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Analysis of and commentary on South African politics from a liberal perspective.

Category: Excellence

14 April 2013

Dealing with apartheid’s legacy: The Lee/Manuel correspondence


TrevorManuelFEATURE: Much has been made of Trevor Manuel’s recent comments on apartheid and whether or not it constitutes a valid excuse for poor service delivery. One area relevant to the debate, on which Manuel has been very outspoken in the past but did not address in his speech, is quotas in sport. In 2005 he set out his views in an exchange of letters with DA MP Donald Lee. I have set them all out in this article. Thus, one question perhaps worth putting to Manuel today, is whether or not he still thinks they are necessary.

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12 December 2012

Cricket SA: The long shadow of Thabo Mbeki


ExcellenceFEATURE: Cricket South Africa has recently announced it will appointing a new national selector not on merit, but on their race: they must be black. Not only are quotas anathema to professional sport in general and excellence in particular but, for the most part, South African sport seems to have moved beyond demographic representivity; at least, that is what the Minister says. But CSA seems trapped in the past and, with that, held hostage by the antiquated thinking of Thabo Mbeki.

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30 August 2012

SA Journalism: Prizes for everyone


FEATURE: Yet another round of South African journalism awards has just passed. Did you know there are some 82 of them? That’s an awards ceremony every four and a half days. Is South African journalism really such a worthy recipient of so much self-reflecting praise? Look at the Fourth Estate more closely and it seems rife with problems. But it would be you alone looking, certainly the mainstream media, despite so many protestations about its import and the value of self-regulation, is the last institution to cast a critical gaze over its own condition. But with so many awards on offer, why would it? Not when it can rather remind itself every few days just how excellent it truly is.

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22 August 2012

Zero Worship


FEATURE: The manic adulation heaped unthinkingly on all our Olympians seems to have died down somewhat. And the events at Lonmin Mine adjusted our reaction to the endlessly repeated refrain that the Olympics ‘united’ us as a nation. So, perhaps now is as good a time as any to ask: did we really do that well at the Olympics? Is six medals the epitome of excellence or have we settled for mediocrity? In the article below, I argue South Africans seriously needs to readjust their expectations if we want to succeed and stop celebrating the average.

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21 May 2012

An essay on mediocrity


SERIES: One from the archives. What follows below is a 2009 essay I wrote on the nature and effect of mediocrity on a society. How does what is set out in the essay apply to South Africa? Are we a society caught in its warm embrace? There can be little doubt that its influence is powerful, the question is: is it so well-entrenched its effect cannot be reversed? Perhaps if we understood it a little better, we would be better equipped to counter the pervasive way in which it seeps into public life.

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8 May 2012

On excellence


SERIES: The Thing About is a weekly Business Day column designed to discuss democratic ideas, ideals, values and principles from a liberal perspective. Today, a brief look at the idea of excellence. In particular, how identifying excellence is often confused with its pursuit. In other words, how a description is conflated with an attitude, why the distinction is important and what role each – being able to identify what is excellent and being able to pursue it – plays in a society.

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7 May 2012

SA hockey: 1 Government neglect: 0


FEATURE: Yesterday the South African men’s hockey team joined their female counterparts in successfully qualifying for the London Olympics. Many will have no idea just what a remarkable achievement that is. For years South African hockey has been undermined by the ANC government, financially and politically, to the extent that their players have often had to fund their own training. They have overcome daunting odds. What follows is a tribute to their excellence and a description of the obstacles they have risen above as a result of it.

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2 April 2012

What would a society mired in mediocrity look like?


ARTICLE: Mediocrity is a devilish thing – pervasive and insidious and yet so ill-defined. It is relatively easy to understand what excellence is, much harder though to define its nemesis. What I have tried to do in the article below is describe what a society firmly in mediocrity’s grip might look like. It is a helpful exercise, if only because it makes it easier to understand the important role excellence plays and its general effect.

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20 March 2012

Excellence as an antidote


ARTICLE: In the piece below Wilmot James makes a fairly profound point: that excellence and its pursuit can be a mechanism through which reconciliation can be achieved. That is, to my mind, an entirely original approach. And quite true too: for a country that suffers low self esteem and over which victimhood has such a strong hold, what can be a better anecdote than setting high standards and then achieving them? Something to think about.

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