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Practical Reason

Newspaper columns, arguments and ideas

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Practical reason is the human capacity for working out what to do, using reason.

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Recent posts

Gloomy sentiments
Closing in on a grid collapse
The unlikely rise of the Gauteng ANC
SA’s foreign policy dilemmas
The crisis in SA’s schools
SA’s hopeful revolutionaries
A new deputy president for 2024?
Watch out for vote rigging
The talents of Fikile Mbalula
The ANC’s electoral prospects in 2024
Time for a reform-oriented energy minister
Mashatile, Mkhize and Ramaphosa
Is a Mashatile presidency on the cards?
Political deployment cycles and SOE bailouts
Not all slates are the same
Slates are not dead
Kings, Queens and Presidents
What kind of ANC collective leadership does Ramaphosa want?
Thabo Mbeki’s mixed legacy
Time to ditch the lump of labour fallacy
How “independents” bolster existing parties
The Commonwealth may still matter to SA
Judges and electoral systems
Blackout
Beleaguered presidents
The politics of time
Did Mandela want Ramaphosa to be his successor?
Thoko Didiza and the locusts
The strengths of democracy
The trouble with social compacts
Foreign policy after Ukraine
Crises close in
Ukraine
It’s the SOEs, stupid
The future of SOEs
Lindiwe Sisulu’s presidential bid
We still need Santa
Economic diplomacy rules
Will the ANC finally lose in 2024
Method in Mantashe’s madness
Reasons for mandate hesitancy
Rating Ramaphosa
More problems with BIG
Mantashe’s reminder about ANC clientelism
The problem with symbolic policies
We need more trust and better communications for vaccine rollout success
Enough conspiracy theories
What kind of state are we in?
Flattery, fawning and brown-nosing from the SACP
The politics of vaccine rationing
A growing centralisation of power
What is it like to be a health minister?
A less funny follow up: “Life among the Econ: fifty years on”, Thomas Palley, April 2021
Life Among the Econ
Managing joint programmes for public service reform
Why Magashule’s departure matters
Averting the demise of the public domain
Ramaphosa’s public sector reform project
Time to end cadre deployment
Unshackle Gauteng and the Western Cape so that they can grow
Getting off the ground
Mantashe is in the wrong job
Burdens of academic leadership
Who runs the DA? And how will it form coalitions?
Stop smoking your Rooibos
Perils of the District Development Model
Will local, national and provincial elections be merged?
Santa Cyril’s year
The Troubles of National Treasury
Conspiracy theories
Losing his Mojo or just losing his mind?
Paul Mashatile’s presidential ambitions
Time for a Cabinet reshuffle
Keeping the president healthy
Mashaba’s ActionSA and the DA are natural coalition partners
Ramaphosa’s empty letter to ANC cadres
Blaming Ace Magashule
A full IMF bailout before the 2024 elections?
Basic income grant rises from the political grave
Politics of blame will scupper Mboweni reforms
Judicial dreamers
Thinking about constitutional crises
ANC Economic Transformation Committee’s draft paper on post-Covid Economic Reconstruction, 22 May 2020
The political rationale for lockdown regulations
Post-Covid Politics
Dr Zweli Mkhize lockdown amendments. 14 May 2020
It’s the economy, stupid
The third dimension of Covid-19 uncertainty
Rationing in the times of HIV and Covid-19
Coronavirus and HIV
Three elephants
Orange jumpsuits and the NPA
What’s Lindiwe Sisulu up to?
Of testicles and tigers
Santa column. Last one
The great parastatal scandal
Assuming the position
Sport in Schools
“Independent” panel clears the way for Steenhuisen?
Entrenched interests at Eskom
Beware Boris
CR’s support in government
The EFF’s growth trap
NHI blues
Presidential appointments
Zuma’s poisoned liver
Avoid presidential elections
Cabinet is likely to veer left
Ramaphosa’s precommitment strategy
Who was behind Ramaphosa’s rise?
Magashule has to go
Climate resilience
Alex Shutdown
Business minister needs to back business
ANC dominance (from 2016)
Malema’s dominance
Abuse of intelligence agencies
ANC splits
Lekota is wrong about Ramaphosa
Zille’s tax revolt
For better or for worse, Ramaphosa is secure
NDZ as stalking horse
NDZ campaign options narrow
Gupta-leaks raise the stakes
Gupta-leaks threaten Zuma faction
NDZ is a non-starter
The premier league
Zuma weakens his faction
Ramaphosa campaign strengthens (2016)
2016 election disaster changes ANC’s leadership dynamic
Motsoeneng for UCT Vice-Chancellor?
Hawks sabotage manifesto launch
Zuma’s survival (2016)
Will Zuma faction go for a Zuma 3rd term, NDZ, or Mkhize? (from 2015)
RW Johnson’s insights
Mid-term appraisal of DP Ramaphosa
A strong first year as DP for Ramaphosa
Ramaphosa’s early days as Deputy President (2014)
Maphatsoe confuses CIA with shady organisation ‘ANC’ (2014)
Hlaudi Motsoeneng is only an actor (from 2014)
Ghosts in politics and the state (from 2014)
Topless dancing in SA public policy (from 2013)
Ramaphosa’s return at Mangaung
Ramaphosa in the Mangaung run-up (from 2012)
Ramaphosa’s chances at Mangaung (from 2012)
Marikana (from 2012)
Psychoanalysis and governance (from 2012)
Zuma’s trousers (from 2012)
Why Santa Cyril will stay on
The poor may finally take centre stage in 2019

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