Suchergebnisse

The distribution of incomes in South Africa in 2004, ten years after the transition to democracy, was probably more unequal than it had been under apartheid. In this book, Jeremy Seekings and Nicoli Nattrass explain why this is so, offering a detailed and comprehensive analysis of inequality in South Africa from the midtwentieth century to the early twenty-first century. They show that the basis of inequality shifted in the last decades of the twentieth century from race to class. Formal deracialization of public policy did not reduce the actual disadvantages experienced by the poor nor the advantages of the rich. The fundamental continuity in patterns of advantage and disadvantage resulted from underlying continuities in public policy, or what Seekings and Nattrass call the "distributional regime." The post-apartheid distributional regime continues to divide South Africans into insiders and outsiders. The insiders, now increasingly multiracial, enjoy good access to well-paid, skilled jobs; the outsiders lack skills and employment

South Africa has one of the highest rates of unemployment in the world. Job creation is a national priority, yet labor-intensive options are derided by the trade union movement as an unacceptable throwback to the "cheap labor" policies of apartheid, and effectively ruled out by the government in its recent National Development Plan (NDP). Instead, minimum-wage setting in South Africa continues to contribute to job destruction (as evidenced most recently in the clothing industry). Policy-makers hope that support for high-productivity firms and rapid economic growth will make up for job losses and solve the unemployment problem. Unfortunately, South Africa's economic performance has been comparatively disappointing and constrained by negative investor sentiment, especially with regard to the labor market. The NDP has called for a social accord between labor and capital. But the prospects are not promising, and unemployment is likely to remain a significant feature of the South African economic landscape.

This paper explores the South African political economy through the lens of a variety of capitalism (VoC) approach. It argues that attempts were made in the early post-apartheid period to forge a more social-democratic and co-ordinated variety of capitalism, but that this floundered as the government adopted neoliberal macroeconomic policies against the wishes of organised labour, and as black economic empowerment policies further undermined an already racially-fraught business sector. Organised labour was able to push for, and maintain, protective labour market policies – but this came at the cost of growing policy inconsistency notably with regard to trade liberalisation which, in the presence of growing labour-market protection, has exacerbated South Africa's unemployment crisis. Unemployment remains intractable (and with it inequality) and corruption/patrimonialism appears to be a growing problem.

This paper explores the South African political economy through the lens of a variety of capitalism (VoC) approach. It argues that attempts were made in the early post-apartheid period to forge a more social-democratic and co-ordinated variety of capitalism, but that this floundered as the government adopted neoliberal macroeconomic policies against the wishes of organised labour, and as black economic empowerment policies further undermined an already racially-fraught business sector. Organised labour was able to push for, and maintain, protective labour market policies -- but this came at the cost of growing policy inconsistency notably with regard to trade liberalisation which, in the presence of growing labour-market protection, has exacerbated South Africa's unemployment crisis. Unemployment remains intractable (and with it inequality) and corruption/patrimonialism appears to be a growing problem. Adapted from the source document.

This paper explores the South African political economy through the lens of a variety of capitalism (VoC) approach. It argues that attempts were made in the early post-apartheid period to forge a more social-democratic and co-ordinated variety of capitalism, but that this floundered as the government adopted neoliberal macroeconomic policies against the wishes of organised labour, and as black economic empowerment policies further undermined an already racially-fraught business sector. Organised labour was able to push for, and maintain, protective labour market policies – but this came at the cost of growing policy inconsistency notably with regard to trade liberalisation which, in the presence of growing labour-market protection, has exacerbated South Africa's unemployment crisis. Unemployment remains intractable (and with it inequality) and corruption/patrimonialism appears to be a growing problem.

MDG 6, 'to combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases', is unique among the MDGs because it emerged in the context of unprecedented prior international mobilisation, especially around HIV/AIDS, thus both reflecting and facilitating an expanding international health agenda. MDG 6 built on the idea of 'health as development', originally articulated at the 1978 conference on primary health at Alma-Ata, but was profoundly shaped by the political traction and fund-raising successes of AIDS activism and the international AIDS response. This underpinned the expansion of MDG 6 targets to include antiretroviral treatment (ART), helped forge partnerships to reduce the prices of ART and essential medicine, thereby contributing to MDG 8 ('building partnerships for development') and, in high HIV-prevalence regions, also to MDGs 4 and 5 (maternal and child health). The moral-economic dimensions of the international AIDS response point to the importance of civil society mobilisation in shaping the AIDS and international health agendas. Continued support for civil society organisations is necessary for continued progress on global health.

This paper explores the South African political economy through the lens of a variety of capitalism (VoC) approach. It argues that attempts were made in the early post-apartheid period to forge a more social-democratic and co-ordinated variety of capitalism, but that this floundered as the government adopted neoliberal macroeconomic policies against the wishes of organised labour, and as black economic empowerment policies further undermined an already raciallyfraught business sector. Organised labour was able to push for, and maintain, protective labour market policies – but this came at the cost of growing policy inconsistency notably with regard to trade liberalisation which, in the presence of growing labour-market protection, has exacerbated South Africa's unemployment crisis. Unemployment remains intractable (and with it inequality) and corruption/ patrimonialism appears to be a growing problem.

U.S. foreign aid has been crucial to the international AIDS response, especially to the rollout of antiretrovirals (ARVs) in Africa. The unprecedented scale of funding that has been raised to combat this disease evolved out of fears that AIDS was a both a humanitarian disaster and a threat to international security and economic development. U.S. commitment to fighting AIDS in Africa has traditionally been, and still is, buoyed by bi-partisan support. This support has remained strong post-2007. Even so, the view is widespread that African country governments ought to take greater ownership of combating the problem and reducing aid dependency in managing it. One of the most effective interventions the United States could make to this end would be to ensure that trade negotiations facilitate, rather than impede, the supply of affordable ARVs for developing countries. Boosting U.S. development assistance to the international target of 0.7% of national income would also help.

AbstractThe human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) originated from cross‐species transmission of the simian immunodeficiency virus from primates to humans. Yet a significant minority of people in the United States (US) and South Africa believe that HIV was deliberately created by scientists as a bioweapon. Scholars in the humanities emphasise the historical context, socially situated character and psycho‐social dimensions of such aetiological narratives. This is important, but so is the role of individual agents participating in the cultic milieu in which oppositional ideas such as HIV conspiracy theories are borrowed across national, ideological and political divides. This article discusses the origins of the legend of 'HIV as bioweapon' and summarises the available evidence on the prevalence of acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) conspiracy beliefs in the US and South Africa. This is followed by a discussion of the history of biowarfare and racial oppression which renders the legend (and its local South African variants) believable for many people. The article then moves beyond socio‐historical analysis to argue that analytical space needs to be created to critique the political leaders who promoted AIDS conspiracy beliefs.