This study aimed to better define the boundary conditions of voluntary business engagement for social and economic transformation.
Case study of the Consultative Business Movement (CBM) in South Africa’s democratic transition through historical narrative and analysis, applying both contemporaneous and contemporary lenses.
The analysis demonstrates that creating shared value requires shared power, an arrangement into which incumbent businesses may reluctantly enter, and from which they may quickly exit when their own political interests are met but before transformational economic goals have been achieved. Thus, exogenous forces are necessary to dependably shape a private sector that is fully aligned with economic transformation and peaceful development.
Economic and political carrots and sticks combined with the mandatory embedding of business actors in broader networks may be required to ensure that business strategies and operations are more directly the result of consensus reached with more progressive social and economic agents in ways that advance societal goals. Those managers who do want to lead change should take from the experience of CBM the imperative to take no unilateral decisions but rather to share decision-making power with civil society and community actors.
The article challenges and refines discourse that assumes that business interests are broadly aligned with sustainable societal outcomes. It thus sheds light on the boundary conditions for the variety of propositions in the management literature that business and societal aims are largely aligned that have been underexplored.
The political transformation which is about to take place will not be successful unless it is accompanied by an equivalent transformation of the economy.
Murray Hofmeyr, chairman of the Consultative Business Movement, 1990 (CBM,
I look at South African managers and I have to warn you that I see no signals of you responding and understanding the role that you have to play. There will be no business as usual. You will either have to decide whether you want to acknowledge the forces of the future and willingly become part of it or be overwhelmed by them.
Eddie Cross, CEO of the Beira Corridor Group, 1989 (Nel & Grealy,
What is lacking is not intelligent people, but courageous ones.
Address by T.N. Chapman and M.B. Hofmeyr to the Harvard Business School Club of South Africa, 1994 (Chapman & Hofmeyr,
The story of progressive company leaders who took action to help facilitate the transition to a democratic South Africa has taken its place in the canon of examples widely drawn upon to argue that business can contribute to peace (Charney,
This version of the CBM story supports arguments that value for business and value for society are complementary – expressed, for example, in the claims of the business and peace literature that the private sector ‘can make important contributions to peacebuilding’ (Fourie,
However, this narrative of the CBM is incomplete. The CBM was active only 6 years at the tail end of minority rule. It emerged from business interests that were for more than a century deeply entwined in the politics, policies and practices of the violent repression of the majority, and somewhat more than a decade of tentative business efforts to engage to promote greater stability in the business environment without commitment to fundamental transformation. During the period in which the CBM was active, only a relatively small number of businesses mobilised in any decisive way for positive change, while many more were actively engaged in the maintenance of the apartheid state (Nattrass,
Within this fuller contextualisation of the CBM’s efforts, questions arise that have been less well addressed in the literature. Firstly, how did the CBM succeed in its efforts, given that it faced not only scepticism from mass movement leaders but also hostility from government and, often enough, opposition from the broader business community? Secondly, what were the limitations of that which even progressive business leaders could and would work for, given their economic interests? Thirdly, what are the lessons learned from the historical analysis that may have resonance 25 years after the coming into force of South Africa’s new Constitution, particularly with respect to the boundary conditions within which corporate governance can be relied upon to advance societal interests?
