Talk:Inequality in post-apartheid South Africa

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Jessymar.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 00:29, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Opinions vs Facts
Some statements in this article seems to be the editors' beliefs instead of facts. For example, the last line, "Education therefore remains one of the poorest areas of performance in post-apartheid South Africa and one of the biggest causes of continued inequality and poverty" is not supported by an academic source, but rather seems to be the writer's opinion on the greatest reasons for inequality and poverty in South Africa. I think it is important to let the readers decide what the biggest causes may be instead of inputting the writer's own unsupported opinions on the issue. Kateraz (talk) 18:54, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

Sentence Structure Improvement
The line, "Despite a rising GDP, poverty, unemployment, income inequality, life expectancy, land ownership, and educational achievement have worsened since the end of apartheid and the election of the African National Congress" in the introduction could be improved by restructuring the sentence. When I first read this, I was not sure what exactly was rising; as it stands, the sentence could be read that "GDP, poverty, unemployment, income inequality, life expectancy, land ownership, and educational achievement" are all increasing. I would structure this: "Despite a rising GDP, other factors such as poverty, unemployment, income inequality, life expectancy, land ownership, and educational achievement have worsened since the end of apartheid and the elction of the African National Congress". Kateraz (talk) 18:54, 3 September 2015 (UTC)

Bias?
The way this article is set sounds like it have a whites-conservative POV. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.130.1.152 (talk) 01:24, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
 * You mean, you are missing the anti-White left-wing bias, you are used to? --41.151.54.115 (talk) 18:31, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

Expanding and revising this article
I'm thinking about expanding this article, adding plentiful sources, and making the tone more neutral in accordance with Wikipedia's policies. Feel free to respond with any suggestions! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Samanthaplove (talk • contribs) 22:32, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Restructuring this article

 * Education Program:Rice University/Poverty, Justice, Human Capabilities, Section 2 (Fall 2013)

I plan to extensively revise, expand, and restructure this article as part of a class assignment for my Poverty, Justice, and Human Capabilities class at Rice University. The course banner is linked above. If you have any suggestions or comments, please respond to my post! Below is a brief plan of the changes I plan to make.

I plan to change the title “Legacies of apartheid” to “Inequality in post-apartheid South Africa” to better specify what the article discusses. The long article on apartheid itself has a link to the “Legacies of apartheid” article, so I hope that expanding the article will better inform those who view the page after wanting to know more about apartheid’s lasting impacts on South Africa. ”. The entry needs extensive revision and rewriting to convey a more neutral viewpoint, an eradication of its white bias, more comprehensive information (there appear to be serious gaps in the topic), and an almost entirely new reference list, composed on scholarly articles and news sites, rather than personal blogs and sites that do not even exist anymore.

Additionally, the article has an apparent white, conservative bias that was already pointed out on the Talk Page. Most of the “Land ownership and inequality claims” section discusses the “genocide” of white farmers, rather than the stark racial inequalities in land ownership that is a persistent result of apartheid. The article currently uses incredibly biased terms to describe poor, black South Africans living in the cities as “poor urbanized people with no comprehension of agriculture or agricultural management”. The article also describes the Employment Equity Act as “allow[ing] for legal discrimination against White males”, an extremely biased and almost supremacist statement.

After a comprehensive introductory overview, I want to include a small section on the current racial demographics of South Africa so that readers can understand that whites are small in numbers while black South Africans make up the majority of the population. When discussing inequality, demographic context is important to gauge expectations. I also want to discuss the differences in income distribution from 1993- the official end of apartheid- and the most current measures. The current article makes no mention of education inequality and education’s importance in determining future income. I will totally rewrite the “land reform” section to better describe the specific policies the post-apartheid administrations have implemented and their consequences.

I'm not sure if anyone is watching this page, as no one responded to an earlier posting I made on the talk page about potentially revising this article.

