I suggest, it may be possible to spot the seeds of what could become a potent
new form of po�liti�cal mobilization and claim-�making.
In its day, the Freedom Charter’s demand that “the people” should
“share in the country’s wealth” was generally understood to refer to nationalization.
The paragraph that follows the declaration goes on to state that
“the national wealth” (including “the mineral wealth beneath the soil”)
“shall be transferred to the ownÂ�ership of the people as a Â�whole.” This key
formulation was widely interpreted as calling for state own�ership of at
least the “strategic sectors” or “commanding heights” of the economy
(within which the mining industry inevitably looms large).2 But South
Africa’s ruling anc party never took that path, and most of the regimes
in the region that did nationalize major industries have since rethought
the issue. While the state-�owned mining company remains an internationally
reputable model for natural resource extraction,3 the region’s history
has made clear that such nationalization by no means automatically
leads to ordinary people “sharing in the country’s wealth,” and the anc
today insists that it has no ambition to nationalize major industries such
as mining.4 Yet there continues to be a vigorous distributive politics in
the region, and the old dream of a liberation in which “the people” might
“share in the country’s wealth” remains very much alive.