The social and economic successes of Asia have drawn global attention to the developmental state as a possible model for developing countries. In South Africa, many, including government, see this as a possible panacea to the country's social, economic and institutional crises. However, a government committing itself to constructing a developmental state is one thing; actually implementing the necessary institutional and policy reforms to bring that into reality is another.
In this seminal collection, an interdisciplinary team of distinguished scholars examine how South Africa could go about building a democratic developmental state, while drawing on relevant conceptual models and useful comparative experiences from other countries. The macro- and microeconomic questions, as well as the institutional, governance and social challenges facing South Africa are lucidly analysed, as are the country's advantages; such as its existing constitutional democracy, rents from its mineral resources and the commitment of its political leadership to creating a democratic developmental state.
Providing an eloquent and intelligent account of what the state's primary goals should be at this point, the contributors make the case that for South Africa to become a developmental state that is both democratic and socially inclusive, economic and social policy have to be intertwined; development and democratic agendas have to be mutually reinforcing; and a competent bureaucracy needs to be built to enhance state capacity.
An authoritative and comprehensive study that illuminates the political economy of economic development, this work is invaluable for anyone interested in the political and economic future of South Africa and similar developing countries.
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1. Constructing a democratic developmental state in South Africa: potentials and challenges
Omano Edigheji
PART ONE Conceptual issues and historical experiences
2. Constructing the 21st century developmental state: potentialities and pitfalls
Peter B Evans
3. From maladjusted states to democratic developmental states in Africa
Thandika Mkandawire
4. How to do a developmental state: political, organisational and human resource requirements for the developmental state
Ha-Joon Chang
5. Limits of the authoritarian developmental state of South Korea
Eun Mee Kim
6. Foiling the Resource Curse: wealth, equality, oil and the Norwegian state
Jonathon W Moses
PART TWO Policy-making and economic governance in South Africa
7. The effect of a mainstream approach to economic and corporate governance on development in South Africa
Seeraj Mohamed
8. Can South Africa be a developmental state?
Ben Fine
9. Consolidation first: institutional reform priorities in the creation of a developmental state in South Africa
Anthony Butler
PART THREE South Africas macroeconomic and industrial policy landscapes
10. Towards an appropriate macroeconomic policy for a democratic developmental state in South Africa
Kenneth Creamer
11. Competition policy, competitive rivalry and a developmental state in South Africa
Simon Roberts
PART FOUR Social policy and its institutional underpinnings in South Africa: what hope for a developmental state?
12. The South African post-apartheid bureaucracy: inner workings, contradictory rationales and the developmental state
Karl von Holdt
13. Intermediate skills development in South Africa: understanding the context, responding to the challenge
Salim Akoojee
PART FIVE Agrarian reform
14. The agrarian question and the developmental state in southern Africa
Sam Moyo
Contributors
Index
