Hamber, B. (1998). Who Pays for Peace? Implications of the negotiated settlement for reconciliation, transformation and violence in a post-apartheid South Africa. Public lecture at the Annual General Meeting of the Catholic Institute for International Relations London Voluntary Sector Resource Centre, London, 30 October.
by Brandon Hamber
Public lecture at the Annual General Meeting of the Catholic Institute for International Relations London Voluntary Sector Resource Centre, London, 30 October 1998.
Brandon Hamber is an independent consultant.
Thanks to Paul Arthur, Adrian Guelke, Roger MacGinty, Gillian Robinson and Sue Williams for their valuable comments. The assistance of Damaris Hess is also gratefully acknowledged.
But was it a miracle? Or was it an expression of one of those good moments that sometimes happen in history? That have happened in all histories. Fancifully, we believe such events happened more frequently in South Africa than elsewhere; these strange moments that are strange because of their goodness. Strange because mostly our context is not good. Mostly it is wretched. (Mike Nicol, The Waiting Country, pg. 91)
South Africa's transition to democracy in April 1994 is regarded by many as one of the major achievements of twentieth century. The transformation of the apartheid state to majority rule has been warmly (and at times cynically) referred to as "a negotiated revolution", "a miracle transition" and "the birth of a new rainbow nation". It is true that South African society has changed. Power has been ushered correctly into the hands of the majority, overt racism has been outlawed, human rights policies entrenched, a constitutional system that can rival any liberal democracy in the world established and there has been limited socio-economic development.
Despite these successes, the long-term impact of the agreements made to ensure peace and reconciliation remain uncertain. A highly politicised population remains trapped in a society of staggering wealth differentials. Those brutally victimised by the security forces have witnessed ruthless killers and their governmental accomplices walk free in exchange for often-meagre confessions. For some victims and survivors of apartheid, the price of peace has been high.
This paper focuses on the legacy of the negotiated settlement in South Africa. It begins by outlining the events surrounding the South African transition, and looks closely at the role of violence in that process. The timing of the transition and the agreements reached are explored. The issue of amnesty is specifically highlighted. The long-term consequences for the survivors of apartheid of amnesties, and the economic concessions that forged peace, are discussed.
The Transition to Democracy in South Africa
It is no coincidence that the formal transition to democracy in South Africa coincided1 with the demise of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union. Confronted with the ostensible failures of communism, political parties and liberation movements across the world, including the African National Congress (ANC), began to move rapidly away from the doctrines of state centralism, nationalisation and violent revolution. At the same time, the West began to relax its commitment to using military means to prevent the spread of communism. Rather the West, and particularly the United States (US), promoted a global free-market and economic "reform" in former-communist countries.
US policy towards South Africa is an example of this trend. Until the mid-1980s the US failed to discourage (and some argue indirectly sponsored) South African armed interventions in Namibia, Angola and Mozambique. South Africa's claim that it was "fighting communism" was enough to draw US support.2 However, as the Cubans withdrew from Angola and Namibia moved toward independence in the late 1980s, and as the socialist agenda of the ANC became increasingly unworkable and unthinkable with the demise of communism, the US began to push for change in South Africa. In 1989 the US government told South Africa president F.W. De Klerk that he had only one year to end the state of emergency, lift the ban on the liberation movement and release all political prisoners (Landsberg, 1994 cited in Wilson, 1997).
At the same time, the National Party (NP) began to realise that the so-called rooi gevaar (red danger) was actually declining.3 As Johnson and Schlemmer (1996) note:
De Klerk too was quick to understand that it no longer greatly mattered whether or not the South African Communist Party controlled the ANC: the Communists were now toothless tigers and the "Communist menace" no longer existed. Negotiation was now possible on terms never before possible. (p. 5)
The South African government was also under significant and increasing economic pressure. International economic sanctions, particularly those imposed by the European Union in 1985 and the US Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act of 1986, had begun to take their toll by the late 1980s. In addition, the border wars, the maintenance of an extensive internal security apparatus, and large-scale civil unrest including strikes and boycotts were draining a shrinking domestic economy. Big business and government began to see that, so long as the rights of the white minority were protected and their economic interests secured, they had more to gain from being part of the international economy than by being outside it. From the mid-1980s on the more enlightened sectors of the business community opened discussions with the ANC-in-exile. By the end of the decade, the NP government too had realised that a political settlement might be the lesser of the potential evils that it faced.
In February 1990 the NP unbanned the liberation movement parties and released Nelson Mandela and other key ANC leaders from jail. Hundreds more liberation-movement prisoners were released in May 1990 and throughout 1991. Indemnity was also granted to returning liberation-movement exiles. Almost two years after Mandela's release, all-party talks began in December 1991.
