China as a ‘net donor’: tracking dollars and sense

The article examines China's emergence over the past decade as a net donor, and the implications of this status in global development. The analysis begins by outlining China's rise as a net donor, drawing comparisons in two-way aid flows with the other rising states, specifically Brazil, South Africa and India, and then turns to the implications of China's rise as an aid sender. The central argument is that conceptualizing China's rise as a ‘net donor’ is crucial for understanding the hybrid position that China has come to occupy in the global aid system, and the consequences of this positioning. Although China has achieved remarkable success with its own development, rather than join the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's Development Assistance Committee (DAC) regime of traditional donors, the Chinese Communist Party and government leadership has chosen instead to continue to self-identify with the countries of the South, and to construct ties of South–South cooperation outside of DAC arrangements. The Chinese leadership is trying to stake out an unprecedented position in the global aid system, traversing the North–South divide, despite the fact that China has already joined the ranks of world economic powers.     

Towards convergence and cooperation in the global development finance regime: closing Africa's policy space?

The revival of China's interest in Africa is often highlighted as being an opportunity to provide African governments with a choice between development partners that may strengthen negotiation leverage and thereby carve out policy space to define and implement policies that affect social and economic development. This article critically reviews the most recent developments in Chinese and Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) approaches to development finance to Africa. It argues that although we can detect a number of incidents that point towards more policy space for African governments, the revival of China's development finance does not fundamentally alter the power relations between African countries and their financiers, as the tendency now is towards convergence and cooperation between China and Development Assistance Committee (DAC) donors—not divergence and competition, which could have created policy space as it did prior to the end of the Cold War. This follows the trend of other ‘emerging’ donors who increasingly play by DAC rules and thereby minimize the future possibility of playing out one partner against the other.     

European interests in the SALT process

The ambitions of the global South for a larger share of global wealth and political power are at least partly being played out on the African continent. The increasing Africa--South relations seem to indicate a relative decline in Africa--North ties, with the shift in Africa's trade relations from North to South resulting in trade creation rather than trade diversion. The South partners are also providing much needed infrastructure development assistance to the continent. Politically, these relations are formalised in a host of frameworks and associations and operate in fundamentally different ways from those between Africa and its erstwhile colonial masters. It is doubtful, though, to what extent Africa's capacity to influence the global agenda is strengthened, especially given that not a single African country is (yet) a member of the ‘South Big Four’, the BRICs.     

Securitisation from below: the relationship between immigration and foreign policy in South Africa's approach to the Zimbabwe crisis

The political and economic debacle in Zimbabwe has led to a large-scale influx of Zimbabweans into neighbouring South Africa. This article argues that there is a complex and significant link between the domestic response to this immigration influx and South Africa's foreign policy towards Zimbabwe. South Africa's foreign and security policy elite preferred to use an immigration approach of benign neglect as a tool to promote its ‘quiet diplomacy’ approach towards the Zimbabwean regime, treating the influx as a ‘non-problem’. But increased xenophobic violence, vigilantism and protests in townships and informal settlements against Zimbabwean and other African immigrants, culminating in widespread riots across the country in 2008, contributed to a change not only in immigration policy but also in the mediation efforts towards the Zimbabwean parties. I argue that this foreign policy change was pushed by a process of ‘securitisation from below’, where the understanding of Zimbabwean immigrants as a security threat were promoted not by traditional security elites but by South Africa's marginalised urban poor.     

Europe's global ambitions and the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD): of what relevance is the Politique Africaine?

The New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) agreed in 2001 between the G7 and African leaders is an ambitious initiative to resolve the problems of economic underdevelopment, political instability and armed conflict in Africa. Essentially, it rests on the promise of increased economic aid in exchange for African commitment to liberal political and economic governance. This article examines the implications of NEPAD for the EU's policies towards Africa. It argues that the EU's economic instruments are more suitable for tackling security problems in Africa than its evolving military capacity or global multilateral cooperation with African states through NEPAD structures. It is argued that extant structures of European-African relations can significantly impact on African governance processes and their security outcomes only if they can be graduated into ‘constitutive’ forms of economic intervention similar to processes of accession into the EU. Such a modification, based on variegated competitive partnerships, would be consistent with the French origins of European-African relations and maybe possible because of the links between French foreign policy and Europe's evolving global role.     

