Adam Habib on South Africa's Elections

Democracy in Question?

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Glossary

African National Congress (ANC)

(02:22 or p.1 in the transcript)

African National Congress (ANC) is a South African political party and Black nationalist organization. Founded in 1912 as the South African Native National Congress, it had as its main goal the maintenance of voting rights for Coloureds (persons of mixed race) and Black Africans in Cape Province. It was renamed the African National Congress in 1923. From the 1940s it spearheaded the fight to eliminate apartheid, the official South African policy of racial separation and discrimination. The ANC was banned from 1960 to 1990 by the white South African government; during these three decades it operated underground and outside South African territory. The ban was lifted in 1990, and Nelson Mandela, the president of the ANC, was elected in 1994 to head South Africa’s first multiethnic government. The party received a majority of the vote in that election and every election after until 2024, when it saw its support plummet to about 40 percent. source

Growth, Employment, and Redistribution (GEAR) Strategy

(10:30 or p.3 in the transcript)

After democratic elections in 1994, postapartheid South Africa was faced with the problem of integrating the previously disenfranchised and oppressed majority into the economy. In 1996 the government created a five-year plan—Growth, Employment, and Redistribution (GEAR)—that focused on privatization and the removal of exchange controls. GEAR was only moderately successful in achieving some of its goals but was hailed by some as laying an important foundation for future economic progress. The government also implemented new laws and programs designed to improve the economic situation of the marginalized majority. One such strategy, called Black Economic Empowerment (BEE), focused on increasing the number of employment opportunities for people formerly classified under apartheid as Black, Coloured, or Indian, improving their work skills, and enhancing their income-earning potential. The concept of BEE was further defined and expanded by the Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (BBBEE) Act of 2003 (promulgated in 2004), which addressed gender and social inequality as well as racial inequality. source