Brain drain and South Africa's socioeconomic development: The waves and its effects

Many African countries are bedeviled with huge losses of human skills, and this, in turn, has affected thier development. From health professionals to teachers, academics and engineers, the continent has lost numerous skilled personnel who ought to be contributing extensively to its socio‐economic development. The socio‐economic development of a country hinges on the availability of skilled human resources to drive its growth. Brain drain has long being a challenge for South Africa as the country continues to lose skilled professionals to other countries, hence, the unsteady growth of its economy. Using a strict textual analysis of the relevant literature relating to brain drain in South Africa, the study found that the South African government lacks a clear cut policy on how to reduce brain drain, and this will impact the country's socioeconomic development in the long term. Using the theoretical framework of Lee's push and pull theory, the study argues that brain drain in South Africa is reinforced by certain socio‐economic factors. The paper concludes that South Africa's vision of becoming Africa's industrial hub may remain a dream if the country fails to put losing its skilled professionals under control.     

An Afrocentric exploration of Jacob Zuma's anti Apartheid stance: The question of Israeli–Palestinian struggle

In this article, the author utilizes interdisciplinary critical discourse analysis to analyse the state of South Africa–Israel relations under the Zuma‐led African National Congress (ANC). The author ground roots this article on Afrocentricity as the alternative theoretical framework to identify the position of the ANC in relation to the unfolding events in Israel and broadly analyse this position in order to make sense of it. This is done within the context of the Zuma‐led ANC in order to tease out major contradictions, which characterizes the administration of Zuma's stance on attested Apartheid Israel. The central question engaged with in this article is to determine whether political and ideological counterstatements to those the ANC communicated, by some of the opposition political parties such as African Christian Democratic Party (ACDP), had any major implications on South Africa's foreign policy on the Apartheid Israel. In this article, the author argues extensively that Zuma's foreign policy on Israel can best be understood when located into his entire term as president of South Africa and the NASREC resolution of 2017.     

The new world [dis] order in the complexity of multi‐polarity: United States of America's hegemonic decline and the configuration of new power patterns

History tells us that the United States of America (US)'s hegemonic predomination materialized from a very long‐ideological battle and/ Cold War, sometimes referred to as the war of words lasted for about five decades from the mid‐1940s to 1989, and consequently stopped after the fragmentation of the Soviet Union Empire. Thus, in contemporary times, it is lamentably regrettable that USA has come to face oligopolistic challenge in the context of both political and economic dominion. The international system is slowly but surely experiencing the emergence of brand new political and economic power patterns vis‐à‐vis China, European Union (EU) and Brazil, Russian, India, China, South Africa (BRICS). In light of the aforementioned, this article assesses the symptoms of US hegemonic decline and how this helps shape the current global academic and/ scholarly debates on the strategic environment. Equally important is the adoption and application of Afrocentricity as the theoretical framework in the quest for ”relocation from the knowledge production margins” and the spirit of the anticipation of the DE‐colonial Political contemplation in South Africa's life‐time. As a theory, it is employed to answer the central question: Is it a reality or a myth that USA's dominion over the international system is coming to an end? Methodologically, this article relied on interdisciplinary discourse analysis and thematic content prevailing documents.     

A FAST-FOLLOWING SPACE CONTROL STRATEGY

This article analyzes South Africa's space program, which can be divided into three chronological periods. First, was the age of amateurs that took place from 1947–1962. Second, from 1963–1993, South Africa's apartheid regime started various missile projects, including a secret military space launch program aimed at orbiting reconnaissance satellites. Under U.S. Government pressure, this was canceled before the first democratically-elected government came to power in South Africa, and the facilities for manufacturing and static testing the space launch vehicle were destroyed. But, South Africa maintains a nucleus of space heritage infrastructure, including a space launch range with telemetry capabilities, satellite testing, and integration facilities, and aerospace and software industrial sectors. Third, South Africa became a democracy in 1994, and established the legal and institutional infrastructure for a civil space program. Since then, South Africa has started to shape a new space policy, this time with greater public transparency.     