To address these issues, this article draws from the historical record and secondary research; key informant interviews with experts familiar with the events that unfolded; the insights of an expert roundtable, including participants in the formation and operation of the CBM, convened to consider and debate these questions; and three input articles prepared to advance those discussions (Cawe,
The article concludes that exogenous regulatory forces are necessary to shape a private sector that is aligned with economic transformation. This is because the creation of shared value requires shared power, an arrangement into which the experience of the CBM shows business may not voluntarily enter and from which it may quickly exit. Market forces play a role, but more determinative may be economic and political carrots and sticks combined with the mandatory embedding of business actors in networks of broader social agents that ensure that business strategies and operations are directly influenced by more progressive social and economic perspectives. These conclusions have implications for South Africa as it struggles with state capture, economic malaise and social division. They also shed light on the necessity for environment, social and governance (ESG) regulation (Hamann,
It is increasingly well accepted that business never stands apart from politics. Rather, it is part and parcel of the political economy – the interplay of politics, society and economics that shapes the social order and the creation and distribution of wealth within it (Ganson & Wennmann,
The domination of business interests in politics was particularly evident after commercial exploitation of diamond deposits began around what is now Kimberley in the 1860s and gold around what is now Johannesburg in the 1870s. The
Moral outrage against commercial excesses was evident from the beginning, even among white citizens. Already in the 1870s, voices at home decried how the ‘slavish system’ of compounds – in which diamond (and later gold) workers were forced to live apart from their families to maintain control and minimise theft – undermined the local economy (Tamarkin,
Yet commercial interests prevailed in the then-new South Africa. The president of the Chamber of Mines stated unequivocally in 1912, ‘We must have labour. The mining industry without labour is as … it would be to imagine that you could get milk without cows’ (Potenza,
Building on a history of hut taxes, poll taxes and unemployment taxes (under which Africans who could not show that they held formal employment for at least some months a year were subject to an additional tax), these measures guaranteed the mines cheap labour. The Chamber also supported the state’s brutal suppression of successive waves of the black labour movement in the 1910s, the 1940s and the 1960s. These land and labour ‘reforms’ were similarly backed by the country’s politically and economically important agricultural sector for reasons of land acquisition, suppression of black competition and wage control (Wilson,
In the 1970s, the evident ability of labour to mount effective strikes, the need for more highly skilled workers and the closing of labour recruitment from Malawi, Angola and Mozambique changed the mining landscape. One executive observed:
[
By 1972, Wilson, deputy chairman of the mining conglomerate Anglo American Corporation, called for a ‘major overhaul’ of labour law and labour relations, stating that reforms would determine ‘whether we will retain industrial peace and whether we will have the human resources to continue the development and expansion of our enterprises’ (Lipton,
Some business leaders acted based on these changed notions. After the Soweto uprising of 1976, Oppenheimer and a few other leading industrialists founded the Urban Foundation to help improve the living conditions of the black urban population. Its first executive director stated that ‘No free enterprise system can survive in circumstances of persistent social disruption and disorder’ (Lipton,
But these were fundamentally palliative measures, arguably akin to the abolition in the 1980s under State President Botha of the pass laws, the granting of rights to black people to live in urban areas and the decriminalisation of interracial marriage or his government’s increase in spending for black schools from one-sixteenth of what was spent per white child up to one-seventh. There was at some level a recognition that a fundamentally unworkable system was driving the protests of an increasingly well-organised mass movement. Yet business measures were by and large an attempt to take the sharp edges off the system, not to change it fundamentally.
Private sector ‘institutions and initiatives appeared to follow an ongoing incremental route and to rely primarily upon government-led initiatives’ (CBM,
A variety of sources (CBM,
Amidst a growing economic crisis, escalating violence, biting international sanctions and an increasing sense of isolation, a small number of business leaders took steps to reach out to democratic forces inside the country and the African National Congress (ANC) in exile. In January 1987, Chris Ball, the CEO of then Barclays Bank, identified in early 1987 a handful of senior leaders ‘who shared the opinion that traditional methods of interaction with mainly black unions and political leaders being employed within business and organised industry and commerce were inadequate’ (CBM,
Over a period of months, the interventions of well-networked allies, including the television journalists Roger and Miranda Harris, allowed for several meetings between business and black leaders of the United Democratic Front (UDF), a coalition of more than 400 organisations opposing apartheid:
During these meetings the concept of establishing a group of business leaders who would interact intensively with legitimate black leaders was discussed. They, in turn, were willing to endorse and support the initiative that had already been taken by other black leaders. (CBM,
Meetings were also held with ANC leaders in exile, who also lent their support to the idea. In April 1988, business representatives met with senior members of the COSATU and the UDF. ‘At this meeting it was agreed that a formal workshop should be conducted between senior business leaders and representatives of the mass-based movements’ (CBM,
In August 1988, approximately 40 white business leaders and senior academics met with a similar number of leaders representing several mass-based sociopolitical movements and unions, establishing what was only then named the CBM. This was in direct response ‘to the frustration of inadequate responses being generated within the business community and organised industry and commerce’ (CBM,
True to its name, the CBM undertook a process of broad-based bilateral consultations: with leaders of the UDF and the (still banned) ANC; with the national party and senior government civil servants and diplomats; with other political parties including the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), the Democratic Party and, later, the more militant Pan African Congress (PAC) and Azanian People’s Organisation (AZAPO), as well as the right-wing Afrikaner Volkswag and Conservative Party; civil society leaders from the press and churches; and organised business and organised labour, both black and nonblack. These discussions continued throughout 1988 and 1989, establishing both the need and the possibility for common ground.
