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The South African Defence Force and Political Reform

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Extract

South Africa's security establishment, specifically the South African Defence Force (S.A.D.F.), illustrates important linkages between national security and political reform. The military and police influence reconciliation, for better or for worse, in all post-conflict states, especially those experiencing an interregnum between authoritarianism and hoped-for democracy, and in which no undisputed ‘winner’ has yet emerged. Alexis de Tocqueville noted long ago that ‘the most perilous moment for a bad government is one when it seeks to mend its ways’, Reform and political change, as Samuel Huntington observes, ‘may contribute not to political stability but to greater instability …[and] encourages demands for still more changes which can easily snowball’. Both suddenly unrestrained popular demands and forces loyal to the ancien régime (including the military) may threaten the process and outcome of reform.

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

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References

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3 The S.A.P. is understudied but increasingly important, having grown from a force of 35,000 in the early 1980s to about 115,000 in 1993, while the budget of the S.A.D.F. under the régime headed by President F. W. de Klerk has declined in real terms.Google Scholar

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60 A common phrase in security circles.

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