The primary NP strategy was to force power-sharing and the protection of minority rights on an unprepared ANC struggling to make the transition from a revolutionary movement to a political party. Right-wing elements within the NP also used a more sinister strategy that was to have a determining effect on the negotiations process and the final settlement: they set up a third force of state security operatives and funded Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) paramilitaries to attack the liberation movement and civilians. The third force allowed (and at times directly supported) campaigns of terror by IFP warlords and others. In some instances, the government itself directly sponsored covert violence. The NP government was also complicit in the violence through acts of omission: De Klerk largely turned a blind eye on renegade elements within the security apparatus.4
By the early 1990s, the situation had spiralled out of control and a cycle of murder and retribution permeated most South African townships. Violence flared between the ANC and the IFP. Paramilitaries from all sides armed themselves in the name of defending their communities. Targeted assassinations and massacres left hundreds of fatalities, and drive-by shootings, violence against commuters on trains and at taxi ranks became commonplace. The white extreme-right threatened to launch an armed insurrection if minority rule was ended. This created an environment of instability and terror. Johnson (1994) captured the mood at the time:
It's hard to know what would count as normality in a society where scores of Africans can be shot down in the street by other Africans and no one even dreams of apprehending their killers. Where Eugene Terre'Blanche can appear on TV and boast that the AWB raid into Bophutswana5 was a "victory" because his men killed a hundred innocent Africans, and no one even suggests that in that case he should be arrested for murder. Where taxi wars rage, leaving scores dead. Where men with Kalashnikovs board commuter trains shouting "Bulala abathakathi" (Kill the witches) and then proceed to hurl any "witches" they find off the moving train. Where a disturbed woman with a criminal record can be elected head of her party's women's section, an MP, and … to the Cabinet. Where Afrikaner conservatives insist, under the threat of war, on a volkstaat6 but cannot for the life of them tell you where they want it to be. (p.93-94)
Once the violence had begun in the early 1990s, its origin became difficult to place. State security forces were certainly complicit, but a range of political opportunists from across the spectrum also used violence to strengthen their hand at the negotiating table and to increase their personal power at the local level.
As with so many conflicts, competition over scarce resources also sparked violence in many impoverished communities. Simpson and Rauch (1991) argue that as the repressive apartheid mechanisms that had historically put limitations on people's aspirations began fall away, competing claims for limited resources became more intense. This caused heightened levels of conflict. Ethnic identity was also manipulated as a recruitment tool, mainly by IFP paramilitary groups, but also at times by the ANC. Once mobilised, these ethnically based groups were generally volatile, defensive and extremely difficult to demobilise (National Crime Prevention Strategy, 1996).
In the mid-1970s, political violence killed on average 44 persons a month. By the mid-1980s this figure had risen to 86, and by the 1990s it was 250 (SAIRR, 1993). The nature of violence had also changed from "vertical" (i.e. the state against its citizens and the citizens against the state) to "horizontal" (i.e. fellow citizens against one another). In the 1970s and 1980s the police were responsible for many deaths. But by the 1990s intra-community and intra-organisational conflict in the townships and rural areas (some covertly sponsored by the state and its agents) accounted for the greatest number of fatalities.7 Over the period of the negotiations from February 1990 to April 1994, as South Africa was supposedly normalising, 14,807 people were killed, according to the South African Institute of Race Relations. This is in stark comparison to the previous five years, when the Institute reported 5,3878 deaths from political violence.
In June 1992, in the wake of the Boipatong Massacre9 outside Johannesburg in which 48 people died at the hands of the IFP, the all-party talks collapsed. Clearly, a solution to the violence was urgently needed. In response, many civil groups took to the streets to demand an end to violence and the re-opening of negotiations. Across the country 4 million people took part in two days of peaceful mass action. The National Peace Accord, a countrywide network of peace committees at the local, regional and national levels, also stepped up its campaign to get political parties, labour leaders, local structures and the business community to pursue the common objective of peace (cf. Gastrow, 1995). A mass mobilisation campaign was organised by the ANC and its allies. Thousands of ANC supporters took to the streets at marches around the country, and rolling mass-action campaigns and a host of worker stay-aways threatened a decline into anarchy. Even where action was intended as peaceful at the slightest provocation it often ignited into rioting given the tensions in the country at the time.
These actions reached an explosive head on 7 September 1992 when the Ciskei Defence Force killed 28 ANC supporters at a march in Bisho. Paradoxically, the incident served as a catalyst to get the talks back on track. Johnson and Schlemmer (1996) note:
The "popular upsurge" implicit in mass mobilisation was enough to frighten even the ANC moderates (who played little part in the mass mobilisation campaign), but in the end all parties came to worry that the damage to society might be so deep that recovery would be impossible, whatever the political outcome. It was this worry, rather than fear of a military coup, which hung over all the negotiators and which underlay the implicit pact between the ANC and NP throughout the negotiations. (p. 9)
The Bisho massacre "jolted people to their senses" as Aziz Pahad of the ANC put it at the time. The horror of the carnage, coupled with the extensive civil protests and unrest, and the ANC concession (made under considerable local and international pressure) to cancel two other marches, led the negotiators back to the table. This incident highlights the contradictory role of violence as both "maker" and "breaker" of peace – a role it tragically played throughout the entire negotiations period in South Africa.
In September 1992 Mandela and De Klerk signed the "Record of Understanding" which committed them to restarting talks and ending the violence. The negotiation process began once again, but in contrast to the preceding two years, the ANC now held the balance of power. The NP release at this time of several hundred ANC prisoners illustrates this shift. The show of public support for the ANC, and progressive revelations of the covert strategies of the security forces, had reduced the NP support base and eroded its legitimacy. This left the NP unable to secure the minority and economic rights it had initially hoped for. Similarly, the ANC realised that it had to engage in the negotiation process to prevent further carnage. This inevitably meant compromise, and the possible alienation of radicals within the ANC ranks who wanted the complete capitulation of the apartheid regime. Wilson (1997) comments:
Feeling the pressure from the international community as well as from a society tired of violence, fear and instability, both sides in the conflict in South Africa began to move from viewing negotiations as an extension of war by other means towards seeing peace as an end in itself. (p.14)
With negotiators from both sides firmly entrenched in the process,10 the realpolitik of compromise began to take shape. Ironically, it was the civil groups who had been responsible for demanding that negotiations be put back on track who were the first to be marginalised. The negotiators also began to distance themselves, as a negotiation process demands, from their constituencies. Constant report-back to the wider political party, consensus on every issue, and confrontation of the more radical fringes would have frustrated and slowed the already haphazard progress.