Post‐1994 South Africa's peacekeeping and military intervention in Southern Africa,reference from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Lesotho

South Africa, once a pariah state as a result of the apartheid regime destabilization policies in Southern Africa, became a full fledge democratic state following the victory of the African National Congress (ANC) in the first and all‐inclusive democratic elections of 1994. The ANC's vision for Southern Africa was to be routed on the notion of curbing the imbalances of the past (pre‐1994), which had cost the Southern African region great economic loss. Here, one of the many fundamentals that were to drive the ANC's foreign policy doctrine was that of conflict resolution for a more stable and prosperous Africa particularly Southern Africa. Conflict resolution was viewed as a pivotal element for the new democratic government in order to stimulate beneficial relations with other African states post the apartheid era. In light of the above, and using a qualitative method approach, this paper draws a nuanced appraisal and examines the role of South Africa's peacekeeping and mediation initiatives in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Lesotho post‐1994. In conclusion, South Africa has been able to utilize its regional hegemonic stance to ensure regional security while ensuring economic stability at home.     

Ubuntu diplomacy: Broadening soft power in an African context

Ubuntu is an African philosophical worldview that has increasingly gained prominence since South Africa's democratic transition in 1994. It places emphasis on the world's common humanity and its consequent interdependence. Through content analysis, the article examines the soft power that is inherent in South Africa's foreign policy, as codified in the 2011 White Paper on South African Foreign Policy–Building a Better World: Diplomacy of Ubuntu. In its findings, the article established a distinction between Joseph Nye's original conceptualization of soft power, formulated from a United States realist foreign policy perspective, and the one inherent in South Africa's humanist foreign policy guided by the philosophy of Ubuntu. This distinction is premised on the geopolitical disparities between the two nations. The article further examines South Africa's wielding of soft power within the African continent, the first audience of the country's diplomacy of Ubuntu.     

The relevance,practicality and viability of spatial development initiatives: a South African case study

Policymakers have for long had an ambivalent attitude towards space and have been hesitant in dealing with intra‐national models of uneven development. Issues surrounding regional development have always been tainted with ideological and political influences rather than being a purely economic consideration. This article addresses the thinking behind regional development policies and questions the role of spatial policy. It confronts this question in the South African case where local government capacity is particularly constrained and the boundaries between government tiers unclear. The first section outlines a selected critical history of the regional policy literature as it applies to South Africa. This is followed by an examination of South Africa's post‐apartheid policy of spatial development initiatives (SDIs) focusing on the most contentious of these, namely the Fish River SDI, which has been plagued by controversy. It focuses on the tensions involved in development planning between government agencies and between politicians and technocrats. It also highlights the growing schism between government and civil society with the former emphasising mega‐projects which reinforce its global competitive strategy but with limited apparent benefit to the local community. Lastly, it concludes that little effort was made to integrate the SDI into a provincial poverty strategy and argues that instead of utilising industrial decentralisation to redress inequality and poverty, a ‘first‐best’ option may be for the government to target poverty directly by investing in various forms of human capital. Such an approach would lead to long‐term economic growth and also improve South Africa's international competitiveness. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Local government in the new South Africa

On 1 November 1995 the final piece in South Africa's democratic jigsaw was slotted into place when elections were held to create 686 new local authorities throughout the country. The new councils are confronted with a daunting task, as they have been championed by the national Government of National Unity (GNU) as the main delivery mechanism for social and economic redistribution as well as the vehicle for the achievement of the aims and objectives of the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP). This article argues that the legislative framework developed for local government has an urban bias that has operated to the detriment of a manageable solution to the problems of rural local government in South Africa. The article examines the new structures of local democracy and argues that the need to secure local representation may have been achieved at the expense of functional efficiency. The lack of human and financial resources in some of the less developed councils makes service delivery problematic. If service delivery is not improved it could undermine the new local democracy as peoples' expectations remain unfulfilled. The article also examines the efforts to accommodate the political and economic demands of South Africa's traditional societies and the commercial farmers. The article argues that the efforts to incorporate these powerful elements into the new dispensation have largely failed, creating a potential for future disruption. The article concludes that the creation of a constitutional framework for local government must be seen as the first step in the development of autonomous local government, and that the main task now facing all three tiers of South Africa's government is the development of sufficient financial and human resources to ensure improvements in the standards of living of poor South Africans.     