In 1990, the CBM organised a meeting of 40 ANC representatives, including Nelson Mandela, with 350 senior business leaders to reduce mutual distrust and start work towards a new national economic framework. ‘At last’, it was said, ‘we are discussing our country’s future’ (CBM,
This in turn set the stage for constitutional negotiations. The CBM was asked by the participating political parties and government authorities to provide process support and secretariat services for the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) I and II, two rounds of multiparty talks. The CBM later acted as the administration of the Multi-Party Negotiating Process, which put into motion South Africa’s ultimate transition to democracy. And where Lord Carrington and Henry Kissinger had failed to secure the agreement of the IFP to participate in the first elections, risking renewed violence on the eve of the country’s transition to democracy, the CBM-supported process succeeded (Marais & Davies,
South Africans voted on 27 April 1994 under the interim constitution. The CBM ceased to exist when it merged with the Urban Foundation in 1995 to form the National Business Initiative (NBI), not quite 2 years before the coming into force of the current Constitution on 04 February 1997.
The snapshot presented here does not give a full picture of the CBM’s activities, which became increasingly structured over time. They developed programmes, for example, to find employment for released detainees. But the weight of its positive influence came from its leadership’s willingness ‘to listen first, then act in partnership; at a time when consultation was both unknown and almost impossible because of the polarisation in society. This was seen as the CBM’s greatest strength’ (CBM,
Importantly, the CBM only moved forward when it had secured the support of black leaders. ‘This was the first, and probably still only time in South Africa’s history’, it was observed, ‘that a business-led institution was created through direct consultation with largely black leadership and mass-based institutions’ (CBM,
The mission statement adopted by the CBM was ‘to assist South African business to contribute in partnership with all other interest groups to democracy, peace, growth and development in South Africa’ (CBM Brochure,
The way the CBM worked also gave meaning to the word ‘movement’ in its name. It created structures – particularly at the regional level and later with the National Peace Accord at the local level – that could opportunistically absorb energy and commitment, as well as channel money and social capital as more people inside and outside the business community became comfortable with, and committed to, a peaceful transition to majority rule. This to some extent encompassed even the apartheid government, particularly after De Klerk took over the reins of the state from Botha in 1989; the government craved and valued information about the mass democratic movement and its leaders that its self-isolating policies denied it.
Notably, the CBM never claimed to represent business, meaning that it was to some extent insulated from the ‘least common denominator’ politics (CBM,
Where the ‘business’ bona fides of the CBM were perhaps most clear were in its use of its leaders’ power and privilege to act in defiance of the apartheid regime. It was no secret that the law was not applied equally in South Africa; there were many instances, for example, where a black woman would be convicted and punished for violation of the miscegenation laws, while her white male partner would go free. The CEOs of some of South Africa’s most important concerns could take advantage of this structural injustice to take calculated risks. In one case, meetings were held with opposition leaders in detention during their trial for treason, with their counsel bringing in the business representative as part of the legal team; in another, a co-facilitator of the meeting establishing the CBM was under restriction orders, making it illegal for him – or others with him – to participate in a meeting of more than five people. The CBM simply ignored restrictions on its ability to meet with banned organisations such as the ANC and PAC and worked around restrictions on organised labour and other ‘suspect’ organisations and individuals.