In April 1993 the talks were again threatened with collapse when prominent ANC leader Chris Hani was assassinated. The incident took South Africa to the precipice of disaster; violent revolution seemed imminent. Journalist Fergal Keane captured the uncertainty of the time:
This is a strange and frightening hour in South Africa: the voices of reason are being drowned, swept away in a wave of anger and bitterness. For the first time in my experience, naked hatred of whites is in the eyes and speech of those I met on the township streets. I experienced it myself in Soweto yesterday. An angry crowd surged around my car and chanted the slogan of the radical left, "One settler, one bullet" … this was a crowd seething with hatred and only my black colleague's calming voice soothed them. (1996, p.74)
Initially the ANC leadership seemed unable to control their supporters as riots broke out across the country. However, with time, Mandela as shadow-president managed to restrain the rising anger and stabilise the situation. Frost (1998) writes:
Effectively he was already acting as President when, on television, he called for calm and pointed out that it was a woman of Afrikaner origin who risked her life to get the necessary information which had led to the arrest of the assassins. How South Africans handled the pain, grief and outrage would determine whether the country moved forward to an elected government of its people. (p. 7)
Paradoxically, and contrary to the intentions of the assassins, Mandela's ability to control the majority strengthened his leadership position. There was no longer any doubt that he would be the next President of South Africa. Once again violence, and the threat of national chaos, had pushed the negotiators further into the middle ground and toward settlement.
Negotiations were threatened again in mid-1993 when the AWB drove an armed vehicle through the front window of the talks venue outside Johannesburg. However, the move backfired. The credibility of the AWB was undermined and the group marginalised. The event also disrupted the tenuous alliance that Chief Buthelezi of the IFP had forged with the extreme right (Guelke, 1996), and pushed the IFP back into a more moderate position.
As the negotiations progressed, macro-economic factors began to play a significant role. The NP engaged in a process of economic sabotage to ensure that the ANC would inherit a weak state. Riding the wave of global neo-liberalism, De Klerk began to privatise many parastatals and give away state land and facilities. The government gave 20 million hectares of land to homeland leaders in Bophuthatswana, Kwazulu and Lebowa as an election sweetener and 96 per cent of white state schools were handed over to local communities (CIIR, 1996). The economy was also radically opened-up in order to force the new government into a range of international and local alliances that safeguarded white-owned economic interests and guaranteed some perpetuation of the old economic order.
In February 1992 even the ANC's former ally, Russia, established full diplomatic relations with the De Klerk government in violation of the UN General Assembly resolutions. Within a context of their own economic difficulties, Gorbachev and later Yeltsin, aimed to find short cuts to get quick credit, loans and investment irrespective of the source being the De Klerk government and white-owned business (Shubin, 1999).11 Such actions (which Russia was undoubtedly not alone in) further entrenched white economic interest as an immovable consideration in any future dispensation.
The Western powers also asserted their influence behind the scenes. They persuaded the ANC to adopt free-market economics and abandon its commitment to socialism (Wilson, 1997). This stabilised the negotiation process significantly, and created common ground between the ANC and the NP. But the concession also gave the NP more power at the negotiation table. The prioritisation of economic stability above all else inevitably meant that the white-dominated economy could not be overhauled. Pilger (1998) asserts that economic factors were at the heart of the negotiated settlement:
The most important "historic compromise" was made not with the apartheid regime, but with the forces of Western and white South African capital, which changed their allegiance from P.W. Botha to Nelson Mandela on condition that their multinational corporations would not be obstructed as they "opened up" the South African economy, and the ANC would drop the foolish promises in its Freedom Charter about equity and the country's natural resources, such as minerals, "belonging to the people". This meant the ANC agreeing to investment conditions that favoured big business. (p. 607)
In October 1993 it was announced that De Klerk and Mandela were to be awarded the Noble Peace Prize. Oddly this happened on the same day that the murderers of Chris Hani were sentenced to death.12 The final negotiated settlement was reached in November 1993 and the election date set for April 1994. The violence declined slightly, but did not stop after these agreements. Fierce intra-organisational conflict, mainly between the ANC and the IFP, continued in Kwazulu-Natal and the East Rand townships outside Johannesburg. Several massacres took place and the peculiar phenomenon of violence against commuters continued.
The extreme right's threat of violence was translated into action in February 1994, when the AWB rushed to assist the President of Bophuthatswana,13 Lucas Mangope. Mangope had encouraged his people not to vote and was being deposed. AWB members rode through the streets on bakkies (light pick-up trucks) firing on civilians and killing several, before being apprehended and wounded by soldiers. Shortly after, in view of television cameras, two wounded AWB men were executed by Mangope's troops. This horrendous incident symbolised the collapse of the right wing in South Africa. Threats of armed insurrection were suddenly eclipsed by the image, broadcast across the country, of a far-right fanatic pleading for help before being callously murdered. Keane (1996) notes:
The belief that blacks would melt away in the face of white firepower, that a white South African somehow carried an aura of untouchability when he confronted a black in battle, was punctured forever. (p. 137)
The AWB made a final, albeit devastating, attempt to maintain the old order when it detonated a number of bombs a week before the election.14 Twenty South Africans lost their lives and another 45 were injured. But by this point the negotiations process was unstoppable. Despite fears that a full-blown civil war would follow the election,15 voting passed peacefully. The first day, 27 April 1994, was perhaps the most "miraculous" day of South Africa's transition. Nicol (1995) captures it poignantly:
On election day we switched on the radio at seven in the morning. We needed to know what was happening: that there had not been another bomb or … the sort of minibus taxi killing that fills me with horror. What we heard was how people had walked for miles through the dark and bush to get to the polling stations and how they stood there in a fierce autumn sun sometimes for seven hours without food, without water, without toilets as they waited to draw their crosses. We were told of people who broke into tears afterwards, how they sobbed in one another's arms at the simplicity of what they had done. (p. 23-24)
On 10 May 1994 Mandela was inaugurated as President. The long walk down the difficult "road to freedom" that he mentioned in his inaugural speech was about to begin. Political violence continued, albeit at much lower levels than during the negotiations process. In 1995 the Human Rights Committee documented over 800 deaths from political violence, many of them the massacres of whole families. Perhaps the worst incident was the massacre of twenty ANC supporters in the Shoba Shobane area in Kwa-Zulu Natal on Christmas Day 1995. Political violence continued to flare sporadically throughout 1996.
