We can break things with the best of them, South Africans. The public and government have over the past two decades damaged, destroyed, weakened, bankrupted, vandalised, robbed, undermined, mismanaged, collapsed and compromised such a wide range of institutions and ideas that we’ve turned destruction into an art form. When you excel at something, it is worth understanding why. How have we become so accomplished at ruin? A good place to start is with intent, and it comes in two forms. First, there is the deliberate and conscious act, undertaken with purpose and a clear outcome in mind. Setting a library on fire, for example, or torching a train carriage. Second, there is the by-product of disregard, neglect, contempt or incompetence. Examples include ignoring electricity infrastructure for decades or turning the SABC into a lunatic asylum. One can already see a natural divide. The former is generally the preserve of the public; the latter, government. But the two do come together in ...
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