According to a recent press alert, the Helen Suzman Foundation (HSF) is soon to be hosting its first Quarterly Roundtable for 2007.
Essentially the HSF's aim is to promote and support liberal democratic policies and ideals "in the South African political situation". The opening line of its mission statement describes the HSF as "inspired by the courageous opposition to apartheid of its patron-in-chief and guided by liberal democratic principles".
The press alert says, "The Quarterly Roundtable Series was launched in 2006 to create alternative arenas for dialogue on matters that affect constitutional liberal democracy and human rights".
The topic this quarter will be "Chapter 9s - Review, Reform or Reduction?" and one of the panel of four will be none other than Kader Asmal, the former education minister and the current chair of the ad hoc committee set up by parliament to review South Africa's Chapter 9 institutions.
(The other panellists are: Judith February from the Institute for Democratic Alternatives for South Africa; Mcebisi Ndletyana from the Human Sciences Research Council and Jody Kollapen, from the South African Human Rights Commission.)
In her inaugural speech as the new director of the HSF, on 29 May last year, Raenette Taljaard spelt out her vision for the organisation. In it, she said the following:
"It can never be in the interests of the liberal discourse to engage in a localised version of a binary Bush-like doctrine of being ‘with us' or ‘against us' in aiming to further this dialogue of values. Indeed one can argue that it would be the exact antithesis of liberal tolerance to do so.
"The challenge for the liberal cause is to capture the imagination of current and future leaders with solid contributions to contemporary policy challenges in South Africa's national discourse and not merely to identify ‘enemies' or ‘inherently illiberal' opponents. This is an unhelpful and self-defeating labelling process that does little to further a dialogue of values and societal discourse about where we are in consolidating liberal democracy in South Africa."
Basically she was saying that liberalism has a name-recognition problem in South Africa, that the HSF needs to be at the forefront of debate and that, in order to do that, it needs to engage all sectors of the political spectrum. Fair enough.
But if the Quarterly Roundtable panel is anything to go by, Taljaard is certainly going out of her way to accommodate the most virulent critics of liberalism and liberal discourse.
And, oddly, there don't seem to be any liberals on the panel?
Take Kader Asmal, for example. He has a long and well documented history of attacking liberalism, something he has described as "South Africa's last credible instrument of privilege".
A good example is to be found in a book published by the Friedrich-Naumann Stiftung (the president of its board of directors - Dr Otto Graf Lambsdorff - is one of the patrons of the HSF) called "Watchdogs or Hypocrites? The amazing debate on South African liberals and liberalism". It contains an article by Kader Asmal and Ronald Suresh Roberts, titled "Liberalism's hollow core".
The article was originally published in the Sunday Times in October 1995, in response to a piece by then-editor Ken Owen. Among other things, Asmal and Roberts said the following:
"In the 1980s leading liberals (including Owen) muffled our calls for sanctions. Like parents protecting children from fire, they cautioned that we would only hurt ourselves".
And,
"...liberalism, worn down over the years, has sadly become South Africa's last credible instrument of privilege."
And so far as Helen Suzman goes,
"At the core of liberalism is echoing space. Within the anti-apartheid alliance, liberalism's only unique content was in demonising its opponents and romanticising itself."
And the liberal press?
"Liberal journalism also blurred into apartheid propaganda in the liberal press's anti-communist hysteria and in the craven self censorship and accommodation of the NP that enabled so many senior media personalities to prosper..."
All-in-all the article was a damning assault on liberalism, in all its forms. It concluded with the assertion that, "If liberalism once had something to offer, it was steadily eroded under the blandishments of racial privilege."
Asmal's attitude wasn't just a pre-1994 reaction to liberalism under apartheid. His animosity towards liberalism and liberals continued unabated.
In May 1999, again in the Sunday Times, Asmal penned an article "Is liberalism dead or alive?" - an attack on the Democratic Party in general, and its leader Tony Leon in particular.
In it, he stated:
"...liberalism [once] had a better self, a self theoretically committed to social justice and equity, the self it has abandoned".
It also included another attack on liberals under apartheid:
"..it is no surprise that, beginning under apartheid and blossoming so spectacularly today, apartheid also bred the loudest liberals who ever weren't."
(Asmal's earlier writing partner - Ronald Suresh Roberts - has also been scathing about liberalism over the last decade. And the ANC, the party to which Asmal belongs, even more so.)
And so it goes. Over time Asmal has focused his underlying animosity for liberals in general onto Tony Leon and the Democratic Alliance. One way or the other he is outspoken about what he sees as liberalism's fundamental failings - both under apartheid and in South Africa's new democracy.
It is admirable indeed that Taljaard and the Helen Suzman Foundation are willing to play host to such an outspoken critic of liberalism and, indeed, of the official opposition. Of course, one would have thought, in the interests of fair and balanced debate, that it might be an idea to have someone from the Democratic Alliance on the panel as a counterweight? Dene Smuts for example, who sits on Asmal's review committee (she was also part of the constitutional negotiations).
Or not even from the Democratic Alliance - any liberal would do.
After all, the organisation is supposed to be guided by liberal democratic principles.
Certainly Judith February's sympathies lie with the ANC and Jody Kollapen is firmly in the African nationalist camp. Mcebisi Ndletyana too, concerns himself largely with black consciousness and history.
Inarguably, none of them are liberals, nor would they publicly claim to be.
The last HSF Roundtable - which took place in December 2006 - had the following members on its panel: Richard Calland (IDASA) - an outspoken critic of the Democratic Alliance; Aubrey Matshiqi - a former ANC government spokesperson and now ‘independent analyst'; Xolela Mangcu - Director of the Steve Biko Foundation; Professor Sipho Seepe; and Steven Friedman - another critic of the official opposition.
Of those, Sipho Seepe might describe himself as a liberal - but he would qualify that, and call himself an ‘African liberal' - but none of the others would describe themselves as liberals in the traditional sense of the word - the sense described by the HSF in its mission statement.
The last edition of Focus - the official journal of the HSF - contained articles by Jody Kollpen, Patrick Craven - spokesperson for the Congress of South African Trade Unions - and Jeremy Cronin, the Deputy Secretary-General of the South African Communist Party.
The editorial in that edition - by Raenette Taljaard - was titled "Debating ANC policy preferences".
No doubt, the omission of any readily identifiable liberal from the last Roundtable was just an oversight.
One would hate to think that the HSF, like just about every other NGO in the country, is slowly but steadily buying into the ANC's ideological paradigm.
POSTSCRIPT
InsidePolitics understands that long time servant, staunch liberal and editor of Focus - the Helen Suzman Foundation journal - Patrick Laurence has been removed from his position by the HSF's new director Raenette Taljaard, who has taken over as editor. The particular circumstances of his departure are not yet known.
This article originally appeared on the DA weblog InsidePolitics, on 28 February 2007.
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