Conflict, empowerment and planning in post-apartheid South Africa

Abstract

The discussion which follows is predicated upon the premise that where there is a substantial inequality in the distribution of resources in a society, that society is likely to be involved in conflict. The nature and extent of conflict has a congruency with the circumstances that have precipitated and sustained the condition of inequality, in which regard the volatile and violent climate that for decades spread through all areas and activities in South Africa can be attributed to the abnormal circumstances that attached to the apartheid doctrine. It is now common cause that doctrine skewed resource distribution on an unparalleled scale. The demise of apartheid in the early 1990s carried with it the hope and expectation that societal conflict would be eradicated, but the disparities created during some forty years of statutory discrimination have proved difficult to dislodge. Conflict, albeit of a genre less hostile than that pertaining previously, remains prevalent around the country. The past is not yet past.