In 1997, the Human Rights Committee reported that more than 300 people in Kwazulu-Natal and 151 people in the rural Eastern Cape had been killed in political violence. By the end of May 1998, a further 368 people had been killed across the country. Although alarming, this violence was significantly lower and more manageable than it had been in the years immediately preceding the election. Today political violence is over-shadowed by the high levels of violent crime.16
To a great extent, the negotiated settlement did result in political stability and bring an end to large-scale political violence. It also provided a powerful lesson in the mutual dependency of former enemies who, within a context of continual crisis management and high levels of violence, were forced to accept compromise. In Tomorrow is Another Country: The Inside Story of South Africa's Negotiated Revolution, Alister Sparks captures this important aspect of the South Africa peace process:
For this was always a crisis-driven process. From the moment De Klerk made his fateful announcement on 2 February 1990, there could be no turning back. There was no way he could ban the ANC or any other black movement again, return Mandela to prison, or revert to apartheid again. With his political opponents in the same boat, he had embarked on a one-way voyage, and they could either arrive at a new shore together or sink together. There were no other options. So as each new crisis reminded these squabbling voyagers afresh of their mutual dependency, they leaned on their oars with renewed effort and pulled for the shore. (p. 178)
The ANC made many concessions to reach a settlement,17 including temporary power-sharing and job reservation for selected civil servants. Most notably the ANC agreed to grant amnesty to members of the old regime. The rationale was that, without such a guarantee, the country could easily plunge back into bitter political conflict. In this regard, amnesty was an essential and inescapable precondition to the negotiated settlement.
Although the ANC did not have sufficient power to demand prosecutions of former human rights abusers (and in reality the criminal justice system probably did not have the capacity to prosecute large numbers of individuals) it could prevent the NP from granting itself blanket amnesty. The result was a criterion-driven amnesty process: amnesty would be granted only if the crime was political in nature and if the individual fully disclosed the details of the act for which amnesty was sought. In essence, truth was traded for formal justice. The function of deciding who would be granted amnesty fell to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). As well as performing this quasi-judicial role the Commission provided survivors with space to recount their past traumas. The TRC was also mandated to draw up a reparations policy for the new government.18
The TRC was just one component of the transformation strategy. Other bodies and processes were set up to deal with additional issues. For example, the Human Rights Commission was established to deal with current and future human rights violations, a gender-equality process was set in motion, and a Land Claims Court was set up to settle land disputes. A change management process was adopted in the police services, the ANC and Pan-African Congress (PAC) paramilitaries whereby military personnel were incorporated into the mainstream military and other security apparatus. Arguably the most important new programme was the Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) which aimed to redress the structural economic imbalances in the country. In this way the transformation of the country was parcelled-out into manageable pieces.
The Relationship between Reconciliation and Transformation
To prevent any risk of disturbing the frail economy or igniting conflict, the ANC agreed not to dismantle the economic institutions of apartheid in the short term but to implement change from "the inside out". This approach ran contrary to the electorates' aspirations, but it did provide an opportunity for gradual and lasting change. The new government did have some power. It could re-direct the "trickle-down" economic benefits towards the poor, glean international investment and begin to transform apartheid's institutions to guarantee basic civil liberties for the population. In short, the term "reconciliation" represented the agreement for a pragmatic path to transformation and came to mean compromise for all concerned.
The TRC also walked the narrow line between fundamental change and the maintenance of stability. It promised the survivors of apartheid violence accountability, reparations and truth. And by not prosecuting, the TRC ensured that the fragile peace could be sustained.
Although the transformation process had many components, the TRC, as the public face of the government's reconciliation agenda, is often criticised for not addressing the structural violations of the apartheid system. The TRC is also criticised for restricting its focus to the victims of killing, abduction, torture or severe ill-treatment, so-called gross violations. The majority of people who appeared before the TRC suffered not only because of their political affiliation and activities, but also because of their gender, poverty, race and social marginalisation (Hamber, 1998a).
The result of this narrow focus was an over-emphasis on the direct perpetrators of gross violations and an insufficient focus on the indirect beneficiaries of the apartheid system.19 The larger truth of the systematic oppression of apartheid was obscured by a "truth" constructed solely from the testimony of individuals.20 It could be argued that this mirrors the spirit of the negotiated settlement: inclusiveness and stability are prioritised over economic justice.
Despite these criticisms, the TRC has largely stuck to its mandate to focus on gross violations. To compensate it has held a limited number of hearings on the sectors of the society complicit in maintaining apartheid, such as the judiciary, business and health. The broader context of apartheid, and the link between structural oppression and gross violations, is discussed in the TRC's final report, though the issue is not examined extensively.
