Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment in South Africa

Dr Loyiso Mbabane (Executive Dean) reviews the economic empowerment policies and strategies of the South African Government- post apartheid. A number of laws and policies had to be enacted by the post- apartheid government of Mandela and subsequent leaders in order to redress the racial and other imbalances that were deliberately perpertuated by successive colonial and apartheid regimes (from 1652 up to 1994). In this book the economic empowerment construct is analysed from an empirical point of view, using Human Capital Development as a framework. It is argued that in the long term the development of human capital (both at school; work and in society) holds a better chance of delivering the sustainable empowerment of the still largely poor and economically disempowered masses of black people (including women and youth). The BBBEE policies and strategies of the South African government (2003- 2007) are scrutinized against the international literature on human capital. A transformational leadership approach is then propagated as the most conducive one to deliver BBBEE, as opposed to erstwhile transactional empowerment which has benefitted only a few.