Most importantly, the CBM used its power and networks of influence on behalf of others. The morality of apartheid defenders may have been misplaced, but their observations were true: the CBM lent voice and credibility to leaders of the opposition, replacing propaganda about communist revolutionaries manipulated from abroad with experience of pragmatic, thoughtful and deeply committed leaders. The CBM earned their trust by doing what no South African business entity had done before: reject racial authoritarian government and commit to the rapid implementation of majoritarian rule. It thus committed unambiguously in policy and action to the principles and outcomes of greatest importance to the disempowered and disenfranchised. In doing so, it used its process focus – expanding the circle of dialogue; establishing a common fact base; working towards consensus on outcomes; agreeing on roles, responsibilities and obligations for action; and maintaining a platform for mutual accountability – to meaningfully shift power and to facilitate fundamental social change.
The CBM story has contributed to a generalised argument about a ‘business case’ for peacebuilding (Fourie,
Business came to the movement for a democratic South Africa very late. The Sharpeville Massacre – an event so iconic that the new South African Constitution was signed into law there in 1996, and the date commemorated both as a national holiday and as the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination – was in 1960. The United Nations (UN) Security Council’s adoption in the same year of Resolution 134, calling for an end to apartheid and racial discrimination, marked growing international isolation as the government implemented the first state of emergency.
In 1970, the Anglican Bishop of Lesotho at the time, the Rev. Desmond Tutu, assumed a leadership role in the nonviolent struggle against apartheid as head of the South African Council of Churches; increasingly well-organised labour organised the surprisingly effective Durban Strikes of 1973; while in 1975, the ANC Revolutionary Council publicised its intent to launch ‘total war’, followed by increasingly sophisticated armed attacks. The year 1976 saw the Soweto Youth Uprising – a youth-inspired protest resulting from the consciousness raising efforts of the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM), itself a nonaligned political movement started by young university students that spread to high schools, churches and civil society organisations – spread across the country.
The year 1980 saw both massive school and university strikes and a declaration by the Nederduitse Gereformerde Kerk (NGK), together with its sister churches for black people (the NGK in Afrika), mixed-race people (the NG Sendingkerk) and Indian people (the Reformed Church in Africa), that it had no objection to the repeal of the
These few milestones among many in the long anti-apartheid struggle illustrate that the writing was increasingly both on the wall – and being read by growing numbers of South Africans of all races – from the 1960s through the 1980s.
Yet organised business was hardly to be found in the struggle. Only in 1986 did the South African Federated Chamber of Industries adopt its
Individual white business leaders were similarly absent. In 1987, black leaders asked that a group of white business leaders join them in a statement to the press calling for the lifting of the state of emergency and certain restriction orders, as it was increasingly impossible for moderate leaders to exercise any influence over escalating violence in the townships. But no more than six business leaders would sign onto the statement, and the idea was shelved (CBM, 1990). Similarly, anti-apartheid activists that same year arranged for 18 leaders from the black community to meet with white business leaders. Eighteen business leaders attended a preparatory briefing, but only six remained to meet with the black leaders after twice as many excused themselves – one of them with the apology that he had to attend a flower show with his wife (CBM,
As late as 1989, the CBM could count no more than 40 business members, only passing the 100 mark after the unbanning of the ANC in 1990 amidst a growing understanding that political changes were inevitable and as business leaders realised that they risked being left out or left behind. The first regional meeting the CBM organised between business leaders and mass movement leaders in the Western Cape began to look like the caboose rather than the locomotive of change; it took so long to organise that it was interrupted by the announcement of Nelson Mandela’s release (CBM,
Far more common than the positive actions exemplified by the CBM was what the Truth and Reconciliation Commission described as ‘the role business played or failed to play in the apartheid years’ (TRC,
Indeed, it is arguably only through a narrow, white, business-centric lens on history that South Africa’s crisis can be particularly situated in the late 1980s, finally motivating even a minority of the business community to more concerted action. Apartheid – an explicit policy of institutional racism – has roots at least as deep as 1858, when the constitution of the South African Republic (commonly known as Transvaal Republic) was adopted, stating that ‘the people will admit of no equality of persons of colour with the white inhabitants, either in state or in church’. The system of forced migrant labour began the systematic disruption of the black family in the 1860s; black people in the territory of present-day South Africa were dispossessed of nearly all of their land in 1913. Black people were systematically denied education, healthcare, decent housing, economic opportunities and political rights throughout the 20th century, including the right to South African citizenship in 1980. Business voices, if heard at all, were overwhelmingly in favour of these policies (CBM,
Meanwhile, as the apartheid regime matured and then came under threat, the state engaged in a campaign of terror against democratic forces. For example, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission found state President P.W. Botha responsible for gross violations of human rights, to have directly authorised unlawful activity that included killing and to have personally ordered the bombing of the offices of the South African Council of Churches (Hopkins,
It is said that a crisis is something bad that happens to oneself, and it appears that even those few business actors who organised and mobilised in favour of a democratic South Africa did so only as social unrest and revolutionary threats could no longer be contained and international isolation limited both capital and markets, posing an existential threat to incumbent business interests.
