Democratization and Parliamentary Opposition in Contemporary South Africa: The 2009 National and Provincial Elections in Perspective

Abstract

South Africa's 2009 elections were characterized by an increase in electoral participation in terms of registered voters and actual numbers of voters, a resurgence of support for the opposition, and a realignment within the opposition bloc in favour of the Democratic Alliance and the Congress of the People. In addition, the vote share of the governing African National Congress declined nationally for the first time since 1994, with the party also losing support in eight of nine provinces. Despite this, the authors argue that the 2009 election results do not indicate the emergence of a viable opposition party that could seriously contest the ANC's electoral dominance in future elections primarily because voter perceptions of party images remain key to partisan support. Party images act as helpful cues for voters about whom and what parties stand for. Most importantly, these perceptions play a restrictive role, limiting the choice of parties for both partisan and independent voters. Until opposition parties are able and willing to reconstruct their party images and policy agendas they will fail to attract significant electoral support from key black African and poorer constituencies.

Notes

The data is sourced from the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) Elections Results System (ERS), which is based on South Africa's Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) elections database. The percentages do not present a final tally for the entire geographical area of a particular township but instead reflect national votes for each party from a significantly large cluster of voting districts within that township. The percentages are therefore representative impressions rather than exact results of a geographical area.

The data findings presented in this section are sourced from a doctoral thesis submitted in 2008 to the University of Cape Town by Collette Schulz Herzenberg, entitled ‘Towards a Silent Revolution? South African Voters during the First Years of Democracy, 1994–2006’. The thesis consists of an over-time analysis of the motivations of individual voters by comparing different electorates over 12 years using a series of cross-sectional surveys. It explores the relative influence of competing theoretical models on partisanship such as demographic and sociological factors, evaluations of government performance, party images, social networks and the voter's cognitive skills, as well as the relative mix and intersection of these models on partisanship. Findings are based on a range of statistical analyses.

Survey items ask respondents to assess the extent to which the major political parties represent the interests of all South Africans or only one specific group. Does X political party look after interests of all in South Africa or after the interests of one group only? Which group?

The confidence interval for 1994, 1999 and 2004 CNEP is 1%. At the 95% confidence level, expected range of response rates within the population will be between one percentage point above or below the reported frequencies.

Some opposition parties have attempted to transform their images, most obviously the National Party, which tried to reinvent itself as the New National Party, and the Democratic Alliance, which attempted to garner the black African vote in the 2004 and 2009 elections. The ANC also presents itself as a national, non-racial party in some areas.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Adam Habib

Deputy Vice-Chancellor, University of Johannesburg.

Collette Schulz Herzenberg

Senior Researcher, Institute for Security Studies. Email: [email protected]