Mining codes in Africa: emergence of a ‘fourth’ generation?

A burgeoning interest among academics, policy-makers and civil society groups has developed concerning Africa's extractive sector and particularly its mining codes, which are now at the centre of a wider policy debate over natural resource governance and economic development on the continent. This article reviews the evolution of Africa's regulatory codes in the mining sector, which has undergone what Bonnie Campbell describes as ‘three generations’ of liberalization since the 1980s. We also highlight new voluntary, regional and transnational initiatives, driven by a host of heterogeneous actors from Africa and abroad, which constitute a ‘fourth’ generation of mining codes and natural resource governance practices that place primary emphasis on transparency and accountability by both mining companies and host governments. This new generation of natural resource governance initiatives presents new opportunities as well as unique challenges, particularly with the growing role of emerging economies such as the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa). We conclude by assessing future trends and policy challenges in Africa's extractive sector governance.     

Who is (South) African? A re-reading of Thabo Mbeki's ‘I am an African’ speech in the context of the banned (later unbanned) Nando's ‘diversity’ television commercial

Abstract

In 2012 flame-grilled chicken company, Nando's, released a 52-second advert showing people of various races and ethnicities vaporising into thin air, one after the other, leaving a lone San Bushman wearing a xai who declares: ‘I'm not going anywhere. You f*#@ng found us here.’ Broadcasters SABC, DStv and etv initially banned the advert, citing fears of a xenophobic backlash. In 1996, former South African president, Thabo Mbeki, who was deputy president at the time, delivered what has become known as the ‘I am an African’ speech at the adoption of the South Africa Constitution Bill. In the speech Mbeki appears to codify ‘Africanness’ into a consciousness not just of history, but a shared history. The conceptual reach of his speech seems to imply that everyone who may share South Africa's history is somehow South African and African. This article argues that the Mbeki speech and the Nando's advert, taken together, draw attention to the simultaneous richness and poverty of citizenship in South Africa, and the potential benefits and contradictions of claiming citizenship in the sense preferred by the two texts. The context is supplied by a sampling of 22 randomly selected online comments centering on the censored advert.     

Development cooperation,the international–domestic nexus and the graduation dilemma: comparing South Africa and Brazil

Development cooperation is a foreign policy tool marked by deep-seated conflicts of interest and dilemmas of particular relevance to second-tier and non-nuclear countries that aim to change their international status and role. Building on the concept of ‘graduation dilemma’, this article compares specific dilemmas that Brazil and South Africa face in their foreign policies concerning the development cooperation agenda at three levels: the domestic, the regional and the global level. The research question guiding this analysis is: how does the graduation dilemma manifest in relation to Brazil and South Africa’s role in development cooperation?     

The Chinese problem as seen by the WEU

Europe has been the privileged economic and political partner of Africa, but more recently China has increased its foothold in Africa through important financial investments and trade agreements. Against this backdrop, the empirical research conducted in 2007-08 in Kenya and South Africa as part of a pioneering international project investigates the perceptions of public opinion, political leaders, civil society activists and media operators. While confirming their continent's traditional proximity to Europe, African citizens are increasingly interested in China and its impact on Africa's development. Europe is criticised for not having been able to dismiss the traditionally ‘patronising’ attitude towards Africa. While African civil society leaders and media operators describe China as an opportunity for Africa to break free of its historical dependence on European markets, other opinion leaders warn against too much enthusiasm for the Asian giant. There is a suspicion that the Chinese strategy might, in the long run, turn into a new form of economic patronage.     

