The Subject as Object: 40 Years of Scholarship

Abstract

This contribution to the special anniversary edition serves as a framing document, taking a macro view and reflecting on all contributions to Politikon over the past 40 years. Rather than presenting an objective and comprehensive literature review of the entire and disparate corpus of scholarship, this article provides subjective reflections on how the journal and Political Science scholarship have evolved in their operationalisation and presentation of research in South Africa. This is done by contextualising the research as products of their specific time(s), by considering instances of meta-reflection by South African political scientists, and by highlighting remarkable historical and intellectual pointers in the evolution of the kind of scholarship that has been published in this journal. An appeal is made for a closer and more systematic study of South African Political Science (therefore, the subject qua object), and for future scholarship to be undertaken with greater constitutive (self-)awareness.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to the anonymous reviewers of this special anniversary edition for their constructive feedback. I have attempted to integrate some of their comments into my argument and general reflections, and the analysis is much improved as a result. Any misinterpretation and other errors remain my own.