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Examines the need and prospects for a UBI As jobs disappear and wages flat-line, paid work is an increasingly fragile and unattainable basis for dignified life. This predicament, deepened by the COVID-19 pandemic, is sparking urgent debates about alternatives such as a universal basic income (UBI). Highly topical and distinctive in its approach, In the Balance: The Case for a Universal Basic Income in South Africa and Beyond is the most rounded and up-to-date examination yet of the need and prospects for a UBI in a global South setting such as South Africa. Hein Marais casts the debate about a UBI in the wider context of the dispossessing pressures of capitalism and the onrushing turmoil of global warming, pandemics and social upheaval. Marais surveys the meaning, history and appeal of a UBI before even-handedly weighing the case for and against such an intervention. The book explores the vexing questions a UBI raises about the relationship of paid work to social rights, about prevailing notions of entitlement and dependency, and the role of the state in contemporary capitalism. Along with cost estimates for different versions of a basic income in South Africa, it discusses financing options and lays out the social, economic and political implications. This incisive new book advances both our theoretical and practical understanding of the prospects for a UBI

This paper examines the impact of the global economic recession on South Africa's economy and society, the ways in which the country's government has chosen to respond to that crisis, and its likely social and political fall-out. Despite initial official denials, South Africa's economy has entered in its first recession in almost two decades. The recession is predicted to last into 2010 and the social impact is likely to prove punishing. The African National Congress (ANC), re-elected to office in April, has pledged to cushion the shock with a package of measures that include an overhauled industrial policy. But a shift to the left in economic policy is highly unlikely, and the ANC remains ambivalent about further expanding its social grant system for the poor. A vibrant, ongoing tradition of social protest means that the political fall-out of the recession is difficult to predict.

Thabo Mbeki, Deputy President of South Africa, will succeed Nelson Mandela as President of the Republic in 1999. The author tries to assess what type of politician Mbeki is. He points out that as the political midwife of the controversial Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) macro-economic plan, Mbeki has not endeared himself to Cosatu or the S.A. Communist Party. However, according to the author, Mbeki's commitment to consolidating the ANC as a broad and inclusive political organization is beyond dispute. (DÜI-Sen)

Two articles on local elections in South Africa except the province of KwaZulu Natal (KZN) and social and political conditions in KZN. In the first article H. Marais discusses the local elections in different provinces; how the ANC has become the strongest party in most of the major towns and many smaller rural communities; slow progress in the RDP (Reconstruction and Development Programme) and the ANC's lack of capacity to extend its political power into administrative and management zones. D. Pottie writes about crime and punishment in KZN, the role of the traditional leaders etc. (DÜI-Sen)