Alternative South–South development collaboration? The role of China in the Coega Special Economic Zone in South Africa

Aid, in the form of financial aid and investment, has become increasingly prevalent in both bilateral and multilateral partnerships in the BRICS. In Africa, the Forum on China–Africa Cooperation provides the official framings for forms of development assistance to the continent, with financial forms of aid available through the New Development Bank and the China–Africa Development Bank (CADFund). This article explores how Chinese international development assistance has influenced South Africa's economic growth and development strategies and is reshaping South Africa as “gateway” to Africa and continental leader. Special economic zones (SEZs) have become a prioritised form of BRICS development collaboration particularly in terms of Chinese trade and investment expansionism into Africa through South Africa. Chinese international development assistance and foreign direct investment in South Africa in particular are very notable and have been strengthened during the Chinese official state visit prior to the Johannesburg BRICS Summit in 2018. The article critically analyses the development policy discourse on BRICS spearheading an alternative model of South–South international cooperation by examining the Coega SEZ in South Africa, hailed as the most SEZ in Africa. The article critically examines the development alternative potential of the Coega SEZ.     

Federalism in Africa: Origins,Operation and (In)Significance

Abstract

Recent years have seen major advances in the comparative study of federalism and a growing literature on decentralization in Africa, but there has been surprisingly little systematic comparison of African federalism. This article explains several commonalities in the origins and operation of Africa's three main federal states: Ethiopia, Nigeria and South Africa. Each country used ‘holding-together’ federalism in order to accommodate ethnic pluralism. Each country—especially Ethiopia and South Africa—also experienced several key centripetal forces: dominant governing parties, top-down state administration and high degrees of fiscal centralism. Federalism mattered in offering accommodative decentralization, but in its operation subnational governments have limited autonomy because of these interlocking centralizing features. This African variant of federalism can have certain salutary features, even as it precludes the possibility of many of the theorized advantages of federalism that are predicated on real subnational autonomy.     

China's multinational corporations in the Democratic Republic of Congo's mining industry: An Afrocentric critique

China's entrance in Africa in the early 2000s through the Forum on China–Africa Cooperation has apparently signalled several mutual beneficial agreements. However, there is a view that the Asian tiger's (China) arrival on the African soil was driven by its national interests. Such interests were particularly in the continent's rich mineral resources complex, which are deemed significant for its own economic boom. This observation reflects that scholars and practitioners alike have not uniformly understood China's engagement with Africa. Therefore, this paper problematizes what is often cited as the second “scramble for Africa” within the context of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). It argues that Chinese mining companies' operations in DRC are no different to the early colonial masters who only came to Africa for nothing else but mineral resources in order to develop their own nations at the peril of Africa's own development. Based on Afrocentricity as the alternative theoretical lens, this paper seeks to critique the involvement of Chinese Multinational Corporations in the mineral resources complex of DRC. Methodically, this paper relies on document review and analysis in its broadest sense.     

South Africa's transition to democracy and democratic consolidation: A reflection on socio-economic challenges

This article uses South Africa as a case of study to reflect on socio-economic transformation challenges confronting the country within the context of democratic consolidation. It argues that although the 1994 democratic project has made considerable strides to enhance the well-being of the society, socio-economic challenges of unemployment, poverty, and inequalities still persists in the contemporary South Africa—hence South Africa's governing party mantra of radical socio-economic transformation. Citizens often demonstrate their discontent through acts of civil disobedience: protests. The last decade has increasingly pockmarked South Africa as a theater of social unrests. The article argues that this is the manifestation of democratic distemper rather than consolidation. In other words, democratic consolidation in South Africa should not, as many do, be understood merely as conceptual fiat but rather as a precondition towards alleviating the socio-economic challenges confronting the nation. If this does not happen, democratic distemper is spawned. The manifestation of this is civil unrest. A democratic project ought to be about, also more importantly, enhancing the economic opportunities of the citizens. This should result in creating jobs and reducing inequalities. For this to happen, socio-economic policies should be restructured in a way interrelated with the economic policy. This is important to advance the well-being of the society.     

