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Summary and lecture notes for Political Science 114 Term 2
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Political Science 114 P2Lecture 3: How can we explain SA’s relatively peaceful transition to democracy?
Source Ch 4: de Jager
Accounting for SA’s negotiated transition
Volatile context – refer to it as ‘miracle’ negotiations were by no means
inevitable, in fact civil war looked like the greater possibility. By 1988 SA situation
was considered to be dire and international discussion group concluded that the
potential for a negotiated settlement was poor but yet scarcely a decade later SA
held its first multi-racial elections = miraculous
Theory – mutually hurting stalemates and ripe moments
Context: 1980s and 1990s
Violent period volatile time, saw most of the violence was seen during this time
‘People’s war’ – ungovernability, guerilla warfare, unconventional warfare aim to
protract warfare, protracted, Soweto uprisings
State Security Council (SSC): state of emergency and ‘total strategy’ in reaction to
‘total onslaught’. Counter-insurgency approach. result more violence
1984-1988 = increase black on black violence over 4000 politically deaths (verified
by the truth and reconciliation commission by the Gold stone commission Incarta
was being funded by a very specific group within the military intelligence and also
the people’s war which no distinction between combatants and civilians (could be
attacked))
Mutually hurting stalemates (MHS) and ripe moments
I William Zartman theory
Ripe moment cantres on MHS
MHS: parties find themselves locked into a conflict they cannot draw to a victory,
results in a painful deadlock
Ripe moment: conditions conducive to negotiations
Parties cannot unilaterally achieve what they want to, they have a veto over each
other and because they are deadlocked it gets moved to the negotiations table
Domestic factors:
Structural crisis the influx control institution could not contain black urbanization
= began to crumble
Demographics especially the proportion of whites and the overall population and
this proportion was not sufficient to man all the strategic positions in all the political
and admin positions. Significant increase in black population
Economic pressure pressure of sanctions, stateism no longer viable, business
sector becomes limited and starts to pressure the government to change and open
the market
NP – decrease support growth of an even more conservative party
Leadership astute leadership on both sides – FW de Klerk and Mandela bought in
that negotiations was the right route and they brought their respective
constituencies with them towards the negotiating table
, Ideological shifts among the economic and political elites, both moderating their
ideas and coming more towards more a centre view and a willingness to work
together
Mass protest movement through the united democratic front formed in 1983 and
the congress of SA TU which was constituted in the 1980s and together were a
rather formidable force
Armed struggle (umkuntu isizwe) unable to topple government
International factors
F.W. De Klerk (1990): “the dynamic developments in international politics have
created new opportunities for SA”
ANC (1994): “the end of the cold war shifted the balance of forces internationally
decisively in favour of the resolution of regional conflicts through negotiations”
Economic deregulation the basis of the NP dominance was economic nationalism
and stateism and this became unviable in the 1980s as the global arenas acceptance
of economic deregulation in a more market led economy grew
No international political legitimacy see it as a parai state with sanctions against it
(economic, sports, science, academia etc)
Collapse of the Soviet Union (important because a key source of support for the ANC
was removed) and the end of the cold war NP couldn’t use the idea of the fear of
the idea of communism because it had fallen
1989 Organization African Union (now African Union) ‘Harare Declaration’ (ANC
platform for negotiations and there was definitely regional support that the route to
go was negotiations) regional support for negotiations
International developments
Negotiations
Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) – 18 political parties
- Undivided SA, bill of rights, multi-party system, constitutional government,
separation of powers, civil liberties
Nelson Mandela’s inauguration speech (1994)
“The time for the healing of the wounds has come. The moment to bridge the chasm
that divide us has come. The time to build is upon us”
Lecture 4: Political Society:
Aim
Constitution source of political society
Electoral System emanates from constitution
- How do we vote?
- Advantages and disadvantages
- Key trends
Political party spectrum
Party system
- Theories of party dominance
Funding
, Source = Ch 5 pgs 96-107; Ch 7
Constitution making
Eister (1993): “Their task is to rebuild a boat while it is sailing on the open (rough)
seas” not an easy task
Number of meetings with CODESA (Convention for a democratic SA), later on the
multi-party negotiating forum - 26 parties participated discussed what form the
constitution would take and what would/ would not be part of the constitution
Interim Constitution of 1993 described as “peace treaty” (Ebrahim, 1998)
Designed for a ‘deeply divided society’ how do we deal and heal, what type of
governmental and electoral systems are ideal
All sides had to concede eg NP had to let go of group representation and had to
accept individual rights, the ANC had to accept constitutional supremacy and check
some balances on its power
Constitution is a social contract and it needs to be seen as this and not a transfer of
power social contract = mutually agreed upon, binding and enduring mechanism
with which to negotiate present and future conflicts in an amicable way, it sets the
ground rules
1996 Constitution
Doctrine of Constitutionalism (embraces and endorses) important because it
specifies that citizens and officers of the state alike should be subject to the rules
outlined in the constitution impartially applied (no one is above the constitution)
Parliamentary system with president
Executive (presidency)
Legislature
Judiciary
Three spheres of government
- National
- Provincial
- Local
Unitary system with federal features
Electoral system
South Africa
Justice Albie Sachs (2017): “Struggle for independence was about the vote…”
- Vote symbolic of human dignity…
- Vote meant the highest and lowest in the land were equal
Elections
Starting block of the democratic game part of the starting block is the electoral
commission/ electoral commission of SA (IEC) is essentially the referee of the
electoral process, thus it is essential that they are respected and considered to be
impartial
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