However, it is unfair to blame the TRC's mandate for the new government's general under-emphasis on apartheid's structural oppression. The mandate was established shortly after the negotiations, when most people were still elated by the euphoria of political change and unaware of the economic compromises agreed to by the ANC. It was assumed that the government would address structural issues through the Reconstruction and Development Programme; thus, it was not necessary for the TRC to focus on structural violations.
It is now clear that it was mistaken and simplistic to assume that truth-telling, public testimony and confession would lead to reconciliation. From the outset, the TRC should have said that truth is just one component of reconciliation and transformation. In contemporary South Africa, this argument is now common and accepted. However, when the TRC process began, truth was equated with reconciliation. The TRC may have been forced to adopt this position to offset right-wing opponents of the amnesty process.
The negotiated settlement was made by politicians, and was not influenced by the average citizen. As a result, the public did not absorb the pragmatic complexity of the process, or the "parcelled-out" approach to transformation. Rather, the majority saw the election as the first step in a process of rapid change that would improve their lives. Truth recovery, and the work of the TRC, was simplistically viewed as the primary vehicle for reconciliation. As a result, the fact that structural equality was integral to genuine reconciliation was ignored.
It could be argued that, given the economic compromises made at the negotiation table, and given the legacy of apartheid inequality, economic imbalance could not be addressed immediately. A blind eye had to be turned on the link between structural inequality and reconciliation in the short term. The settlement reached was a pragmatic means of achieving gradual stable transformation and the redistribution of wealth over an extended period.
A counter view is that reconciliation was a cynical facade that the new government used to perpetuate the inequalities of the past and build a new black elite (Pilger, 1998). According to this view, reconciliation was a tool used to consolidate the power of the new government and sell out the poor. A new ruling class made up of a sector of the black population and their white counterparts was formed.
Yet this view paints too bleak a picture. There has been much progress under the new government:
The real political transition is taking place in the long shadows cast by apartheid and popular opposition to it. Measured against the scale of the task, progress has been limited but nonetheless remarkable. (CIIR, 1996, p.3)
It is important to point out that many of the new laws and development strategies adopted by the ANC have had a positive effect on people's lives. For example, a labour law now covers all workers, and basic constitutional rights have been guaranteed for all citizens. There are improved minimum standards, strong rights for trade unions and workers, and a powerful emphasis on collective bargaining. School nutrition programmes have been introduced, and free school meals are provided to millions of students daily. There is free health care for children, and for breast-feeding and pregnant women, as well as improved access to health care for some sectors of the population. New water legislation has stripped historically-advantaged companies and farmers of their privileged water rights. By 1996 700,000 additional people, and by 1997 a further 1.7 million people, had access to a water supply.
Nonetheless, the new government has not managed to meet many of its promised targets, most notably in regard to housing. On coming to office, it promised to build 1 million houses in five years. Yet by 1995, only 10,000 houses had been built, 50 percent fewer than in apartheid's last year (Frost, 1998). By 1998 the programme was more on track. According to the Minister of Housing some 560 000 new units had been completed or were under construction by September 1998 (Business Day, 9 September, 1998). Nonetheless, the government has not met its promise of 1 million houses by 1999 and the current housing backlog stands about 3 million units (Cawthra, 1999).
Economic disparity in South Africa remains stark. The standard of living of black South Africans is comparable to that in the 124th poorest country, while white South Africans enjoy a lifestyle comparable to the 24th poorest country.21 The poorest sections of society earn relative to inflation less today than they did in 1975, and one quarter of households live below the poverty-line.22 There is also growing economic disparity within black South Africa. This has been the direct result of the growth of the black middle class which is considered by some the main achievement of the transformation since 1994 (Cawthra, 1999). Over 4 million blacks now compromise more than half of the top-income earners in the country (Hawthorne, 1999). However, this growth has been coupled with a decline in wealth among the 25 million people, about 60% of the total, who are poor (Hawthorne, 1999). Within white communities, the proportion of people living below the poverty line is also rising, up from 3 percent in 1975 to 7 percent in 1991 (Frost, 1998).
The current economic policy, the Growth, Employment and Redistribution Programme or GEAR, remains neo-liberal in its framework. It emphasises rapid growth within the worldwide capitalist system, and accepts a trickle-down approach to development. GEAR aims to trim public debt by cutting back on public spending and it limits the role of the state in job creation; stimulating economic growth has been left entirely in the hands of the private sector (Cawthra, 1999). On the whole, the South African government advocates a non-interventionist approach to the market. Foreign investment is encouraged above all else (which has limited strategies to raise money for development such as taxation), and deregulation and privatisation have become mainstays of government economic policy. This policy was summarised by Nelson Mandela when he said:
You can say [our policy] is Thatcherite, but for this country, privatisation is the fundamental policy of the government. (cited in Pilger, 1998, p. 606)
In the context of enormous inequality, it is questionable whether this approach has any prospect of changing the economic landscape of South Africa. An acceptance of the new global economic order is perhaps an inescapable reality for South Africa at this point. But the new government must consider the implications of this acceptance and explore alternatives. Even examined within a free-market framework the government's policy appears to be failing. As a result of the fact that economic growth has not been as forthcoming as was hoped, the government is attempting, with little success, to address the staggering inequality by redirecting and prioritising expenditure within the parameters of the limited existing budgets. Economic growth has stagnated in the last few years averaging less than 2% of the gross domestic product per annum (the success of GEAR demanded 3 to 6% growth) and the result is that socio-economic progress for the poor has been unimpressive. Frost (1998) suggests:
That those wishing for economic reparation to Africans will have to compromise … and come to terms with the implications of the ANC's acceptance of the market economy. (p. 178)
The danger is that, in order to divert attention away from economic inequality, the government will start to blame "enemies of change" for the lack of progress. There are clear dangers to this approach. At the economic level, many white communities do oppose change and their economic dominance must be challenged. In addition, over time, black South Africans with a stake in the current economic order may also favour the status quo and they too will need to demonstrate their commitment to redistribution. It is overly simplistic to assert that the white community alone is responsible for all the ongoing inequality in South Africa. The government created a post-apartheid economic environment that has been favourable to entrenching existing white economic privilege and creating a powerful black elite.
