Rainbow’s End: Public Support for Democracy in the New South Africa

Abstract

The two headlines on the front page of the Cape Times on this South African summer morning in February told of two democracies battling their own worst impulses. Terrorists had bombed another police station in downtown Cape Town, killing a woman passerby. And in equally large type: "Lewinsky to Testify."

To this newly arrived visitor from the United States, the juxtaposed headlines were at once startling and revealing. Eight thousand miles away, the world's most powerful and successful democracy lurched toward a constitutional crisis over a sex scandal that most Americans viewed as inconsequential. Meanwhile in South Africa, one of the world's newest democracies confronted issues of life and death, stability and chaos.

The story of South Africa's political transformation from international pariah to the Rainbow Nation has been told often, and told well. In April 1999, a team of reporters and editors from Independent Newspapers, the largest newspaper chain in the country, added another chapter to this inspiring narrative. These journalists, drawn from newspapers around the country, worked as a team to report the findings of a survey of 3,000 South Africans who shared their views on democracy, race relations, reconciliation and national unity in the new South Africa.

The project was called “Reality Check.” The five-part series ran April 19-23, 1999, two weeks before voters went to the polls to cast ballots in the second free and democratic election in South Africa’s history.