An alternative recounting of the CBM story might therefore be that, in the century-long struggle for a democratic and peaceful South Africa in which countless South Africans courageously took part, only a very few business leaders – and almost no presence of organised business – could be found until the situation became ‘one of the darker periods’ (Chapman & Hofmeyr,
The limited scope of business engagement in the democratic transition is underlined by the rapidity with which the CBM withdrew from public discourse. The CBM and the Urban Foundation merged in 1995 to form the NBI, with a declared mission to continue private-sector engagement in South Africa’s peaceful development (Marais & Davies,
The NBI took on the look and feel of a more typical business-member organisation, shifting its emphasis from political mobilisation on behalf of values and principles to developing, funding and delivering social programmes within a more traditional corporate social investment framework (Fourie,
A more sympathetic view of this transition from the CBM to the NBI recognises that there was need to respect and support the new, democratically elected government – to give it space to ‘rule and govern’ (Ganson,
The more cynical reading of this rapid retreat from shared power with civil society actors was that the CBM’s business agenda – in the words of the CBM itself, to ‘[
The CBM rather retired from public life as the government was pivoting from the Reconstruction and Development Programme of 1994 (RDP), intended to create a more equal society, to a macro-economic policy framework called the Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) strategy, with a focus on reducing fiscal deficits, lowering inflation, maintaining exchange rate stability, decreasing barriers to trade and liberalising capital flows. These policies brought about greater macro-economic stability, laying the foundation for the business boom that followed. They are also increasingly understood as a policy framework that privileged the interests of capital and the narrow South African elite who controlled it over the aspirations of the majority for a just economy that provided a sustainable livelihood and a dignified life for all (Hirsch,
Nowhere is this failure to follow through on the promises of the CBM to work together with other role players for a transformed South Africa more visible than in the mining sector, from which a number of its business founders emerged. For example, Bojanala is in the heart of the Western Limb of the Bushveld Igneous Complex, the mines of which extract 50% of the platinum produced in the world and 65% of South Africa’s platinum-group metals. At the same time, STATS SA 2020 data show that the unemployment rate for Bojanala is 48.7% and the Gini Coefficient 0.62; fewer than 20% of homes are connected to running water, and fewer than a third of adults have finished high school. The South African Police Service (SAPS) 2020 data and analysis show that Bojanala’s crime rate is the highest of the subregions within the North West province. For the local municipality of Rustenburg, the murder rate in 2016 was roughly 36 per 100 000 population – including not only high levels of armed robbery and domestic violence but also intergroup conflict, gang violence, vigilantism and murders by the police. This violent death rate is comparable to South Sudan and higher than Colombia, the Central African Republic and Yemen, all countries experiencing armed conflict (Allen et al.,
Yet, this downward spiral into abject poverty, a lack of social cohesion and war-zone levels of violence – in which business still manages to prosper – is to a large extent a postapartheid phenomenon. South African platinum production roughly doubled from 100 metric tonnes in 1995 to 200 metric tonnes in 2017. The benefits have flowed largely to business, while the social ills in terms of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) and tuberculosis; a lack of access to basic services; and corrupt arrangements that leave workers in conditions of near slavery – unable to meet even basic needs for food and shelter– continue to fall on the poor and marginalised. The South African Human Rights Commission has emphasised this continuity in mining and its political economy of extraction and impunity from the apartheid era to the present (2018). This was punctuated by the Marikana massacre, the killing of 34 miners by police during a labour protest and the largest killing of civilians by state security forces in the democratic era.
