The purpose of this research is to examine the new constitution of South Africa from a sociological perspective. The plan of the research will be to set forth the social context in which the new constitution was promulgated as of 1994, and then to discuss the implications of the constitution for the transformation of social and to some degree political structure of the country.
The sociological context for the new South African constitution can best be summed up by the understanding that the realities of societal organization can differ from the constitutional, legal mandate under which society is somehow meant to be organized. The familiar history of apartheid in South Africa, which formally enforced social inequality (i.e., privileges for ethnic whites not accorded to ethnic blacks or so-called "coloureds") since the 1950s, was discarded by the new constitution; however, the fact that the law has changed does not necessarily mean that as a practical matter the de facto situation of race-based privilege has disappeared. In November of 1993, some 20 separate political parties in South Africa went to the polls to vote on ratification of an interim constitution and what was termed a National Unity government, which amounted to a power-sharing coalition government comprising ministers and executive representatives chiefly from the formerly ruling (white) National Party (NP) and the African National Congress (ANC). If approved, the constitution would take effect as a consequence of what was described as the multiracial election of April 1994, as well as subsequent constitutional implementations to be completed by the year 2000. The point of the 1994 election was that South Africa would formally leave behind apartheid and thereby enter the family of nations associated with modern western democracies.
The permanent constitution of present-day South Africa has come about in stages, just as the nation-state of South Africa has emerged s...