Restructuring non‐metropolitan local government in South Africa

South Africa's first local government elections held in November 1995 and June 1996 cemented the transition from apartheid to democratic local government. The focus at that time was on the deracialization and democratization of local governance, which was successfully achieved. Local government since then, however, has failed to fulfil its mandate as the delivery arm of government, nor has the hoped‐for rapid transformation of the local sphere of government materialized. In seeking an explanation for this perceived inadequacy, attention has tended to focus on the limited financial and administrative capacity of newly elected councillors and council staff. Although the lack of capacity does present a barrier to the achievement of effective local government, the constraints municipalities encounter in their geographic composition and administrative formation provide the structural dimension of municipal constraint. The White Paper on Local Government published in March 1998 seeks to address these structural constraints and, through an ambitious legislative process, chart a path to ‘developmental’ local government. This article identifies the constraints experienced by non‐metropolitan municipalities and analyses the likely impact of the government's restructuring programme for the achievement of viable and sustainable local government in South Africa. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Conflict and violence in Africa in the 21st century: Where is the African Union? A case of Libya,South Sudan,Democratic Republic of the Congo,and Central African Republic

The inability of the African Union (AU) to deal with increasing outbreaks of violence and conflict has cast a lot of doubt regarding the organization's ability to lead Africa in a 21st century characterized by massive geopolitical dynamics. To answer the critical question of whether the AU is still relevant today, the study employed a strict textual analysis of the relevant literature on the role of the AU in conflict prevention, eradication, and by extension its contribution towards peacebuilding. The study found that the AU has failed to eradicate conflicts in Africa single‐handedly; rather, the UN and together with foreign states have intervened to help quell the violence in Libya, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the Central African Republic and beyond. The failure of the AU has increased global and continental perceptions that the AU is useless and cannot solve Africa's problems today. Therefore, this gives or permits an increase to foreign intervention in the internal affairs of African states. The study concluded that reforms and reaffirming commitment from member states are important elements needed to ensure that the AU can become effective and contribute effectively towards solving Africa's complex problems in a somewhat complex and unpredictable international system.     

South Africa's integration efforts within the Southern African Development Community: Regional supremacy or coalition?

Regional integration has manifested itself to be an integral part of Africa's postcolonial economic growth blueprints. It was viewed as a mechanism for African states to enhance their development and work collectively, improve their cooperation, and enhance peace and security. Nevertheless, regional integration initiatives are often seen to succeed when spearheaded by regional hegemons. By narrowing this to southern Africa, from 1994 after the first-ever democratic elections and after also becoming a member of the Southern African Development Community (SADC), South Africa was regarded as a state capable of spearheading regional integration. This was a result of its relatively robust economy and military power in comparison with other SADC states. As a result, it was poised to utilize these vast resources to the benefit of the SADC. However, over the last two and a half decades, its regional stance has often come under a lot of scrutinizing due to its ambiguous foreign policy doctrine, particularly in southern Africa. Basically, its post-1994 foreign policy projections towards the region have often not been implemented as attested and have often lacked clear articulation. Nevertheless, this paper argues that South Africa has made positive strides in the SADC's regional integration endeavors post its democratic transition. Its vast regional investments and diplomatic and military interventions have played a crucial role in the development and security reforms in the region. Although it is portrayed as a regional hegemon, it has nevertheless used its regional standpoint to the benefit of the region and further contributed to regional integration post the apartheid era.     

An Afrocentric critique of China's security concerns in Africa: The cases of Mali and South Sudan

China's security concerns in Africa has recently become a subject of much academic debate. Most of the academic studies on this subject have wrongly assumed a continental standpoint, which does not take into contemplation the distinctive national captivates of China toward each distinctive African State. Such analytic discourse analysis were also heavily subjected to North [ern] angled perspectives as expressed in either liberal or realist contextual lens, views, and critics. Despite this, the Scholarly discourse on the security concerns of China towards Mali and South Sudan have not been proportionately apprehended. Based on the alternative Afrocentric perspective, this article seeks to employ Mali and South Sudan as test cases to critique the Security Concerns of China toward Mali and South Sudan. The central argument of this article is that, China's Security Concerns towards Mali and South Sudan can best be understood when located within the context of mineral resources complex. Methodologically, this article is based on document review and interdisciplinary discourse analysis in their comprehensive form.     