Media,citizenship and the politics of belonging in contemporary South Africa

Abstract

Drawing on a wide range of theoretical and empirical studies, the articles in this special issue examine issues of citizenship and belonging in South Africa. Questions of belonging and citizenship are neither novel, nor particular to South Africa – they have been high on the intellectual (and popular) agenda internationally since at least the early 1990s. Yet South Africa's history of artificially separating and defining its citizens in the racial regimes of colonialism and apartheid still reverberates today, as is reflected in the continued inequalities marring South African society. Post-apartheid governance of redress still requires the use of apartheid categories of ‘race’, but the terms under which we understand what it means to be South African are much wider, and require continued critical reflection. Using South Africa (and not the global North, as is so often the case) as the focal point for rethinking notions of citizenship and belonging, may urge us to rethink these notions and their meanings within fledgling democracies and societies in transition.     

Brazil as ‘Southern donor’: beyond hierarchy and national interests in development cooperation?

This article analyses Brazil's growing role in external development assistance. During Lula da Silva's presidency, cooperation with developing countries grew dramatically. While the official position is that Brazilian development assistance is moved not by national economic or political interests, but by international ‘solidarity’, and does not reproduce the North–South traditional aid relations, we suggest that it is not completely divorced from national, sub-national or sectoral interests and cannot be viewed apart from Brazil's broader foreign policy objectives. Brazil does pursue political, economic and commercial interests and, concomitantly, has made a positive difference in the recipient countries. However, more empirical research and field investigation are needed to better gauge the impact of Brazil's assistance initiatives and their contributions to South–South cooperation more broadly. During Lula's terms (2003–2010), Brazil could be classified as a ‘Southern donor’, which expresses the country's own novelties, and tensions, of simultaneously being a donor and a developing country.     

The Emerging Threat? South Africa's Extreme Right

In the run-up to South Africa's first non-racial election in 1994, extremist right-wing organizations, and their sympathizers in the state security forces, posed a real danger to the country's future democratic order. After 1994, violent, right-wing extremist activities virtually dissipated. However, during a single night in late 2002, eight bomb blasts rocked Soweto, South Africa's largest black township. An unknown organization, Boeremag (Boer force/power), claimed responsibility for the bombings. Some two dozen alleged Boeremag members, including serving military officers, were subsequently arrested and charged with terrorism-related offenses. The Boeremag makes an interesting case study of how the extreme white right in South Africa mixes politics and religion, and seeks to exploit popular grievances to garner support for the creation of a secessionist Afrikaner state. The South African white right does not have the resources, capacity, or support to successfully execute a coup d'état. The Boeremag serves as a reminder, however, that the extreme right can create instability and destruction on a significant scale in South Africa.     

Centring African culture in water,sanitation, and hygiene development praxis in Ghana: a case for endogenous development

International development aid is driven by actors steeped in Western neo-liberal theory and practice. Africa has largely received failed Western aid, administered mainly through international NGOs in neo-comprador relationships. This article calls for African-centred and -led development, revitalised through endogenous development (ED) praxis. Using a water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) sector case study from Ghana, the article theorises Africa's WASH development within the context of globalisation and the politics of knowledge production on Africa. It shows how ED provides African people with self-determining and culturally relevant development necessary for WASH justice and improved health and livelihoods.     

The meaning of post-apartheid Zulu media

Abstract

This article explores the relationship between certain South African media corporations, growing post-apartheid Zulu media platforms, the size and diversity of Zulu-speaking media consumers, and the historical socio-cultural construction of ‘Zuluness’. This relationship, this author observes, manifests largely through media corporations’ increasing recognition of Zulu people's pride in Zulu (i.e. the language) and ‘Zuluness’ – all of which are historical products of various forms of socialisation. Coopting this pride, profit-driven media corporations are commodifying Zulu and ‘Zuluness’. This commodification via the establishment of Zulu media outlets is paradoxical: 1) it is a transformation of a public and open Zulu cultural sense of ‘being’ into institutionally determined commodities exchangeable for revenue, for the ultimate benefit of media owners other than the masses of Zulus themselves; 2) it is a form of commoditisation that gives Zulu a linguistic profile that has historically been accorded only to English and Afrikaans. This article's argument is further briefly articulated through various intellectual frames: Graham Murdoch and Peter Golding's conceptualisation of critical political economy of communications and culture (2005); John and Jean Comaroff's anthropological analysis of commercialisation of ethnicity (2009); and, for South African specificity and precedent, through Herman Wasserman's reading of Afrikaans media corporations’ commercialisation of Afrikaans language and identity. Then the question is: What does the explored relationship mean for South Africa's multilingualism?     

