Challenges of adopting a culture-sensitive development framework in South Africa: a critical reflection

Abstract

During the negotiations towards a post-1994 new political dispensation in South Africa, the African National Congress expected culture to play a pivotal role in the development of a new country and society. However, since the inception of the new government, culture has been drifting further into the periphery of the country’s development framework. This paper examines the challenges of adopting culture-sensitive development framework in South Africa. The authors identify four areas wherein culture is adversely affected in South Africa. The areas include legislation, finance, national priority listing and the National Development Plan (NDP). They argue that continued disregard of culture in the country’s development perpetuates the Apartheid legacy of spatial infrastructure network it seeks to eradicate. The authors further advocate the review of relevant legislation, capacity building in cultural policy formulation and implementation, realignment of government structures for effective and efficient implementation of cultural policy, and strong political leadership to ensure that decisions taken by the ruling party are translated into government policy. Lastly, they advocate a National Culture Plan as a postscript to the NDP.

Keywords:

• cultural policy
• cultural planning
• national development plan
• National Culture Plan
• spatial planning

Notes

1. Political doctrine of the National Party government based on racial segregation of pre-1994 South African society.

2. Keorapetse Willy Kgositsile, South Africa’s national poet laureate, is a high-profile member of the ANC who was instrumental in the formation of the Department of Education in 1977 and the DAC in 1982 whilst in exile from 1975. Upon his return to South Africa, he worked as a Strategic Support for the Arts, Culture and Heritage Services of the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Council for two years, before becoming the Special Advisor to four ANC Ministers of Arts and Culture in consecutive terms (including the current five-year cycle) of post-1994 government. In 2008, Kgositsile received the South African National Order of Ikhamanga from President Thabo Mbeki for his poetic prowess and cultural activism against Apartheid.

3. Mittah Seperepere was a member of the ANC since 1958 until her death in 2010. She was exiled in Botswana and Tanzania from 1966 (a year after her imprisonment in South Africa) until 1990 when she returned to South Africa. She is renowned for having started a primary school attached to the famous ANC School, Solomon Mahlangu Freedom College in Tanzania. She served on various ANC structures including as a representative of the ANC Women’s Section in the German Democratic Republic, and Member of Parliament in South Africa from 1994 to 1999.

4. Albie Sachs was at the time of the 1989 Lusaka Debate, a National Executive Committee member of the ANC.

5. See the Arts and Culture Policy Review: Report of the Cultural Policy Review Committee.15 December 2007 in the References section.