From this perspective, the political settlement leading to democratic elections in 1994 was for business the hoped-for peace and opportunity for increased profitability. It allowed business leaders to withdraw from meaningful civic engagement and commitment to a shared future in pursuit of their own interests. They pursued this through exclusive forums such as the Big Business Working Group that lobby directly with government and promote the idea that ‘what is good for business is good for development’ (Eloff,
South Africa again finds itself in what the business community is increasingly willing to recognise as a crisis. Thus, mainstream business rhetoric is again increasingly overtly political, encompassing state capture, official corruption and breakdowns in security and the rule of law. Business actors have shown the ability to mobilise decisively, for example, to oppose and reverse the removal of an internationally respected finance minister – the so-called ‘Nenegate’ scandal – with someone perceived to be the President’s personal crony (Ramphele,
But it is less clear whether business leaders have learned the lessons of the CBM: that the private sector is part and parcel of the political economy; that it shapes social and political outcomes through its own actions and inactions; and that it is most effective as an actor for positive societal change when it shares power and opens itself to influence from civil society actors mobilising for justice and peace. Indeed, there seems to be an enduring desire among business leaders to situate change ‘out there’ rather than ‘in here’.
A key role of the CBM was meant to be ‘to heighten the awareness that South African companies will have to change – as with the political process, co-determination was the key and unilateralism was not acceptable any more’ (Chapman & Hofmeyr,
While business leaders have been willing to participate in externally focused initiatives, they have proved less willing to apply themselves with equal rigour to transforming their organisations so that the organisations reflect the culture of non-racial democracy and human rights at organisational and operational levels. (p. 14)
Some see contemporary resonance in this critique of the apparent persistent failure of business to embrace black economic empowerment measures, affirmative action or the full import of the Mining Charter, the government policy framework meant to ensure developmental outcomes from the mining and minerals industry. There is a perceived willingness to complain about government policy without a commensurate willingness to build consensus for a better solution. Indeed, many businesses seem intent on pursuing the path of least resistance – entering into agreements with politically well-connected elites to meet black ownership mandates, for example, rather than creating ownership vehicles that would directly benefit workers or communities – without seeing how this might feed the very system of patronage and state capture that business leaders ostensibly decry.
Similarly, business does not seem willing to confront an economy that many perceive inevitably ‘exacerbates inequality, un- and under-employment, and therefore grotesque levels of poverty’ (Cawe,
The historical analysis shows that business contributions to creation of value for society – here the transition to a democratic South Africa – were at their zenith when business leaders shared power: consulting with mass movement leaders on the CBM’s establishment; establishing structures in which business held only one seat among many at the table; and lending personal power and resources to amplify the voices and meaningful control over outcomes of the poor, oppressed and marginalised. However, it also shows that an arrangement to share power in order to create shared value is one into which business leaders only hesitantly entered and from which they quickly exited after their own narrow interests had been met.
These arguments pose a direct challenge to overoptimistic assessments of the intersection of business interests with those of the broader society, whether characterised as business and peace (Fort,
The business participants in the CBM were only willing to act as what Charney (
Yet consequential progress towards the social justice promised by the South African Constitution may require tough medicine for business: higher wages, lower barriers to entry, less concentration of wealth, greater competition and more direct accountability to the communities in which business operates. Contemporary business inaction – driven by apathy or even antipathy – may be a result of a few powerful incumbent business actors occupying the social centre and therefore being unable to play a catalytic role in addressing ‘a degree of inequality that makes human community impossible’ (Ramphele,
This analysis should give pause to those who imagine that a reinvigorated role for business in leadership towards peaceful development of the country can or will spontaneously emerge. Even in the existential crisis for business of the 1980s, ‘[
These realities belie any fundamental alignment of interests. Rather, they suggest continuity with the observation that, ‘as far as business and its leaders are concerned, they have historically remained basically unwilling to consolidate their quite extraordinary power and influence for the good of society’ (CBM,
This led in the past to the question of, ‘How must business, as arguably the most important and influential social institution, position itself to fulfil its undeniable role as a primary force within the sociopolitical economy of the nation? (CBM,
However, the given analysis suggests that this question may not be the socially optimal one. We cannot be sure whether we are in the 1970s or 1980s of turbulent and increasingly violent contestation over economic transformation, and we cannot risk waiting passively to see whether in the contemporary version of 1990 some few business leaders will finally come on board to help to facilitate fundamental change. Therefore, we might better ask why society tolerates unaccountable business leadership of the political economy and how a private sector that dependably contributes to inclusive and peaceful development can be ensured without reliance on the voluntary consent and private mobilisation of business leaders who may be over-invested in the economic status quo.