Has Reconciliation Failed?
Is it fair to argue that, if the economic situation of South Africa's poor is not transformed, at least in the short-term, then reconciliation has failed?
One view is that economic equality is the basis of true reconciliation. In this sense, the South African settlement is perpetuating divisions by maintaining an unjust economic system. Reconciliation is nothing more than a smoke screen used to justify the perpetuation of old power imbalances.
On the other hand, reconciliation efforts cannot be dismissed because the economic situation has not changed dramatically in the last few years. Other components of the reconciliation process such as the TRC are valuable. The principles, best expressed by Archbishop Tutu,23 of non-racialism, unity and the maintenance of peace at all costs, have lead to some change in attitude among the conflicting parties. This approach has the potential to build more positive relationships in the future, particularly among the young.
It is also undeniably positive that many survivors were given the opportunity to recount their experiences of apartheid and discover the truth about its many injustices through the TRC. This has made the stories of the survivors indisputable and broken the silences of the past. Many South Africans have taken part in a symbolic process of healing, coming together and moving on. The importance of this process cannot be easily dismissed.
It may be idealistic to argue that reconciliation efforts to date will persuade significant numbers of people accept the new social order. That said, bringing people into the process, rather than alienating them, may be the best way to address the economic injustices of the past. In this way, as with South Africa's economic policy, the benefits of reconciliation may "trickle-down" over time.
Who Pays for Peace?
The TRC, and the broader commitment to transformation through compromise, represent the government's willingness to deal with the past and create a new future. But many individuals cannot make the same commitment. Individual processes of healing will not coincide with national or collective strategies such as the TRC. To ensure stability, the interests of the nation have been placed before those of individuals. Although this pragmatic approach was perhaps unavoidable, its impact on the individual cannot be ignored.
Many people have been denied their rights to justice and civil recompense. At the same time, they have seen perpetrators granted amnesty, and in many instances, given golden handshakes by the past government. Intractable personal loss, and the on-going poverty that many survivors suffer aggravate this pain. As a result, the amnesty process has in many cases increased calls for justice rather than diminished them.
Acknowledgement, apology, recognition and even substantial material improvement can never bring back the dead or ameliorate all the levels of psychological pain suffered by a survivor (Hamber, 1998b). Nor can rapid economic progress deal with all the long-term effects of political violence. The amount of distress, hurt, injustice and anger experienced by survivors is immeasurable. Therefore it is unlikely that in the short-term survivors will forgive perpetrators and let "bygones be bygones" (Hamber, 1998d). The TRC has been a catalyst for successful resolution of this kind in some cases. However, most survivors are not ready to put the past behind them once they have testified at the TRC.
It is critical that victims not be expected, either implicitly or explicitly, to forgive the perpetrators or forget about the past because some form of reparation has been made or a truth recovery process completed. Ongoing space has to be provided for survivors to express their feelings of sadness and rage as they struggle to come to terms with the psychological and emotional impact of their loss – a loss that any strategy can only nominally acknowledge. These spaces can be private (e.g. counselling, traditional mechanisms for story telling and sharing) and public (e.g. media and exhibitions).
The population in South Africa remains, relative to many societies, highly politicised and it is unlikely that large-scale inequality will go unnoticed. If expectations remain unmet, the electorate is likely to start protesting about structural inequality. Survivors who appeared before the TRC may even start to feel that they were pawns in the process of reconciliation: their poverty ignored, but their voices used to ensure stability and a consolidation of power.
The poor may even erroneously ascribe their ongoing difficulties to the TRC, the most visible element of the new government's strategy for reconciliation. Survivors may blame the inadequacies of the TRC's reparation policy for their ongoing poverty. Paradoxically this may serve the government, as it will deflect attention away from the shortcomings of macro-economic policy and channel the frustrations against the TRC, which is supposedly independent from government.
The historic compromises that brought peace to South Africa in April 1994 were arguably pragmatic and necessary. But on an individual level they were personally costly and in some cases damaging. One should never lose sight of the fact that the majority had little say over the intricacies of the negotiated settlement, yet they carry the weight of its consequences.
The flip side of this argument is that the costs would have been much higher if peace had been brokered in any other way. Even so, the constant reiteration that there was no alternative to compromise does not help those who have not benefited from peace. There needs to be greater public acknowledgement that many compromises made by the ANC were individually unjust (e.g. the amnesty provisions) and that the survivors who disagreed with the amnesty provisions have been socially marginalised. Other compromises such as the maintenance of the old bureaucracy has also had unforeseen consequences, such as the continued inefficiencies and internal resistances by some white bureaucrats to transformation.
