It would probably not please the DA to know that the party is a symptom of one of this country’s post-1994 problems.
One reason for continued racial tensions among the middle-class here is that those who control many areas of life, from which black people were barred by apartheid, have seen no reason to change what they do and how they do it. They assume that the rules and values which met the needs of white people under apartheid are best for everyone. And so, black people entering these areas of life are expected to fit into rules and habits which may not fit their experience at all.
More than a quarter of a century ago, the educationist James Moulder complained that formerly whites-only universities expected new black students to change so that the university would not need to change. Much the same happened in the professions and many businesses. Rules and habits which fit the needs of one group are not necessarily best for everyone: sticking to the old ways does not “maintain standards”. It frustrates many who are expected to conform to them.
And because alienated and frustrated people don’t give their best, it also makes it less likely that people will perform to their potential. The universities were forced to tackle this problem when protests disrupted campuses in 2015. Other walks of life have yet to be shocked into change.
The DA is an example. As last week’s column pointed out, it started out as a party for suburban white people and then recruited black members. It never seems to have accepted that the party should change as its membership changed.
It would seem obvious that, in a society in which one race dominated others, a political party which had served only the group which dominated and then attracted people who had been dominated would need to work hard to ensure that it served both. But the DA has never tried this work — probably because it never saw the need. Its power holders assumed that what had been best in the past would also be best for black members (as long as they were allowed to dance at meetings). This prompted tension which was swept under the carpet but is becoming much harder to ignore.
This explains why headlines about the DA over the past week have created the impression that the past decade or more simply didn’t happen. Tony Leon, the party leader whose 1999 Fight Back campaign signalled to the suburbs that it was tougher on the ANC than its rivals, reportedly led a delegation which asked leader Mmusi Maimane, to resign. Ryan Coetzee, its strategist when Leon was leader, heads the investigation into why it is losing votes. And Helen Zille wants to fight for the powerful post of federal chair, which, so far, is to be contested by four white candidates, three of them men. (A delight, no doubt, to those who now say that electing white men is a triumph for nonracialism).
How this return to the past will turn out for the DA is unclear. First responses suggest that it may prompt the same anger and frustration we see everywhere else if it is assumed that nonracialism means black people doing and thinking what white people value. And signalling that the only way to keep the party afloat is to rely even more openly on past ways of doing things and the people who did them, is unlikely to help it to advance.
The same applies in business, the professions and elsewhere. If organisations don’t shift to meet the needs of those who were excluded, they are likely to spend more time fighting fires than setting the world alight.
• Friedman is research professor with the humanities faculty of the University of Johannesburg
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.