The siren's song: the political logic of power‐sharing in South Africa

Abstract

This paper does two things. First, it deals with the work of Arend Lijphart and Donald Horowitz on South African politics, and particularly the relationship of their ethnic models to the proposals Lijphart and the National Party are making for a new constitution for South Africa. The concern is less with the empirical accuracy of their research, however, than with the political logic implicit in their thinking. Thus, the paper considers how the National Party has used similar ideas about ethnic politics to justify its proposals for a power‐sharing constitution. Second, the analysis of Lijphart and Horowitz sets up a discussion of the power politics of the National Party's proposals for power‐sharing institutions, which is the target of the paper. The thesis is that power‐sharing is an aggressive as well as a defensive proposal on the part of the National Party, that the argument for its workability is suspect, and that the ends power‐sharing is said to promote — moderation and stability — might end up moderating and stabilising some of the inequalities of apartheid.