The Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection (Mistra) held a roundtable discussion titled “Age of Identity Politics?” last week. On Monday I received a copy of the remarks framing the core issues of identity politics by Mistra’s executive director and one of South Africa’s foremost thinkers and strategists, Joel Netshitenzhe.
The ending of his inputs on the day’s discussions really resonated with a document I had received last week. “The social capital that attaches to the liberation and transformation identity has largely been squandered,” Netshitenzhe wrote.
“Activism around the legitimacy of affirmative action and broad-based black economic empowerment (B-BBEE) by the successful beneficiaries of these policies... is hardly visible. The trauma of having historically been consigned to the status of inferiority seems to have been aggravated.
“What is required to revive the energy towards forging a South African nation, united in its diversity and in pursuit of social justice, is the exercise of social agency.
“The elites and ruling classes across the globe are exercising their agency with much force and confidence. They have generated a trickle-up economics... characterised by wealth excess and political corruption – all the while corralling the working people towards social self-immolation.
“A common human identity should be forged in the fight for social justice, whatever legitimate sub-identities individuals may harbour,” he concluded.
I was reminded of the BEE compliance document I received and the thoughts it elicited in me, particularly in light of the recent discussions that have vilified the existence of BEE from inside and outside our borders, with the DA the loudest in its denouncement.
And what struck me is that the policy has always been grudgingly accepted, echoing Netshitenzhe’s words that the “trauma of having historically been consigned to the status of inferiority seems to have been aggravated”. This is because what necessitated the policy, and what its intended outcomes were, are hardly discussed. What has instead dominated the discourse is a call for its blanket demise, which threatens to erase its historical context and legitimacy.
It is unfortunate that people have to be reminded that BEE was introduced as a policy initiative meant to transform South Africa’s racially exclusionary economy by promoting black ownership and management control in companies and developing skills to correct the imbalances of apartheid.
And though it is true that a minority have co-opted the policy to amass obscene wealth, why is the focus not on sanctioning them as opposed to a wholesale condemnation of a progressive policy?
Calling for BEE’s abandonment and deracialising transformation deliberately obfuscates the fact that economic exclusion was race-based and the impact of this continues to reverberate around the country.
The only way forward towards a society premised on social justice is not only the lip service of a recognition of past injustices, but a correction of them through policies like BEE. We should all be working towards safeguarding these policies from being corrupted so that our collective identity is not marred by racial injustice or denialism. DM
This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R35.
