JONNY STEINBERG: Small-town joblessness fired up a toxic brew
WHY has the ANC become what it is? To say that it has been captured by the corrupt and the dishonest is only to beg the question. Part of a proper explanation for what has become of the governing party lies in a place so obvious that few have bothered to look.For as long as anyone can remember, South Africans have been warned that our unemployment crisis will have dire political consequences. We have been told that a time bomb is ticking, that there will be an explosion soon.This fear usually expresses itself in an Armageddon-like image of young men running amok; without hope, their futures shattered, they simply tear the world apart.But what if the explosion triggered by mass unemployment has already happened? And what if it has taken the form, not of young men going feral, but of corrupt politicians and businessmen raiding the state?Looking back, the growth path SA adopted immediately after the transition to democracy contained an unfortunate combination: rapid trade liberalisatio...
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