Debating Economic Policy for South Africa’s Post-apartheid Transition: From Scholarship and Ideology to Policy in Practice

Critical Reconstructions of Political Economy, Volume 8

Series: 

Author:
Ben Fine
The reasons for South Africa’s full and rapid post-apartheid embrace of neoliberal economic policy remain controversial. Drawing on the author’s own participation in policy debates, this volume establishes there were alternatives available that were either dismissed or not even considered. Explanations for policy failings have to be sought in determinants such as globalisation, financialisation, capital flight, corporate restructuring and Black Economic Empowerment. The text offers extensive surveys of relevant literature including the developmental state, industrial and social policy, privatisation, trade policy, the Harvard School, comparative experience and the deficiencies in the country’s National Development Plan and New Growth Path.
Copyright Year:
2026
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ISBN:
978-90-04-74657-2
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10 Nov 2025
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ISBN:
978-90-04-74656-5
Publication:
20 Nov 2025
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Ben Fine, Ph.D. (1974), London School of Economics, is Emeritus Professor of Economics at SOAS University of London and Visiting Professor at Wits School of Governance, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa. His most recent books include Material Cultures of Financialisation, co-edited with Kate Bayliss and Mary Robertson (Routledge, 2018); Race, Class and the Post-Apartheid Democratic State, co-edited with John Reynolds and Robert van Niekerk (University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2019); and A Guide to the Systems of Provision Approach: Who Gets What, How and Why, with Kate Bayliss (Palgrave, 2021). His Marx’s ‘Capital’ (Pluto, 2016) is now in its sixth edition (with co-author Alfredo Saad-Filho). He was founding Chair of the International Initiative for Promoting Political Economy (iippe.org) until June 2023.
Contents
Preface
List of Figures, Tables and Boxes

1 South Africa’s Policy Conundrums
 1 The Policies and Policymaking that Never Were
 2 The Policies that Could Have Been?

2 Post-Apartheid Economic Transition as Enigma: the Fate of MERG
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Introduction
 2 Demystifying MERG
 3 How Much Did Policy and Policy Making Change?
 4 Reflecting on the Transition

3 Revisiting Apartheid Political Economy
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Introduction
 2 From Disjuncture to Integration but Always Heterogeneity
 3 Industrial Policy Is as Industrial Policy Does

4 The Role and Influence of the IMF on Economic Policy in South Africa’s Transition to Democracy: the 1993 CCFF Revisited
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 The Loan not Taken – The IMF, Innocent as Accused

5 Context and Contest in South African Education Policy: Comment on Curtin
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Introduction
 2 Universal Education in South Africa
 3 Masterplans and Social Actors
 4 User Charges and Education Policy in Transition
 5 Human Capital Theory
 Appendix

6 “Politics and Economics in ANC Economic Policy”: an Alternative Assessment
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Apologetics, Polemics and Scholarship
 2 Methodological Considerations
 3 Theoretical Doubts
 4 Interpretation and Missing Evidence
 5 Future Prospects

7 Flexible Production and Flexible Theory: the Case of South Africa
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Introduction
 2 A Few Theoretical Reconsiderations
 3 The South African Economy and the Minerals-Energy Complex
 4 Flec-Spec’s Intellectual Origins
 5 Concluding Remarks

8 A Sustainable Macroeconomic Growth Path for South Africa?
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Introduction
 2 The Economy on the Eve of Democratic Elections
 3 The Economic Policy of the GNU
 4 The Economy between Elections
 5 Time for a Re-Think?
 6 A Framework for an Alternative Macroeconomic Policy
 7 Conclusion

9 Submission to the COSATU Panel of Economists on “The Final Recommendations of the International Panel on Growth” (the Harvard Panel)
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Introductory Remarks
 2 Policy Initiatives
 Appendix

10 Rejoinder to “A Response to Fine’s ‘Harvard Group Shores Up Shoddy Governance’”
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Introduction
 2 Overlooking Industrial Policy
 3 Underplaying Finance, Investment, Employment and Growth
 4 Closing Remark

11 Assessing South Africa’s New Growth Path: Framework for Change?
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Foreword
 2 New Growth Path for Old?
 3 From Tradeoffs to Capital Flight
 4 Financialisation Meets the MEC
 5 Lessons from China …
 6 … To Developmental State
 7 Twixt Politics and Policies
 8 Concluding Remarks

12 Chronicle of a Developmental Transformation Foretold: South Africa’s National Development Plan in Hindsight
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Introduction
 2 From the Camel’s Back to the Elephant in the Room
 3 Twenty Years of Insolitude
 4 From the Goose to the Monkey, via the Dragon
 5 The MEC: from Albatross to Dead Duck
 6 Resurrecting the Dodo Scenario?
 Appendix

13 The Political Economy of Restructuring South Africa: from MERG to PERSA
 Postscript as Personal Preamble
 1 Parading the Problem of Inequality …
 2 Government: Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem?
 3 Critical Alternatives – Framing the Problems Correctly
 4 A Brief Look at Some South African Peculiarities
 5 Finance Is Not Delivering …
 6 … Nor Are the Minerals-Energy Complex and New Black Elite Delivering
 7 Financialisation on a Global Scale …
 8 South Africa’s Financial Elephant in the Room …
 9 … And Illegal Capital Flight
 10 Macroeconomic Success?
 11 And the Specificities of South Africa – the MEC
 12 The Rise of a New Elite
 13 Towards Alternatives
 14 From the ‘Economic’ to the ‘Social’
References
Index
This book is especially relevant to development economics and studies, scholars focused on (South) Africa, and those interested in economic and social policy.
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