The problem of past violations, and the legacy of the compromises for peace, will not vanish with time or when reparations are granted. Although the TRC process has been collectively necessary, it is not sufficient for the individual. Resolution depends on the individual working through the traumas of the past in the context of the present. Reparations and compensation, both material and symbolic, is a useful part of this process if they are granted.24
South Africa cannot afford to allow resentment to simmer amongst those people who feel that their personal suffering was the price paid for peace. Apartheid has left a legacy of violence and mistrust not only between the state and its citizens, but also within communities. These feelings remain charged and have been defused only to limited extent by the TRC. Future conflict is most likely to appear within communities when new power struggles emerge and as leaders vie for support. Disaffected individuals who feel that their rights were sacrificed for minimal return will become the first recruits of political entrepreneurs willing to exploit their resentment.
Conclusion
South Africa's fragile social fabric has been undermined by years of apartheid's destruction. As a result, today's political tensions often lead to violence that spreads horizontally across communities. The compromises that resulted in peace helped quell this type of violence once, but not before an excessive loss of life and suffering had occurred. It remains to be seen whether a political system based on accommodation, compromise and moderation will be able to hold frustrations at bay in future, particularly as real economic change for the majority seems unlikely. Once the honeymoon of the "miracle" transition is over, the future is uncertain.
In retrospect, it is easy to say that the negotiated settlement could have been different. Similarly, it is convenient to argue that there was no alternative to the route taken, without having explored an alternative. What is clear, however, is that the path to peace chosen by South Africa cannot be divorced from the context in which it was chosen. Smothered by a veil of violence and under the close scrutiny of international capital, South Africa arguably had little choice but to ensure, in the manner that it did, a peace based on compromise. However, this does not negate the need for an ongoing and realistic assessment of the consequences of the approach adopted.
In his novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez writes that people condemned to isolation do not get a "second chance". In South Africa time is running short to seize the opportunities made available by the dismantling of apartheid. Complacency and a constant cry that there is no alternative to the current economic and international system (which clearly does not meet the needs of the poor in the developing world) is insufficient.
Yet South Africa does not exist in isolation. The country was not alone in its struggle for peace; nor was it alone in its experience of violence or in its exploitation of those most in need. The world still watches and waits, hoping that South Africa can triumph, not against the odds, but in spite of them and on behalf of everyone. It appears that across the globe people and governments want to see an end to violence. It is less certain that those who benefit most from the international global economic system, both in and outside South Africa, are willing to see its demise.
For Mike Nicol, the unimaginable and at times miraculous tale of the South African transition is enough:
Perhaps it was because of the constitution, because of Mandela, because of the "reservoir of good will", that things happened the way they did. It was a high point in our history and probably nothing like it will occur again. But I think it was enough that it happened once, that at least there was this story that could be told in any future turned suddenly dark. (p. 92)
This paper disagrees with Nicol. South Africa's transition, although moving, is incomplete. A lasting peace will require justice and equality.
Notes:
1 The collapse of communism coincided with the formal negotiations process in South Africa and impacted upon it. However, the process of actual peace making and developing a solution to the South African problem began long before these events. This included a range of visits starting in about 1984 by academics, businessmen and politicians to the ANC in exile. "Talks about talks" were held between various role-players and the ANC, and finally with the apartheid government towards the end of the 1980s.
2 For example, from 1976, the United States supported Savimbi's UNITA rebel movement that was fighting against the government in Angola (Hobsbawn, 1995, p.453). South African forces fought alongside those of Savimbi. The South African destabilisation activities in its neighbouring countries caused the death of 1.5 million people and cost the country $45 million according to a Commonwealth Report released in 1989 (Sparks, 1997).
3 Although it is unquestionable that the NP conveniently used the threat of a communist take-over as an excuse to prevent multi-party democracy in South Africa, it is important to acknowledge that close ties between the ANC and the Soviet Union did exist. From 1963 to 1991 the Soviet Union trained 1,501 ANC activists in Soviet military institutions (Segodnya, No. 3, 1993 cited in Shubin, 1999). The Soviets also supplied the ANC with several thousand AK-47s of various modifications, over three thousand SKS carbines, over six thousand pistols, 275 grenade launchers, 90 Grad-P missile launchers, over 40 Strela 2M anti-aircraft missile launchers, 20 Malyutkasm and over 60 mortars amongst other equipment (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 8 August 1992 cited in Shubin, 1999). In this regard, however, Vladimir Shubin a key figure in this support, feels that the Soviet Union never looked at their assistance to the liberation movements as waging the Cold War and that the changes that took place were, first and foremost, the result of internal dynamics (Shubin, 1999). He feels that the Soviet's greatest contribution to the elimination of apartheid was not material assistance and the provision of training facilities for ANC guerrillas but rather the encouragement of non-racialism in the ANC (Shubin, 1999).
4 See the chapter "Behind the Violence" (pp.153-178) in Alister Sparks's book, Tomorrow is Another Country: The Inside Story of South Africa's Negotiated Revolution for a discussion on the degree to which De Klerk and others sanctioned this strategy and the third force activities of those in the security forces. Sparks concludes that the evidence is now overwhelming that there was indeed a third force, consisting of elements of the IFP, the police, and Military Intelligence. He also concludes that, although De Klerk had an interest in weakening the ANC, he did not want to destabilise the negotiations and the country considerably. An explanation for De Klerk's half-hearted attempts to try and stop the violence, according to Sparks, lies with his uncertainty of the extent of his control over Botha's old securocrat establishment and fears of his armed forces turning against him. Arguably, however, this does not free De Klerk (and others) from their complicity in the violence by their acts of omission.
5 This incident concerning the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging/Afrikaner Resistance Movement (AWB) is discussed below, under the events of February 1994.
6 One of the demands of the far right (mainly the Freedom Front and the AWB) was for an independent and separate homeland exclusively for Afrikaners (and sympathetic whites) within the borders of South Africa.