THE PROOF IS IN THE PUDDING: (RE)CONSIDERING THE EXCELLENCE OF ACTIVISM IN THE SOUTH AFRICAN MINING INDUSTRY

ABSTRACT

One of the greatest changes organisations in South Africa experienced through the country's democratisation is the introduction of ‘legitimate’ activism in organisational settings. Organisational communication literature – specifically as manifest in the excellence theory – compounded this through views on the potentially positive impact activism could have on organisations by ‘pushing’ them beyond equilibrium to a state of dynamic equilibrium – mediated through strategic and effectual communication. This view, however, is somewhat fouled by occurrences such as those at Marikana, and concomitant strikes in the country's platinum industry, which have held the economy ‘captive’ in various ways. Organisations – especially the mining industry – need to ask ‘How much activism is too much activism?’ and organisational communication practitioners need to introspectively consider whether this theoretical contribution should not perhaps have come with greater guidance in terms of the chary (if not restrained) implementation of this potentially positive, yet almost insidiously dangerous, communicative feature. this article aims to explore activism in the mining industry of South Africa, specifically from the vantage points of industry heads, as it concerns the changed communicative landscape in this industry post-marikana. to this end, the article will report on seven qualitative, semi- structured interviews – along with existing literature on the topic – as it offers up six considerations in applying the aspect of excellence and ‘positive activism’ within organisations in South Africa's mining industry.     

Using the personal influence model to guide theory building for participatory communication in Africa

Abstract

This article argues that the personal influence model (PIM) be used strategically to resolve conflicts and social crises in Africa. It presents PIM as a complementary, analytic discourse to participatory communication, a development paradigm commonly used globally in a variety of social programs. That discourse, as a framework for theory building, is grounded in Africa's emerging and enduring realities: (a) the growing interest of the international community to assist Africa to meet the U.N. Millennium Development Goals, whose focus is to reduce extreme poverty by 2015; (b) the ephemeral nature of Africa's political and social stability that necessitates reducing fear, improving community security, nurturing public trust, and building inter-group relationships, all as preconditions for attaining social development, and for using a community-agency- contracts-partnerships approach to deliver development services; and (c) the palpable congruence of PIM with Africa's extensive social networks, which are typically used as communication tools for social development. Those realities guide four propositions that serve as a heuristic template for testing and refining the participatory approach, thereby guiding theory building in participatory communication in African communities. That template identifies an expansive three-concept research agenda – culture, community governance and rule of law, and economic freedom – that raises questions, defines concepts, measures key variables, and assesses outcomes.     

China's expanding influence in Africa: projection,perception and prospects in Southern African countries

China's multi-faceted endeavour to expand its influence in Africa has attracted worldwide scholarly and media attention. This article examines the different moments of China's soft power endeavour, from projection through its state media to representation and lived experiences in South Africa and Zimbabwe, two African countries which receive a significant level of attention in China's policymaking. Through interdisciplinary methodologies such as content analysis, online questionnaires and in-depth interviews conducted in China, South Africa and Zimbabwe, the authors found that China's state-engineered soft power initiatives have resulted in partial success in the two countries. The conclusions indicate that China faces many challenges in fully accomplishing its intended goal. The findings provide new insight into China's political impact in Africa within the context of Beijing's growing influence on Africa's political and economic future.     