The death of scientific knowledge in [South] Africa: An Afrocentric response to M. P. Sebola

On the basis of the Afrocentric perspective, this article uses South Africa as a test case to critique Mokoko Piet Sebola's piece titled “Peer review, scholarship and editors of scientific publications: the death of scientific knowledge in Africa,” which appeared in Koers ‐ Bulletin for Christian Scholarship, Volume 83 (1): 1–13. I argue that Sebola's piece provides a partial guide to understanding the state of the knowledge industry in Africa, particularly in South Africa. Safe to say that Sebola's work deepens scholarly and public discourse on the politics of scholarship in Africa and the world at large. However, I do not intend to blatantly praise Sebola's contribution to this academic area, which remains under researched due to the reasons that are beyond the scope of this article. In particular, the current article aspires to identify scholarly weaknesses in Sebola's work with a view to correcting them by offering an alternative view. This correction deserves the attention of all scholars and practitioners especially because it is interdisciplinary in nature, and it is poised to undo the misinformation disseminated in Sebola's piece. Such misinformation has a potential to overshadow the few truths advanced in his article. Methodologically, this article is based on document review, conversations, and interdisciplinary discourse analysis in its broadest form.     

Internet access as citizen's right? Citizenship in the digital age

Discourses about Internet and rights generate ideological, economic, and policy debates that bring to prominence the question of citizenship in today's digital age. But what does Internet access as a citizen's right imply? What are the pragmatic meanings of the intersection of citizenship, rights, and technology access? Specifically, what does citizens' right to technology mean for African states? This paper examines citizenship, rights, and Internet in South Africa, and attempts to move the discourse beyond philosophical rhetoric to practical policy interpretations. To do this, the study examines interpretations and reactions of policy-makers to the idea of Internet access as a citizen's right, and through a survey explores the views of many youth on this subject. Findings reveal strong opinions about rights and technology access in South Africa. For policy-makers, the reality of the socioeconomic challenges of Africa humbles an egalitarian aspiration of rights and Internet access.     

Managing South African transformation: the story of cricket in KwaZulu Natal, 1994–2004

Sport has historically been an important element of South African popular culture, even though it was divided along racial lines for much of the country's history. In post-apartheid South Africa, sport is seen by politicians, sports officials and many ordinary people as a means to surmount race and class barriers and to forge nationhood. But sport remains a site of acute contestation over what transformation means: ‘merit’ versus ‘affirmative action’, beneficiaries of change, pace of transformation and so on. This conflict reflects the broader tensions over how South African society should be restructured. Change in racial composition at the level of leadership, coaching and players since 1990 has failed to transform cricket into a ‘people's game’. The cricket establishment is following the lead of government in prioritizing the empowerment of a minority. Class privilege has replaced race privilege. At the same time, tensions generated by change are producing further hostility along the fault lines of race and class. There is, for example, a conflict over resources among those previously labelled ‘Black’: Indians, Coloureds and the majority African population. These struggles reveal the fragmented nature of post-apartheid South African society, notwithstanding attempts to define South Africa as a ‘rainbow nation’. The historical, social, economic and cultural legacy of South Africa's conflicting pasts, the impact of globalization—and sport is a principal front of globalization, generating vast economic revenue and creating intolerable pressure to succeed—as well as post-apartheid discrepancies in economic and social conditions are all making it difficult to forge a united national culture, despite the attempt to use sport for the ‘mythic enactment’ of a collective South African identity. The tensions discussed in this article continue to be alive though the ‘patterns of prejudice’ are manifesting themselves in different forms.     

‘Twinning’ and the South Africa/Canada programme on governance: some reflections on Blunt,Jones and Askvik

In reflecting on recent articles about ‘twinning’ as a means of building institutional capacity, the experience of the South Africa/Canada Programme on Governance offers some useful insights. The Programme operated in South Africa from 1993 until early 2000. Among other activities, it sponsored seven twinning arrangements in which the paired institutions, mostly sub‐national governments, worked together from two to over five years. These arrangements provided access to the contributed skills of experienced, senior Canadian public servants and access to sites for study visits and placements in Canada. For Canadians the advantages were the means to contribute to South Africa, to employ their own skills in new ways, and to learn. The contributions of Canadian provincial and national governments more than doubled the professional time devoted to the Programme. The use of experienced public servants, careful programme design and management, selection of appropriate partnerships, a strategic focus and flexible use of resources were all important to making the Programme effective. While it is not feasible to prove institutional development in any ‘scientific’ fashion, it is certainly possible to identify successful contributions to South Africa's own public service transformation. Continued study of twinning arrangements should address and compare programme design and delivery including management approaches and the appropriate duration of the arrangements. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.