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Devan Pillay and Roger Southall

South Africa’s fifth democratic general election takes place a few months after the passing away of the pre-eminent icon of national liberation, Nelson Mandela. His death on 5 December 2013 was greeted with a massive outpouring of grief, as millions from all sections of society – black and white, workers and capitalists, rural traditionalists and modern suburbanites, young and old, socialists and liberals – paid tribute during the week-long proceedings leading up to his funeral. It was a time of reflection and of celebration, of tears and of joy, remembering a life that embodied the hopes and dreams of millions, not only in this country, but throughout the world. Indeed, in an unprecedented show of international solidarity, world leaders from almost every nation descended on South Africa last December to hail one of the true heroes of the modern era. In keeping with his legacy of reconciliation, the leader of the capitalist West, the US president Barack Obama, shook hands with the leader of socialist Cuba, Raul Castro.

But what was Mandela’s true legacy? In many senses (as Mao Tse Tung once said in relation to the French Revolution) it’s too early to tell. The country is caught between celebrating the achievements of our democracy, and bemoaning the abject failure to eradicate poverty, unemployment and widening social inequality. Were the ‘balance of forces’ in 1994 such that a political settlement was only possible if the essentials of (predominantly white) corporate economic power and white land ownership remained intact? Or was there space to use the ‘Madiba magic’ to demand much more, if not the promise of ‘socialism’ then at least the inclusive development path envisaged by the Freedom Charter? Historians will be debating this for decades to come.

Whatever the strengths and weaknesses of Mandela’s political legacy, his personal attributes shine through, and resonate with the best in humanity – the combination of humility and steely determination to achieve one’s goals; personal integrity; the willingness to introspect, admit failures and learn from others; kindness towards other living beings and a generosity of spirit. These are the qualities towards which South Africans aspire, that oblige most people – except the lunatic fringes – to forgive whatever shortcomings this icon may have had, and to dwell on the gifts he has bestowed on the nation and the world.

With this in mind, many South Africans judge the shortcomings of those who came after Mandela as leader of the African National Congress (ANC), and of the country. Thabo Mbeki was judged too aloof and arrogant, refusing to listen to the ANC’s alliance partners and forging ahead with a disastrous HIV/AIDs policy. He was ousted by Jacob Zuma who, genial and cuddly, clearly does not have his predecessor’s grasp of policy issues and is severely tainted by his personal failings – including his social conservatism – and strong allegations of corruption. It is no wonder that members of the ANC booed whenever his face appeared on screens during the memorial service for Mandela last December. Many believe that had Mandela been younger and fitter, and served a second term as the country’s president, he would have recognised that the country’s orthodox economic path was exacerbating poverty and inequality, and corrected its course (unlike Zuma, who came to power on that promise but failed to deliver).

Nevertheless, despite the shortcomings of the ruling party and its leader it is generally accepted that the ANC, as the historic liberation movement, will win a renewed mandate. It is also widely expected that it will lose some ground electorally, with many predicting that it will receive less than 60 per cent of the vote (compared with a high of just under 70 per cent in the election of 2004). The ANC will, however, undoubtedly triumph again, and celebrate its victory as a victory for democracy – which, in broad-brush comparative terms, it will be. No transition to democracy is ever ‘an easy walk to freedom’. Two decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia under Putin has lapsed back into authoritarianism; within a few years of independence numerous African countries fell prey to dictatorships, coups or civil war; more recently, the ‘Arab spring’ in country after country has reverted to winter. So, despite the fact that for many South Africa is a ‘dominant party democracy’ – that is, one in which a ruling party dominates the electoral and political arena under a rubric of formal political competition but faces no apparent threat of losing power – it remains a country where the classic political freedoms (of assembly, movement, association and speech) which were denied to the majority under apartheid remain largely intact, even while various indicators suggest that the quality of democracy is declining.

Any attempt to assess the state of democracy in South Africa after twenty years is obviously a perilous enterprise and, unsurprisingly, there are competing narratives. On the one hand, the ANC government and its supporters claim that while much remains to be done it has brought about significant changes for the better; South Africa is a robust and noisy democracy, and while alarmingly high levels of inequality, poverty and employment persist, major strides have been made in improving the material lives of the majority. On the other hand, critics from both left and right aver that the ANC has proved arrogant and unaccountable, has undermined (or threatened to undermine) key aspects of democracy, and has pursued an agenda of racial transformation which, while promoting the rise of a party-connected elite, has rendered it hugely inefficient and unable to tackle the challenges of reversing the ravages of apartheid. Those on the right want to see more free-market reforms and the leashing of labour, whereas those on the left want more aggressive state intervention to oversee rapid industrialisation, and greater protection for labour. A growing voice is nervous of both excessive state bureaucracy and expanding market domination – and prefers a society-led holistic development path that balances economic growth with environmental sustainability and social equity.

These narratives can scarcely be reconciled – indeed, their debate constitutes a welcome characteristic of South African democracy. In any case, whether we choose to consider that South Africa’s glass is half full or half empty will reflect political and ideological positions alongside the particular location of actors and observers (a black mineworker being unlikely to agree about rights and wrongs with a white corporate executive). Nonetheless, it can be argued that the virulence of the debate reflects a deepening sense of crisis and disillusion, a sense that the discord which today characterises South African society is so extreme that it threatens any prospect of social coherence; that it continues to reflect racial divisions and disharmonies; and that a greater sense of national unity is vital if South Africa is to face up to its massive problems. It is fear that South Africa is on a dangerously downward spiral that explains the centrality of Nelson Mandela in the public imagination.

Concerns about South Africa’s developmental and democratic trajectory are shared by all contributors to the present volume. What follows is an assessment of the achievements and failures of the democratic transition, within a historical and comparative context.