Lessons in community-based resistance? South Africa’s Anti-Privatisation Forum

ABSTRACT

Grassroots political organising came to dominate the political landscape in South Africa in the early 2000s. The main impetus for new forms of community-based protest was the rightward shift in the government’s economic policies and the related cut-backs to basic services, such as water and electricity, to township and other impoverished black communities. One of the country’s largest and leading social movements during this time was the Anti-Privatisation Forum (APF). This article provides a rare insider’s look at the APF – its structures, strategies, politics, tactics and internal challenges. The article draws attention to the considerable success the organisation had both in terms of forcing the state to reform some of its policies in favour of the poor and also in terms of creating new spaces and opportunities for political engagement, although it concludes with a sobering reminder that many of the key factors required to support and sustain democratic and accountable community-based organisations were not present in the APF or other social movements in South Africa.

KEYWORDS:

• Anti-privatisation
• social movements
• resistance
• civil society
• neoliberalism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Dale McKinley is an independent writer, researcher and lecturer as well as political activist. Originally from Zimbabwe, Dale has lived and worked in Johannesburg since 1990. He co-founded and served on the executive of the APF. He is the author of The ANC and the Liberation Struggle: a critical political biography and numerous academic and popular articles on South Africa, socio-economic rights/struggles and liberation movement and community politics.