admin…Alcohol has tragic consequences
Ivor Chipkin
The level of debate about the political future of South Africa is shockingly naïve. The weakening of the ANC electorally and the strengthening of opposition parties means, so the argument goes, that democracy in South Africa is maturing as we enter the phase of meaningful competitive politics. This is, at best, one scenario. It is the scenario that many commentators and academics like because, myself included, they believe in some form of democratic polity.Yet, we should not substitute hope for what is happening in reality.
The problem, as I see it, is the absence of a historical sensibility, not just about South Africa’s past but about the past of the world. Political debate in South Africa consistently fails to acknowledge two overriding features of the South African state. In the first place, it is a new state — a little more than a 100-years-old. Secondly, during its short life it has existed as a national territory for only brief periods — for a few years after 1910 and then formally from 1994.
For most of the 20th century South Africa existed as a partial national state, governed through multiple and parallel administrations — usually organised on the basis of race or a notion of tribe. The Bantustans are the culmination of this politics of fragmentation and undoing. One of the major challenges of state-building in post-apartheid South Africa has, therefore, been integrating former homeland administrations in new government arrangements and pacifying their various elites.
As a general rule, one of the decisive dynamics in the history of government over historical time has been the relationship between what we might call the centre and the periphery (though these terms are imprecise). European medieval and Renaissance history frequently turns on the relative authority of the monarchy in relation to the nobility.
When the nobility has been tame, as was the case of France at the time of Louis XIV, the monarchy is supreme and absolutist. In Britain during the 18th century the nobility acquired hereditary title over their lands and become more and more independent vis-à-vis the monarchy. The peculiarity of English history is the balance that was achieved between these constituents, resulting in a constitutionally limited monarchy.
The Japanese regime, for a period of roughly 800 years until 1600, manifests a similar dynamic, as does the Mamluk regime in Egypt. The fate of state-socialist regimes in recent times is also instructive in this regard. I draw on the exciting new work of Xu Huang to illustrate the point.
The “great divergence” between the Soviet Union and China, collapse and disintegration in the case of the first and consolidation of absolutist control in the case of the latter, rests on their respective ability to manage their “barons”, that is, their regional elites.
That the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s produced a period of chaos is not in dispute. When Mao granted groups of workers and citizens the ‘right to rebel’ in 1966 the “red guards” took aim at local and regional administrations and power-brokers. Hence, when in the 1970s China took measures to restore political stability and launch economic growth reforms took place in the context of the enhanced authority of Beijing and of the central Communist Party.
The contrast with the Soviet Union is striking. In the post-Stalinist era, modernisation and economic expansion produced huge growth in the central bureaucracy. Brezhnev’s rule is regarded as the golden age of the nomenklatura. It is also the highpoint of Soviet achievements in military power, geopolitical influence and technology.
Nonetheless, the ‘ossified’ bureaucracy was deemed the principle constraint on further modernisation. Gorbachev’s reforms — perestroika — like Mao’s cultural revolution targeted the bureaucracy. Unlike the cultural revolution, however, that weakened local and regional administrations, Gorbachev sought to break the power of central state bureaucracies — setting off centrifugal forces that ultimately tore the Soviet Union apart.
Why is all this relevant to
contemporary South Africa?
It is relevant because the power of regional and local elites vis-à-vis the central state in South Africa is not a settled matter. Until recently the dominance of the ANC has been achieved because it has absorbed and contained a great variety of social and political contradictions and tensions. Different classes have been able to realise enough of their interests to remain loyal to the party. Furthermore, diverse regional and local elites have been able to pursue their ambitions through its structures, largely reconciling and integrating them to the new South Africa. In this way ANC dominance has given us more than two decades of political stability. The ANC has paid a very high price for this brand of nationalism. It has divided and fragmented the organisation internally.
What does the weakening of the ANC mean in this context?
There are several possible scenarios. The first is that such elites either remain in the ANC while others seek political expression in other or new parties, all the while accepting the broader constitutional framework. We might call this the scenario of state consolidation. It can take two forms: democratic or authoritarian.
Another is that local and regional elites push for greater autonomy in their respective areas and jurisdictions, weakening any move to build capable, national administrations and developing coercive powers through local police and militias that owe them allegiance. I will call this a scenario of state fragmentation. The last two scenarios are not mutually exclusive.
I believe that combinations of the first and third scenario are most likely in the short and medium term. We saw the brazen expression of the logic of fragmentation in December 2015 when the finance minister was unexpectedly fired.
There, regional elites (based in provinces) and local elites (sometimes organised through state-owned enterprises and/or personal/business networks), working through the president, struck against the centralising power of the national treasury.
Indeed, one of the hallmarks of Jacob Zuma’s presidency has been the fragmentation of the state and the weakening of central administrations. Still, there is a nagging worry that in Jacob Zuma, South Africa has found its Gorbachev.
Who will be the country’s Mao? — Daily Maverick.
The short and long-term consequences that arise from under-age alcohol consumption are astonishing in their range and magnitude, affecting adolescents, the people around them, and society as a whole.
Adolescence is a time of life characterised by robust physical health and low incidence of disease, yet overall morbidity and mortality rates increase 200 percent between middle childhood and late adolescence/early adulthood.
This dramatic rise is attributable in large part to the increase in risk-taking, sensation-seeking, and erratic behaviour that follows the onset of puberty and which contributes to violence, unintentional injuries, risky sexual behaviour, homicide, and suicide.
Alcohol frequently plays a role in these adverse outcomes and the human tragedies they produce. Among the most prominent adverse consequences of under-age alcohol use are those listed below.
Annually, about 5 000 people under age 21 die from alcohol-related injuries involving under-age drinking.
Approximately:
1 900 (38 percent) of the 5 000 deaths involve motor vehicle crashes,
1 600 (32 percent) result from homicides, and
300 (6 percent) result from suicides
Underage drinking:
Plays a significant role in risky sexual behaviour, including unwanted, unintended, and unprotected sexual activity, and sex with multiple partners. Such behaviour increases the risk for unplanned pregnancy and for contracting sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), including infection with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.
Increases the risk of physical and sexual assault.
Is associated with academic failure.
Is associated with illicit drug use.
Is associated with tobacco use.
Can cause a range of physical consequences, from hangovers to death from alcohol poisoning.
Can cause alterations in the structure and function of the developing brain, which continues to mature into the mid- to late twenties, and may have consequences reaching far beyond adolescence.
Creates second hand effects that can put others at risk. Loud and unruly behaviour, property destruction, unintentional injuries, violence, and even death because of under-age alcohol use afflict innocent parties.
In conjunction with pregnancy, may result in fatal alcohol spectrum disorders, including fatal alcohol syndrome, which remains a leading cause of mental retardation.
Is a risk factor for heavy drinking later in life, and continued heavy use of alcohol leads to increased risk across the lifespan for acute consequences and for medical problems such as cancers of the oral cavity, larynx, pharynx, and oesophagus; liver cirrhosis; pancreatic; and haemorrhagic stroke.
Online Reporter