One answer to these questions is that it may be necessary to mandate and to facilitate the shared power necessary to create true shared value. Companies need to make their strategic planning more permeable to outside influence (Hollesen,
History has now taught us that it is perhaps naïve to hope that organisations, and their leaders, will spontaneously and
This historical analysis is consistent with more contemporary work that finds that neither CSR nor partnership logics can be expected to be compelling to companies without state intervention (Hamann,
Management may therefore need to be ‘forced to acknowledge a paradigm shift in terms of which the old-style of unilateral and authoritarian decision-making could no longer suffice’, as occurred in the 1980s (Nel & Grealy,
One approach with historical roots would be for national or sector-specific regulation to establish local mechanisms that can credibly convene diverse parties, build common understanding of the local context and nurture sufficient consensus for private sector investment and operations that support national reconciliation and peaceful development (Ganson,
In this way, the Peace Committees of the National Peace Accord would follow in the footsteps of the IMSSA. The IMSSA transitioned from a private arrangement under apartheid to a compulsory institution in the form of the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation, and Arbitration (CCMA), using broadly positive experiments from a turbulent transition to inform democratic governance structures (Hutchison et al.,
The analysis suggests that it may also be desirable to create existential threats to business incumbents – albeit preferably not through the path of violence, which contemporary South Africa appears increasingly inclined to take – in order to create ‘open power relationships’ (Nel & Grealy,
Even though the given analysis is critical of incumbent private sector actors as a whole, it does provide insights for those business leaders – however few or many – who in fact want to take voluntary action for a just and peaceful South Africa. A starting point would be to stop defining the current crisis in business terms, rather than acknowledging a psychosocial crisis, a nuclear family crisis, a spatial crisis and an unemployment crisis alongside a state capture crisis – all of which are rooted in the country’s political history and political economy, and all of which are deeply entwined. A next step would be to abandon the inclination ‘to want to follow an on-going incremental route’ (CBM,
The ‘old heart’ in this case is the one that believes that governance of corporate ESG engagement is a question for the board and management alone. The new one recognises that this governance is equally the domain of communities, labour, civil society and government – and therefore that shared value creation requires shared power over corporate decision-making. Only once this lesson has again been internalised, might a ‘voluntary and independent group of senior business leaders and corporations’, as the CBM described its role, today ‘support the need for constructive transformation of South Africa’s political economy’. As before, ‘a major restraining force and cause of failure will be business’s unwillingness to accept that consultation and involvement in change must become as much an integrated part of business strategy as procurement, production, manufacturing, sales and client service’ (Nel & Grealy,
This article builds from outputs of the research initiative entitled ‘Engaging the Business Community as a New Peacebuilding Actor’, a joint project of the Africa Centre for Dispute Settlement (now Centre on Conflict & Collaboration at the Stellenbosch Business School), the Collaborative for Development Action Collaborative Learning Projects (CDA) and the Peace Research Institute Oslo.
An earlier draft of this article was circulated as part of the working paper series of the Africa Centre for Dispute Settlement at the University of Stellenbosch Business School, available here:
The author has declared that no competing interest exists.
Brian Ganson is the sole author of the submitted article.
This article followed all ethical standards for research without direct contact with human or animal subjects.
Funding was received from the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no new data were created or analysed in this study.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any affiliated agency of the authors.