Browsing by Author "Ndlovu, Alecia"

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Open Access
    Enabling the Just Energy Transition in South Africa
    (2023) Wolf, Victoria; Ndlovu, Alecia
    South Africa's recently published Just Transition Framework (2022) signalled a critical juncture for the country's heretofore separate energy decarbonisation and developmental agendas. However, despite the win-win framing of the South African just energy transition, evidence suggests that it may do little to mitigate socio-economic and environmental inequality, necessitating new approaches to energy scholarship and policy planning. To date, the traditional principle of distributive justice (i.e. ensuring equitable access to energy) has been at the forefront of South Africa's approach to energy planning given the country's highly unequal socio-economic profile. Restorative energy justice, however, is increasingly being recognised across just energy transition research and practice as a means to both address and redress systemic inequalities within energy systems and importantly, to identify practical policy pathways – particularly in the varied and unique contexts of the Global South. In this light, this study provides a critical review of the state of the South African just energy transition with a focus on the potential of restorative energy justice in particular to enhance socio-economic inclusion, as opposed to the retributive or corrective approaches of distributive and procedural justice (McCauley and Heffron, 2017:2). By examining the South African just energy transition across market, social/environmental, and public/political dimensions, this study finds that while the just energy transition is distinctly an integrative framework, restorative energy justice is inadequately represented within the country's energy political economy. Ultimately, it is suggested that restorative policy instruments such as local content and ownership requirements, environmental impact assessments, environmental tax and energy financial reserve obligations serve as valuable conceptual bridges between scholarship and practice.
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Open Access
    State ownership, petroleum revenue, and the enduring legacy of authoritarianism in Angola
    (2021) Pule, Ramakwe Nicholus; Ndlovu, Alecia; Akokpari, John
    In the post-independence period, Angola's political economy has been shaped by the petroleum industry. After gaining independence in 1975, Angola turned authoritarian and subsequently, Sonangol, a state-owned oil company, was created. Once established, authoritarianism in Angola persisted for a long period, with oil playing a major role. This study investigates how the state's ownership of Sonangol has reinforced authoritarianism in Angola. Theoretically, it builds on the ideas of the resource curse hypothesis, which refers to the adverse effects of abundant non-renewable resources on a country's socio-economic and political outcomes. In addition to these findings of an adverse impact of non-renewable resources, this study argues that the type of resource ownership matters. Specifically, state ownership adversely affects political regimes. The rentier state model and the centralized political economy model of the resource curse are applied to investigate how the interaction between state ownership and petroleum revenue has reinforced authoritarian persistence in Angola. Building on Ross' quantitative cross-national findings of this interaction, this study uses process tracing research method to provide an in-depth investigation of Angola. There are two central findings. First, state ownership (with control) in the oil sector enabled the Angolan state to capture petroleum rents directly. This direct access to rents granted the state autonomy from having to formulate its goals under the scrutiny of its citizens, and thus undermined the statesociety bargaining dynamic. Second, the incumbent's discretionary power over the distribution of petroleum rents as patronage increased the value of staying in power and provided sufficient incentives for authoritarian practices to persist.