Post by cjm on Dec 12, 2019 5:34:03 GMT
The current crisis of Eskom is only part of a more general crisis of the centralized state. Almost everything under the charge of that state is collapsing. The airline has pretty much gone, the railways are under administration, water, electricity, the road accident fund, PetroSA, the state information technology agency and Statistics SA are all on their knees. The list is actually much longer but, like an iceberg, is mainly hidden from view.
When discussion gets this far there is often talk of a taxpayers’ strike. This is, though, harder than it sounds. To be sure, if a hundred thousand taxpayers all announced together that they wouldn’t pay tax, the state would be powerless. But in practice most people make such decisions individually. This is called tax evasion and it is individually punished.
The crisis of the central state is different precisely because those in charge of it are manifestly incapable of running it and the results are increasingly obvious to everybody. Interestingly, Africans are far less abashed than whites in saying that things were better under white rule. This is important for the state lacks almost all credibility and trust, so that its legitimacy is now very fragile.