Journalism education and practice in South Africa and the discourse of the African Renaissance

Abstract

At the turn of the century there was sheer optimism that ‘Africa's time’ to address all its problems had come, and as a result the 21st century was widely hailed as the ‘African century’ (Ban 2008; Makgoba 1999; Mbeki 1999; O'Reilly 1998; Zoellick 2009). This pronouncement was accompanied by the parallel call for the African Renaissance, which challenged many institutions to align themselves with this ‘crucial phase’ in the history of Africa. In the process, expressions such as ‘de-Westernisation’, ‘Africanisation’, ‘indigenisation’ and ‘domestication’ became buzz-words. Yet, after almost a decade of such claims, there appears to be very little, if anything, gained from these confident pronouncements. This article is situated within embryonic debates on the Africanisation of the curricula. The article explores the current thinking on journalism education (the teaching of journalism) and practice (the practice of journalism) in the country, with a view to furthering our understanding of journalism agility deemed important for the ‘African century’. It further explores the opportunities and limitations of situating journalism education and journalism practice within the discourse of the African Renaissance. The key data that form the basis of this article were collected through interviews and an open-ended questionnaire from a sample consisting of journalists, journalism educators and senior journalism students. The findings point to the need to rethink journalism education and journalism practice, given the trends of globilisation and the equally compelling need to Africanise.     

The story of the larger grain borer: Communicating Science to Rural Communities

Abstract

Although the democratisation of science was prioritised after the South African democratic elections of 1994, thus, promoting dialogue, transparency and consultation, communication with rural communities remains a challenge in South Africa. Because of the diverse cultural landscape of the country, aspects such as language, traditions and poverty impact significantly on the facilitation of communication and the dissemination of information, particularly in rural communities.

The South African government's quest to build a better future for all South Africans places renewed emphasis on the role of ‘development’ and the use of communication to meet the future challenges of ‘development for all’.

The purpose of this article is, firstly, to explore the development communication media used in the community awareness programme of the National Department of Agriculture of South Africa in the town of Makutu, Mpumalanga Province, and, secondly, to investigate and offer an assessment of the communication approach followed by the National Department of Agriculture. In this article the scene is set with a brief overview of development communication models and a discussion of different types of media and methods available for communicating with rural communities. A case study on an awareness project launched by the National Department of Agriculture is presented and the article concludes with an assessment of the case study against the theoretical overview presented in the first section of this article to determine the communication approach followed, and communication media and methods used.

A case study on The Larger Grain Borer (LGB), a quarantine insect pest of maize that has left a path of destruction through Africa, forms the basis of this article. The Directorate: Plant Health and Quality of the National Department of Agriculture of South Africa initiated this awareness project to empower farmers through awareness and education to prevent the spread, and to manage the impact, of the pest. It is believed that the key to rural food security lies in the country's ability to effectively disseminate information to rural communities.     

Information,communication and transformation: a South African perspective

ABSTRACT

The growth of the South African information and communication technology (ICT) sector has been phenomenal in the past four years. Although the global ICT sector has suffered setbacks in the past few months because of the dramatic loss of technology stocks in world markets. South Africa's ICT is set to improve due to a still massive unmet demand for ICT services in the country. South Africa must seize the opportunity to leapfrog into an information society, while not repeating the mistakes of the developing economies. South Africa has opted for a managed liberalisation of the economy. The telecommunications sector is gradually being opened to competition while ensuring the optimum use of existing investments in the sector. This article argues that while liberalising telecommunications, it remains important that state assets such as Telkom, the telecommunications parastatal, should remain in the hands of the state in order to serve public interest. Wholesale privatisation of state assets is not the solution for South Africa, but to build global dreams needs global architects. Unless South Africa joins the global architects of the information society, the quality of life of its citizens will remain poor. This then makes privatisation a necessity as it brings huge revenue to state coffers in order to deliver much-needed services. This article also argues that the success of the implementation of South Africa's ICT policies relies mainly on the stability and viability of the sector regulator, the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA).