Neoliberalism and Resistance in South Africa

This book critically examines the persistence of market orthodoxy in post-apartheid South Africa and the civil society resistance such policies have generated over a twenty-five-year period. Each chapter unpacks the key political coalitions and economic dynamics, domestic as well as global, that have sustained neoliberalism in the country since the transition to liberal democracy in 1994. Chapter 1 analyzes the political economy of segregation and apartheid, as well as the factors that drove the democratic reform and the African National Congress' (ANC) subsequent abandonment of redistribution in favor of neoliberal policies. Further chapters explore the causes and consequences of South Africa's integration into the global financial markets, the limitations of the post-apartheid social welfare program, the massive labour strikes and protests that have erupted throughout the country, and the role of the IMF and World Bank in policymaking. The final chapters also examine the political and economic barriers thwarting the emergence of a viable post-apartheid developmental state, the implications of monopoly capital and foreign investment for democracy and development, and the phenomenon of state capture during the Jacob Zuma Presidency.

Investigates why the African National Congress government persists with a set of economic policies that fail to alleviate gross socio-economic inequalities and unemployment Analyzes the government's use of cash transfer and social grants policies to assist impoverished South African citizens Illustrates how local commitments to greater equality and socio-economic opportunity are undermined by the power of the global financial markets

Autorentext

Shaukat Ansari received his PhD in Political Science from the University of Toronto, Canada, and has published in several peer-reviewed journals, including African Affairs, Review of Political Economy, and International Critical Thought.

Inhalt
Chapter 1: Financialization as a New Regime of Accumulation: Business, Apartheid, and the Neoliberal Transition.- Chapter 2: Bureaucratic Fragmentation, Cash-Transfers, and Financial Markets: Policymaking in the Post-Apartheid Neoliberal Landscape.- Chapter 3: Political Resistance to Neoliberalism: Cracks in the Post-Apartheid Corporatist Arrangement.- Chapter 4: Early Forms of State Resistance to Neoliberalism: The International Monetary Fund in South Africa.- Chapter 5: Forging a Developmental State in Post-Apartheid South Africa: A Comparative Analysis of the Structural and Political Barriers to Industrialization.- Chapter 6: Conclusion.