Post-Apartheid South Africa: Constraints on Socialism

Abstract

Few observers reckon that the white citadel will fall overnight, yet the days of racial minority rule in South Africa are now widely assumed to be running out. But the future can rarely be tamed in advance, and many of the more optimistic scenarios and hopes concerning a transition to a non-racial form of state may well prove to be hopelessly misplaced. Even so, to the extent that it is considered that history is now finally on the move, debate about the nature of opportunities available to, and constraints upon a post-apartheid state becomes not only more legitimate but more urgent. The ambition of this article is to provide a framework for consideration of whether a non-racial South Africa could or will be socialist.