it is the one political arrangement that enables this collective process of (sometimes antagonistic) learning. A lot of political theorists, myself included (Hamilton 2014a), have supposed the panacea lies in innovative institutional arrangements, on the assumption that there may exist an institutional fix for democracy’s deficiencies. But this is wrongheaded; we need more, always and everywhere. Democracy must be constantly worked on, by leaders and ordinary citizens, to ensure it prioritizes and enables this collective process of learning for good political judgement (Cabral 1974; Hountoundji 2002; Dunn 2014). In other words, the health and vitality of everyone’s democracy is, ultimately, each individual person’s responsibility.

This, then, this the main point of political theory, especially in precarious democratic contexts: continually to remind fellow citizens of this responsibility and how best to meet it; and to arm them with the conceptual and factual tools to carry it out. If democracy is necessary for the free, collective determination of individual needs, good political judgement at all levels is a requirement for the health of democracy. Political theorists must guide this political judgement. If they shirk this responsibility, the very existence of the globe is imperiled.

Most political theory that emanates from the Global North does just this as it retreats into the life of the ‘ivory tower’ or actively turns away from the messy business of real politics. Political theorists from the Global South are well placed to resist this ‘flight from reality’ (Shapiro 2005) due to the visceral nature of their politics. They are forced to face the actual politics of their time rather than build philosophical castles in the sky. Critical South is a forum for the expression of this practical, postcolonial imperative. It thus aims to empower everyone to judge well in politics.

Cabral, A. (1974), ‘Análise de alguns Tipos de Resistência’, in Colecção de Leste a Oeste (Lisbon: Seara Nova).
Dunn, J. (2014), Breaking Democracy’s Spell (Yale University Press)
Geuss, R. (2008), Philosophy and Real Politics (Princeton University Press)
Geuss, R. and Hamilton, L. (2013), Human Rights: A Very Bad Idea, Theoria, 60.2.
Hamilton, L. (2009), ‘Human Needs and Political Judgement’, in New Waves in Political Philosophy, ed. Zurn and de Bruin (London: Palgrave)
Hamilton, L. (2014a), Freedom is Power: Liberty Through Political Representation (Cambridge University Press)
Hamilton, L. (2014b), Are South Africans Free? (Bloomsbury)
Hountondji, P. (2002), The Struggle for Meaning: Reflections on Philosophy, Culture, and Democracy in Africa (Ohio University Press)
Lenin, V. (1972), Materialism and Empirico-criticism (Beijing: Foreign Language Press)
Moyn, S. (2018), Not Enough: Human Rights in an Unequal World (Harvard University Press)
Shapiro, I (2005), The Flight From Reality in the Human Sciences (Princeton University Press

Critical South

Perspectives on politics and society

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