As walls go up, engagement stalls
He says constructive engagement is not happening. "Formal and informal borders are (re)made every day through diverse 'security infrastructures' such as physical barriers, security company patrols, alarm systems and various formal and informal institutions.
"Concomitant to societal divisions has been the reshuffling of the middle and upper classes after apartheid. The privileged group is now more diverse than ever. The government, which includes a large part of a new elite, has strategically promoted these complexities by playing groups off against each other, while benefitting from social division in the name of security," he adds.
"If we understand peace as a process, then crime to a significant degree is a function of inequality in particular. As such the status quo, which in the wake of Covid-19 has excluded more South African residents from economic activity, is increasingly fragile. The post-Covid era – if this is possible – or the 'new normal' is likely to suffer the same ills that crippled the pre-Covid era, notably economic inequality and various other layers of marginality," Dr Van Riet explains.
He says the political party system and the various invited (formal participatory democratic institutions) and invented (less formal spaces often hijacked by political parties) have not served those who live in South Africa well.
"Seemingly the only feasible solution, though relatively unexplored, is social mobilisation by the people themselves, across historical lines of division. Given that South Africa does not consist of two groups only, dynamic alliances around issues where different groups support the concerns of others may offer the most productive form of politics by which to tackle the new normal."
|