Is it bizarre to say that such hopes reflect not just optimism about the future of capitalism, but a deep-seated need to make a success of capitalism in South Africa? I hope that the purpose of debating strategies for creating a civil society, is to demonstrate the futility of that task, given that a much more plausible future for South Africa is the entrenchment of a corrupt ANC elite amid deepening social despair and misery, popular outrage and the failure of the ANC/Afrikaner business/political elite and its international sponsors and backers, to do anything at all about correcting the colossal inequities which are apartheid's legacy. But I'm not holding my breath.
Is not the future even WITH economic growth, likely to be one of social explosions and insurrectionary risings? And if the neoliberal promise fails, what THEN?
The lexicon of the DEBATE journal is curious: In your call for papers, the word 'empowerment' is unsurprisingly there but not the words 'state' 'power', 'police', 'repression', 'class struggle', 'tribalism': absent like the concepts
'narco-culture', criminalisation of the poor, etc, and the fate of black people in the new econo-racist S Africa.
You will not create a civil society in S Africa, which is a prerevolutionary society and were it not for the dead weight of ideological hegemony which you yourself reproduce while moaning about how people are resigned to the market etc, there would be risings now. Wait; indeed there ARE constant battles, as you yourself eloquently describe, while simultaneously describing the alleged fatalism of the masses.
No, no civil society in the making, but a lot of good careers will be made trying to create one.
Mark
Patrick Bond wrote:
> Look, here in Johannesburg, it's a bright, sunny morning. Unless
> someone else out there disagrees and wants rebuttals to fly, there's
> one point amidst the bizarre posts of Mark Jones on Tuesday night
> worth taking up...
>
> > Date: Tue, 12 May 1998 19:10:43 +0100
> > From: Mark Jones <Jones_M at netcomuk.co.uk>
> ...
> > The worst is that the kind of nexus of corrupted NGO's and
> > compromised social movements which forms the new elite in S Africa
> > will sideline and exhaust the real anger and energy of people, frustrate
> > the struggle to raise consciousness and generally be the most
> > baleful (and experienced on the poacher-gamekeeper model) enemy
> > of the only kind of revolutionary politics which might make a difference.
>
> This is indeed quite a serious problem. Here's an early attempt to delineate
> it:
>
> > CALL FOR PAPERS
> >
> > The Editorial Collectives of the journal "DEBATE - Voices from the
> > South African Left" are planning, for issue #5, a special focus on
> >
> > DEBATING CIVIL SOCIETY -
> > Organisations, Movements and Struggle in
> > South Africa in the Age of Neoliberalism
> >
> > The aim of the special focus is to contribute to the definition of an
> > analytical and political framework for social struggles and
> > movements in South Africa in the current phase. This effort
> > will be focused on plural, diverse dynamics of resistance for social
> > rights and citizenship, that are currently emerging inside the
> > spheres of production and reproduction, factory and communities
> > alike. To combine our reconceptualisation of resistance with a
> > fundamental respect for differences in its dynamics, we think it
> > is important to critically evaluate the importance of the concept of
> > "civil society". This evaluation would include both the relevance of
> > the concept in understanding social dynamics of contestation, and
> > its usefulness for left strategies.
> >
> > WE INVITE POTENTIALLY INTERESTED CONTRIBUTORS TO SUBMIT PAPERS
> > which are possibly focus on questions such as:
> >
> > * Social rights, citizenship and democracy: exploring the
> > contradictions, exposing the weaknesses in current governmnet
> > policies
> >
> > * "Civil society" paradigms and neoliberal developmentalism:
> > continuities and ruptures
> >
> > * Neoliberalism, civil society, and the crisis of welfarism: towards
> > an oppositional view of social citizenship as collective
> > reappropriation without class cooptation
> >
> > * Social subjects and movements in a contested understanding of the
> > South African civil society: "actually existing movements" in the
> > South African context
> >
> > * Local dynamics of self-organisation in the struggle for social
> > rights and services
> >
> > * Civil society and autonomy: organizational conditions for a
> > critical agenda on collective entitlements
> >
> > * The role of South African NGOs in relation to ideological
> > reorientations in the strategies of transnational financial
> > institutions: pressures for cooptation and openings for contestation
> >
> > * Developments in South African civics' politics: towards an
> > independent urban social movement?
> >
> > * Civil society and the "rural question": collective self-empowerment
> > or neo-traditionalism?
> >
> > * Working class organizations and possible links between factory and
> > territory in articulating stratgies of struggle
> >
> > * Capitalist restructuring of production and its impact on social
> > movements' agendas
> >
> > We would welcome, in particular, articles which can combine in depth
> > empirical research with a sound, well supported theoretical
> > background. This in order to avoid reproducing a mere polarization
> > between "theory-based" materials and a list of case studies.
> >
> > In case you are interested you can contact, for submissions or
> > further information:
> >
> > DEBATE - Voices from the South African Left
> > PO Box 581
> > Wits 2050
> > Johannesburg
> > SOUTH AFRICA
> > Ph. (++27 11) 716.3290 or 487.1348
> > Fax (++27 11) 487.1348
> > Email 029frb at cosmos.wits.ac.za
> > pbond at wn.apc.org