South Africa has had its fair share of fortunes and misfortunes since the inaugural democratic dispensation. What characterised the Mandela era (1994-1999) has been referred to as the reconciliation era wherein business bought into the much-vaunted social contract. However, this period did not bring in the much needed trust; the Mbeki era (1999-2008) came to be known as the African renaissance era with emphasis on transformation of the racially skewed structure of ownership and management wit ...

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2021-Jun-21 19:01:34

In the literature reviewed, a lack in leadership competencies to deal with globalisation within the South African Industrial Development Zones was identified. This led to questions being raised on the prevalence of these essential global leadership competencies within these zones. Realising the need for the development of an outwardly focused and globally competitive leadership model this study sought to investigate the key generic leadership competencies relevant to globalisation and the dem ...

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2021-Jun-21 18:58:50

The purpose of this article was to explore the readiness of local governments (municipalities) in South Africa to transform to be able to deliver services to its citizens using ICT. The study applied Structuration Theory (ST) and drew on the concepts of duality of structure and action particularly: the enactment of technology-in-practice (ETiP) as a lens to understand and interpret the social construct. The objective was to determine the factors contributing to the readiness of municipalities ...

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2021-Jun-21 18:55:45

  The quandary within which Public Administration finds itself calls for academics and practitioners in the field to astutely apply their minds so as to provide an accurate description and analysis of the current state as well as predicting its future course. The five paradigms put forward by Nicholas Henry in 1975 provide a sound base on the evolutionary discussion of the emergence of Public Administration since Woodrow Wilson's seminal article 'The study of Administra ...

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2021-Jun-21 18:51:44

Majority of South Africans experience high levels of poverty and unemployment. In most cases, the unemployed resort to self-employment where they engage in small and informal business activities to generate a sustainable livelihood. The underlying problem is that it is costly to serve micro enterprises in South Africa due to high security costs, collateral constraints and the regulatory bottlenecks that hinder lending. The objective of this article is to propose strategic microfinance models ...

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2021-Jun-21 18:46:46

The South African government has identified Local Economic Development (LED) as a key element in its drive to institute 'developmental local government'. Local government in the country has accordingly been mandated to give effect to the LED function. This article advances a number of means by which LED can be stimulated, and obstacles to small town economic growth neutralised. The article also reviews the roles played by government institutions, value chains and donor funding in enha ...

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2021-Jun-21 18:43:16

The government of South Africa has, over the past few years, introduced a new, integrated approach to monitoring and evaluation. The system, as implemented, is predicated on a belief that government needs a 'strong centre' to drive the development agenda, and that a coherent structure, with evidence-based reporting at the apex of government, is essential for service delivery across society. This article serves to explore this orientation, with a view to highlighting some of the diffic ...

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2021-Jun-21 18:40:24

This article presents a case study of how the Skills Development Levies Act (SDLA) of 1999 (RSA, 1999) was implemented to drive skills development and training in both public and the private sectors. The authors argue that the skills development levy policy did not afford an optimal fit with the public sector organisational environment. Unintentional consequences of this policy have hampered generation of data, restricted planning, monitoring and evaluation activities, as well as impeded effe ...

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2021-Jun-21 18:36:36

To secure the future of Africa and take her to new greatness, we need to heed Janita Patrick's (2009) warning that "it's awfully cruel to plant seeds of ignorance in fertile minds". This is profoundly instructive in that, as in Africa, we have a history of being preoccupied with what Ali Mazrui describes as "alien paradigms", ignoring the fact that we have knowledge of our own to frame our thinking and imagination of the future of the continent. However, such knowl ...

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2021-Jun-21 18:34:07