Paper short abstract:

Rural power and access to land receive little attention in mainstream political discussion. But former reserve areas have become a core battleground in a fight to determine the country’s political trajectory; how the rural question is resolved fate could, therefore, define the nature of the polity.

Paper long abstract:

For much of the period since South Africa became a democracy in 1994, traditional authority and its power over land distribution been a marginal issue in political and policy debate: government policy was characterised by desultory and largely incoherent attempt to compromise between the rights enshrined in a democratic constitution and the powers of traditional authorities. But the fate of the rural reserves created by white domination has now become a core battleground between contending factions in the governing party who are seeking to define the direction of the polity. These factions represent very different understandings of politics which reflect the reality that only some black South Africans have been incorporated into the post-apartheid formal economy. Widespread economic exclusion has created a power base for patronage politics which is resisted by a faction whose constituency has been integrated into the formal marketplace and is thus concerned to protect it from the predations of patronage. The patronage faction have identified traditional authorities as a key source of support and have been trying to use the law and policy to entrench their power over land and people: this has been resisted by their opponents with varying degrees of success. One consequence is a battle in the reserve areas between traditional authorities and their allies in government on the one hand, small farmers on the other. The outcome of this conflict could play an important role in deciding whether the politics of patronage or that of the marketplace prevail.