A book entitled Searching for South Africa implies that there is a search for something. Something called South Africa. This is an odd title for a book. The longitudinal and latitudinal coordinates can be provided and there … you will find it. The Republic of South Africa: are we searching for borders? All around the world we hear its music, see its beauty, and taste its food. What cultures and practices do we seek? Has something been lost, that we need to search for, to recover? What is it that eludes us and for which we have to search now, 17 years after the defeat of apartheid. Who has been searching for South Africa? Who is searching for South Africa now?

1994 to 2009 has seen unprecedented changes in the Republic of South Africa. In 1994 the liberation movement, the African National Congress came to power on a wave of popular support and euphoria. The Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) the ANC began with was a radical socialdemocratic policy document based on the Freedom Charter, centred around human, infrastructural and economic development. Its goals were one million houses, universal and affordable electricity, a national health scheme and social security. However, forced reorientation by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 1996 meant that South Africa had to adapt to the ‘realities’ of the global economy through its new Growth Employment and Redistribution strategy (GEAR).

South Africa has seen the emergence of many forms of organising and mobilising. Some call these mobilisations the new social movements – perhaps they are. They are: the Anti-Privatisation Forum (APF), the Anti- War Coalition, the Concerned Citizens Forum, the Remoho Women's Group, the Education Rights Project (ERP), Jubilee South, the Khulumani Support Group, the Landless People's Movement (LPM), Building Women's Activism, Men By the Side of the Road, the Palestine Solidarity Committee, the Soweto Electricity Crisis Committee (SEC), the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), the Sex Worker Advocacy and Education Trust (SWEAT) and the Sex Worker Union Sisonke, the UCT Workers Support Committee, the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign (AEC), Sikula Sonke, Women on Farms, Youth for Work. This is a sketchy and schematic list, including only those movements, for example, that have names, occasional addresses, and a bit of duration.