7 The actual number of fatalities at the hands of the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging/Afrikaner Resistance Movement (AWB) and other extreme white right groups were minimal, comparatively speaking. The Human Rights Commission has reported that over the period July 1990 to June 1993 the extreme white right accounted for only 0.6% of fatalities, i.e. 54 deaths of the total 9 325. They did, however, inflict a number of other deaths between June 1993 and the election in April 1994. Nonetheless, the AWB does receive prominence in the paper because their violence had a significant impact on the negotiations process. This is discussed below.
8 It should be noted that the divisions between what is labelled as "political" violence and what was termed "criminal" violence in South Africa over this period were blurred. This accounts for some discrepancies between different agencies' statistics on fatalities. In addition, relativising (and approximating) the number of fatalities is also used cautiously, because this not only cheapens the lives of each individual killed, but also obscures other forms of repression. For example, between 1984 and 1986 the South African police shot dead 300 children, wounded 1000, detained 11 000 without trial, arrested 18 000 on charges relating to political protest and held a further 173 000 in police cells awaiting trial (CIIR, 1996).
9 See Sparks (1997, pp. 141-147) for a personal account of the massacre and the dramatic events that followed. These included the killing by the police of ANC protesters and the driving of De Klerk from Boipatong by an enraged mob when he tried to make a conciliatory visit. Mandela himself even came under fire from angry township residents who yelled at him during a rally in nearby Evaton: "You are like lambs while the government is killing us" (p.146).
10 See Sparks (1997) for some fascinating accounts (some anecdotal) of how relationships were built (in and outside the negotiation chambers and in secret meetings) between the members of different parties and race groups during, and prior, to the negotiations. He specifically highlights the positive relationship between Cyril Ramaphosa and Roelf Meyer, the ANC and NP chief negotiators, as instrumental to the successful outcome of the process.
11 It is interesting to note that Mandela was invited to Moscow first by Gorbachev in November 1991 and then by Yeltsin in May 1992, but in both cases the invitations were issued after the visit by De Klerk was agreed upon (Shubin, 1999). The De Klerk visit took place in June 1992 before Mandela was to visit Moscow.
12 Mike Nicol (1995) notes that on that day, across the street from where the Rand Supreme Court were passing judgement on the murderers of Hani, a memorial service was being held. The memorial was for five young people (two under the age of twelve) killed by the South African Defence Force (SADF) in Umtata the previous Friday. The SADF attacked what they believed to be a PAC stronghold in a twenty-seven-minute assault resulting in some of the victims having as many as eighteen bullet wounds. At the service mourners chanted: "In the name of Jesus Christ … one settler, one bullet". Presumably, this would have meant De Klerk himself, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, who is said to have authorised the attack and was condemned by Mandela 3 days later in a radio interview. In 1998, Clive Derby-Lewis and Janusz Walus, both serving life sentences for the murder of Hani, applied for amnesty – in October 1998 their applications were still pending.
13 Under the system of apartheid, Bophuthatswana was the "separate development" homeland area for the Batswana tribe. Mangope ruled Bophuthatswana on behalf of the NP government as the "perfect puppet: a man who was quick to denounce racial discrimination but who was equally willing to praise the notion of separate development as means to achieving peace and prosperity" (Keane, 1996, p. 117). For a moving and personal account of the events of February 1994, see the chapter "Land of the Dead" in Fergal Keane's book Letter to Daniel: Dispatches from the Heart, 1996, pp. 115-141. As well as the chapter "The Battle of Bop" in Sparks (1997, pp. 197-225)
14 Five members of the AWB were sentenced to 26 years each for the incidents, two others received an 8 year sentence and three received smaller sentences. When Mandela extended the cut-off date for amnesty to May 1994 (it was originally December 1993 because that is when a settlement was reached), those found guilty of the pre-election bombs became eligible to apply for amnesty.
15 Before the election many white South Africans began stockpiling their cupboards and buying basic provision like candles, for fear that war was imminent.
16 The shift from "political" to "criminal" violence in South Africa is beyond the present scope. For more information on the causes and extent of the shift see Hamber (1998a; 1998c); National Crime Prevention Strategy (1996) and Simpson & Rauch (1991).
17 This paper argues that the settlement was a compromise for the majority within the context of the power-balances during the 1990-1994 period in South Africa. It is interesting to note that Guelke (1996) holds a slightly different position. He argues that the settlement in South Africa was not fundamentally different to the transfer of power to black majority rule in Kenya, Zimbabwe and Namibia. He argues that there is a myth that South Africa came up with a political model new to Africa. He says that the temporary power-sharing arrangements in South Africa were similar to those in other countries and that, in their day, the transitions in Kenya, Zimbabwe and Namibia were all hailed as a miracle of accommodation and reconciliation.
18 Space does not permit a thorough discussion of the mandate, structure and operations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. For more detail see Asmal, Asmal, & Roberts, (1996); Hamber & Kibble (1999) and Simpson, G. & van Zyl, P. (1995). For the full mandate of the TRC see the full text of the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, No. 34 of 1995.
21 United Nations Development Programme figures cited in Villa-Vicencio (1998).
22 Weekly Mail & Guardian, 8-14 April 1994 cited in Frost (1998).
23 See Frost (1998) who discusses the role Archbishop Tutu has played in achieving peace and reconciliation in South Africa.
24 At the time of writing only so-called urgent interim reparations had been granted to about 1 500 survivors of the some 22 000 survivors who testified before the TRC. These individuals received a meagre sum between R2 000 and R 6 000 each (about 200 to 600 pounds). Whether the government will grant long-term and more substantial reparations remains in question.
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