Samanthaplove (talk) 04:25, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Peer Reviewer
Here are some specific suggestions for improvement from a peer in the same class. “Land ownership” could benefit from some changes to neutral tone/ language, as well as elaboration. Using the language “whites” and “much” sounds slightly vague and if there is an alternative term to just “whites” as a group, I think that term would be preferable. Also, this sentence would benefit from elaboration, because without some context its conciseness makes the casual reader miss the point. Unless otherwise stated or elaborated on in other areas of the article, this section could benefit from an explanation or definition of “freehold type regimes”. Also, please define “insecure or secondary ways”. In “educational achievement”, the term coloureds needs to either be defined or changed to improve academic tone/ neutrality/ politically correct language. In “Health”, it is unclear what this information has to do with inequality amongst South Africans. Please make it more clear if this represents inequality in comparison to other countries, or whether this will feed into information about inequality in the nation. In “Causes of post-apartheid inequality”, other Wikipedians have made it seem to me that introductory sentences are not necessary unless they provide absolutely necessary information, so I would reconsider whether its appropriate for encyclopedia style. “Unemployment” is well written in academic style, and should serve as an example of what your style should be. In “Economics”, you many consider re-writing their first sentence to place who “Mandela” is in context, for the lay reader. The term “but was forced” does not necessarily sound neutral, and this sentence may benefit from replacing that term. In “Land Reform”, the sentence about “giving compensation to land lost to whites due to… racism” could use a tweak to improve its neutrality as well, just not to sound inflammatory. The clarity of the sentence “helps rural populations obtain stronger rights to their land and regulates” could be improved. I do not understand the transition between the effectiveness at the end of the paragraph- maybe inserting the phrase “however” would help. The last paragraphs about policies is well done. This article would benefit from the clarification of a few particular sentences by placing confusing terms in context and providing more material and information. Also, this article would benefit from improving the neutrality in utilizing the example of neutrality provided in this document. Lbockhorn (talk) 22:17, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

Peer Reviewer
Great job on the article so far! Here are a few suggestions for areas to edit. Instead of saying “Mandela” say “President Nelson Mandela.” Don't assume the reader will know a lot about the topic, so try to be detailed in this area. I think it would also be good to clarify the year in which your statistics are coming from. I think you also need more in-text citations. When you say “about 58.5% of whites 51% of Indians enter some form of higher education, compared to only 14.3% of coloureds and 12% of blacks,” say where it comes from (which organization gave this statistic?). In general, you remain neutral. However, I would be wary of statements like “Without specific reforms, South Africa's racial inequality will not improve.” While specific reforms can certainly help South Africa’s racial inequality, I don’t think it is the only thing that can help. I think you could just delete this sentence, and end that paragraph by stressing how specific reforms can play a role in promoting racial equality. Kimmyfromtexas (talk) 05:15, 7 November 2013 (UTC)

Factual error: inequality between races
This article says: A comparison of data from the 2008 National Income Dynamics Study (NIDS) and the 1993 Project for Statistics on Living Standards and Development (PSLSD) found that income inequality had increased both aggregately and between racial groups. However, the source cited says exactly the opposite, namely: and new methodologies show that the contribution of between-race inequality has decreased.. If no-one objects, I will correct this mistake. Edit: And later on again the source continues to mention This exercise shows that the between-race component of inequality has fallen.--Michael (talk) 09:53, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: The Anthropology of Violence
— Assignment last updated by RiverScullerPDX (talk) 15:47, 13 February 2024 (UTC)


 * The "Possible causes of post-apartheid inequality" section is going to be changed to "Factors contributing to post-apartheid inequality in South Africa".
 * The "Unemployment" subsection is going to be changed to "Key legislation shaping post-apartheid inequality".
 * "The Reconstruction and Development Programme" subsection is going to be changed to "Educational disparities". The first two sentences of the old subsection are going to be moved to the bottom of the newly titled "Key legislation shaping post-apartheid inequality" subsection.
 * A new subsection will be added, titled "Impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic". Winter-PSU (talk) 01:21, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Rewrote the introduction and am in the process of moving it onto the main article.
 * After that, I will go through the article and remove the capitalization of "White" in regards to race and capitalize "Black" in regards to race, based on the conversation of Wikipedia editors here: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters/Archive 32 Winter-PSU (talk) 22:52, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Done with my edits for this class. Winter-PSU (talk) 23:45, 7 March 2024 (UTC)