Protecting the future

The primary intention of this book is to provide a nexus of theory and practice of governance and public accountability in democratic South Africa. The book focuses mainly on public accountability and the state, institutional design and measures of public accountability, decentralised governance, leadership and management of public and private economies and industries, democratic accountability and political parties and participation, civil society and voice. The basic assumption of the book is that without comprehensive, integrated and functional democratic accountability measures in place, the constitutional democratic state will collapse. The book from the contributors' perspectives answers broad questions: What is the nature of the architecture and discourse of governance and public accountability in South Africa? What are the challenges to the design, dilemmas and prospects of governance and public accountability measures? How does South African society ensure a state with competing interests continuously strives towards good governance and public accountability? How does society ensure that leaders and institutions - political, economic and social - are kept answerable for responsibilities and obligations assigned to them?