Part 1: The past stands in front of the present, we cannot see the future

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Michael Abrams* discusses the deep-seated fracturing within South African society continues 20 years after apartheid, and its impact especially on the youth.

Legacies of the past and the poor policy decisions of successive democratic governments have created a lethal set of systemic factors, which, when combined with family and class circumstances, act as huge obstacles to personal and social development. These cycles are caused by the failure of this nation to engage in a sustained process of deep-seated reconciliation that has lead to past injustices becoming intergenerational and acting as a brake on reconstruction and development. The transition from a fractured society to democracy requires fundamental reconciliation of people, families and communities. At the start of our transition to democracy, we were a nation of deeply wounded people who were undereducated; and, experienced unemployment and poverty. Attempts have been made to address these legacies but they have been superficial and have not focused on people and the social infrastructure which holds a society together [families, communities, culture].

Multiple-Wounded Nation

Three-hunded and ifty years of conflict over resources, power and control have scarred the nature of this society, the sense of self and the psychological skin of communities leaving human bonds fragile and dislocated. Although she was discussing Nicaragua, Martha Cabrera’s observations are relevant to South Africa when noted: When a person does not or cannot work through a trauma right away, its social consequences, the most frequent of which are apathy, isolation and aggressiveness, are only revealed over time. … The ability to communicate, to be flexible and tolerant is enormously reduced among people who have a number of unresolved personal traumas. The characteristics vital to a person’s ability to function adequately become affected… Trauma and pain afflict not only individuals. When they become widespread and ongoing, they affect entire communities and even the country as a whole.

The South African Institute of Race Relations into the status of families in South Africa notes in their 2011 report that only 35% of children were living with both their biological parents in 2008. Some 40% were living with their mother only and 2.8% with their father only, which leaves 22.6% of children who were living with neither of their biological parents. We have seen the breakdown of family structures, the rise of woman-headed families and increasingly absent fathers. This affects children, boys and girls and social relationships.

Wherever South Africans gather – churches, sports activities, the economy, in everyday life -we experience a lack of tolerance, poor communication and the inability to unite. The social infrastructure is collapsing, fuelling high rates of male violence, teenage pregnancy and substance abuse which, in turn, creates vicious and self perpetuating cycles of violence and social fragility for our youth. In addition the HIV epidemic has struck down thousands of parents creating a large number of orphans and child headed households.

Inequality perpetuated

The legacy of poor infrastructure and quality of instruction in Black schools has been perpetuated under the democratic government. While significant gains have been made in terms of enrolment of learners since 1994 which now stands at 92%, and de-racialising education spending; the schools are in crises. Equal Education has estimated that only 5% of schools have stocked science laboratories and only 7% have stocked libraries. In a global world where access to information and technology is critical the lack of libraries and laboratories severely hampers the chances of working class youth breaking through the cycle of under education left by apartheid.

The failure to attend to the legacy of apartheid education on people and their abilities has been short sighted and self defeating. Transforming education systems from a colonial and oppressive model to a global democratic one must include fundamental transformation of existing knowledge as well as the culture of learning and teaching. What has been lost needs to be returned before starting with the new. Transformation is about people not systems and structures and our failure to understand this is most clearly seen in the history of educational change since 1994. The school drop out rate is 67% and many youth argue that there is no point in going to school. Even if you get a school leaving certificate you will not get a job.

We see also the lethargy, poor management, corruption and impunity of a bureaucracy unable to implement policies of reconstruction and development, low productivity in the economy and a society which has not yet moved beyond the racial and ethnic divisions of the past. Colonialism and apartheid skewed access to, and control over, the economy resulting in ownership being linked to class and colour, and refined itself over the last 300 years. The reintegration of South Africa into a world economy dominated by forces of free trade has reinforced the existing inequalities. The Government’s Black economic empowerment have had little impact on the ownership and racial distribution of opportunities in the economy.

This skewed and racialised form of economic development has impacted on South African youth and their ability to participate in change and development. Unemployment is a continental high of 51%. Racial and gender oppressions of the past are still reproduced with 63% African women 15 to 24 years being unemployed. The psychological impact of intergenerational unemployment needs to be analysed and better understood.

For many of the youth, a gun is a poor young Black man’s credit card access to the consumer society and a brand driven Western life style. Crime, the sex industry, drugs and gangs offer a real life opportunity for many youth. Relations of production trap many youth in this way and create the belief that bad is good. The less our leaders are able to break structural unemployment and ownership of the means of production, the more our youth are condemned to economic marginalisation and the grey economy.

Conclusion

After 20 years of transformation, South Africa is teetering on the edge of an abyss. The inequalities exacerbated by neoliberal capitalism, moral corruption and violence are structural and systemic in the new South Africa. This“toxic mixture”is trapping the youth in a vicious cycles of hopelessness, anger and violence that threatens the gains made in the struggle for democracy.