THERE appears to have been an "awakening" in SA; the spate of vile online commentary has induced a profound and powerful response.
The virtues and dangers of this "awakening" are many — and not entirely obvious. Multiple essays and interviews have already addressed this point, although no doubt there is more to say. Similarly, the true depth of the ideological and discourse change that is happening in SA’s public sphere is unclear; it may be widespread or it may be limited to very specific urban communities. In general, it is not easy to evaluate such claims, nor is it really a white man’s prerogative to hold court over SA’s racial discourse. Either way, it appears an intellectual change is upon the country.
Speculation about the origins of this movement suggests twin forces. A rising black African middle class has produced, and been met by, a new and outspoken intelligentsia in public and social media. The movement is resuscitating the works and ideas of postcolonial critical theory, black consciousness and the like. These are ideas that have perhaps been too swiftly forgotten in the ascendancy of modern liberalism.
Their thinking is challenging, especially to whites like me. It is powerful, angry, extremely personal, yet also reflective, philosophical and analytical. In many ways, it is painfully insightful and quite correct. It is also important: the conversation is not occurring in a vacuum. It is intertwined with the #FeesMustFall and #RhodesMustFall movements. It percolates government and political parties, and will probably make its way into law as we begin to examine the limits to free speech and hate speech.
This new critical intellectualism represents SA’s first genuine intellectual "moment" since the fall of apartheid. At least a recalibration, at most a revolution, in our public discourse and thinking about the country. An opening of many eyes.
Yet it also reveals where we are still most blinkered. In following the fallout on social media, what struck me most was the comparable disinterest in the other major event of early January: the release of the deeply troubling matric results. Yet again, roughly 40% of our children failed even to sit matric. Pause and think on that for a moment.
In this cohort alone, roughly 400,000 young South Africans (almost 1% of the population) left the formal education system before they sat their final examinations. And the pass rates for those who did write matric hides extensive functional illiteracy and innumeracy, which in turn increases strain on the tertiary system.
Education is merely one major issue our country faces. Income inequality, chronic unemployment, healthcare provision, agricultural sustainability, crime and order — the list is long and daunting. There is no doubting that apartheid and colonialism are in large part to blame for the varied crises we face, nor that these crises disproportionately affect black, coloured and Indian South Africans. Recent academic research shows this to be the case.
These facts are intertwined with the rapid growth of the intellectual movement outlined above, and critical discussion is vital in helping inform our priorities and points of focus. But critical theory alone cannot solve our crises. The practical challenge of running, growing and bettering SA demands renewed attention from all spheres of society.
Now is the time for a different intellectualism in SA. For too long governance, social scientific research and policy making worldwide has been driven by guesswork and path dependency. All of us — activists, journalists, academics, business people, intellectuals, politicians — are guilty of this. We do what has always been done, we decline to test our beliefs rigorously and shy away from innovation. We speak without evidence and allow biases and subconscious prejudices to inform our thinking. This is human nature, but it is not inevitable. SA requires a different intellectualism founded on data-driven, evidence-based debate, policy-generation and decision-making.
Throughout the world, governments, businesses, civil society, academia, even the media, are learning to embrace the application of science and scientific reasoning to social, economic and policy problems. Educational programmes to improve pupil outcomes are now routinely evaluated through experimental methods. The introduction of job market or healthcare or microcredit interventions are randomised so that social scientists can study their effects. Crime prevention strategies are studied with publicly accessible big data. It is even possible rigorously and unbiasedly to study the economic, political and social consequences of racism, allowing us to better design systems and institutions to attenuate its pernicious effects. Worldwide, the tools of laboratory; biological and the hard sciences are being brought to bear on social, economic and policy problems.
The potential applications of these tools are almost limitless. They can help us increase the number of people participating in elections, improve early childhood reading and maths, ensure HIV/AIDS patients follow drug regimens, lower dropout rates, reduce gender-based violence in the home and even increase the efficiency of government service provision. The most difficult part of such a new intellectualism is convincing people that their pre-existing beliefs should be questioned, tested and updated.
That reflective act, combined with an appreciation of the value of scientific evidence and rigour, is the key to change.
South Africans must realise that the problems we face are not simply challenges to be tackled. They are vast untapped opportunities for the government to promote innovation, to lead on the continent and in the world, both within its bureaucracy and in society more broadly. For universities and academics they are opportunities to produce cutting-edge research that changes how our society builds solutions. They are opportunities to re-establish our country’s pre-eminence in social scientific inquiry.
They are a chance for those whose lives are dedicated to making a difference to contribute widely and deeply to our understanding of how to best make that difference.
As Julius Malema recognised in a quite beautiful essay last week, the only true solution to SA’s race malaise is the total structural and economic recalibration of this country. Bringing that about when 40% of our children do not even get to sit matric feels impossible. But embracing scientific inquiries into social and economic hardships, and demanding evidence-based policy making, are the places to start.
As a society, we must embrace the use of modern social science to question and inform our biases, beliefs, policies and plans. Bringing about meaningful change is the question of our age; it is hard, but it demands a serious attempt by South Africans. It demands a new and different intellectual moment.
• De Kadt is a political science PhD candidate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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