Background, Research Questions & Design
This Academic Study develops and tests a unified, falsifiable account of South Africa’s long-run performance (1961–2025) through two complementary frameworks: (i) Mancur Olson’s theory of distributional coalitions and institutional sclerosis, and (ii) the Baumol–Litan–Schramm distinction between “good capitalism” (incentives that reward productive entrepreneurship) and “bad capitalism” (incentives that tilt toward rent extraction). We integrate primary evidence (this survey and follow-up interviews) with secondary, official time series (WDI, SARB/Treasury, WGI, TI-CPI, CSIR power system data) and a date-stamped institutional timeline (e.g., 1976 Soweto; 1994 transition; load-shedding since 2007; SOE crises; the Zondo Commission; logistics reforms). The goal is to adjudicate whether the post-1994 slowdown is driven primarily by domestic rent-seeking/capture dynamics (Olsonian sclerosis), by global headwinds, or by their interaction.
Research Questions (RQs)
- RQ1 – Attribution. To what extent do indicators of rent-seeking/capture and institutional quality statistically precede or coincide with structural breaks in investment (GFCF % of GDP) and productivity?
- RQ2 – Mechanism. Do infrastructure reliability shocks—especially electricity reliability (Energy Availability Factor, load-shedding) and logistics—mediate the relationship between governance deterioration and private investment?
- RQ3 – Counterfactual. After controlling for global and peer conditions (IMF/OECD, upper-middle-income panels), how much of the slowdown remains attributable to domestic governance factors?
- RQ4 – Perceptions & Legitimacy. How do expert and practitioner perceptions align with quantitative evidence, and what do they imply for credible reform sequencing toward “good capitalism”?
Hypotheses (Refined)
- H1 – Olsonian timing. Increases in capture intensity (e.g., WGI control-of-corruption ↓, TI-CPI ↓, Zondo-coded events ↑) lead to Bai–Perron-dated downward breaks in GFCF/productivity.
- H2 – Infrastructure channel. Deterioration in EAF and logistics performance transmits governance shocks into rising firm-level costs and lower investment.
- H3 – Reform response. Post-2019 governance and energy-sector reforms are associated with a partial (directionally positive) recovery in investment sentiment.
- H4 – Null/Alternative (Counter-hypothesis). Once global peers and commodity/terms-of-trade cycles are controlled for, domestic governance factors and capture proxies do not add statistically significant explanatory power for the observed slowdown.
Mixed-Methods Research Design
The study employs a convergent mixed-methods design. Quantitative and qualitative strands are conducted in parallel and integrated via joint displays and inference triangulation.
- Quantitative strand (indicator-first, replication-ready): growth-accounting overview; Bai–Perron multiple-break dating for GFCF and productivity; governance series (WGI sub-indices, TI-CPI); infrastructure metrics (EAF, outage hours; rail/port throughput); peer benchmarking (IMF/OECD upper-middle-income panels). Sensitivity to alternative peer sets and measurement error is reported.
- Qualitative strand (explanatory, mechanism-rich): a structured survey and follow-up semi-structured interviews with purposive and stratified sampling across business, policy, SOE/utility, civil society, and academia. Evidence is coded in NVivo/Atlas.ti with an a-priori codebook aligned to Olson, Baumol–Litan–Schramm, and the infrastructure mechanism (EAF/logistics).
Sampling Strategy & Power
- Survey (quantitative perceptions): target n ≈ 350–600 valid completes, providing power to detect 0.25–0.35 s.d. differences across strata at α = 0.05 with ≥80% power. Quotas by sector (public/private/academia/civil society), province, and experience bands; robust weighting for minor imbalances.
- Interviews (qualitative): target n ≈ 30–45 semi-structured interviews until thematic saturation (minimum 6–8 per stakeholder stratum). Maximum-variation sampling ensures heterogeneity of exposure to energy/logistics constraints and procurement regimes.
Data & Measures
Official series: World Bank WDI (GDP, GFCF %/GDP), SARB/Treasury (domestic vintages), World Bank
WGI, Transparency International CPI, CSIR/Eskom (EAF, outages), logistics/throughput statistics, IMF Article IV
(staff reports), and OECD Economic Survey: South Africa.
Events: Zondo Commission
(Part IV, Vol. 4—Eskom) and major policy/board/contract milestones are date-coded to enable institutional overlays
and stacked difference-in-differences (DID) with UMIC peer panels.
Analytical Methods
- Bai–Perron multiple-break tests on GFCF and productivity (robust trimming, maximum breaks, and serial-correlation corrections). Estimated break dates are overlaid on the institutional timeline.
- Stacked DID around capture-coded events versus synthetic peer panels (IMF/OECD), with placebo windows and alternative peer definitions for robustness.
- Mechanism tests linking breaks to EAF/load-shedding and logistics proxies; firm-cost regressions with simple pass-through specifications to investment and output.
- Qualitative synthesis via thematic coding; joint displays integrate themes with quantitative patterns to support or falsify the Olsonian mechanism.
Ethics & Data Protection
This study adheres to recognised research-ethics standards for human participants in social science research. All procedures have been reviewed for conformity with the hosting institution’s ethics framework. The project is designed to minimise risk and burden on participants while maximising public-interest value through rigorous and transparent scholarship.
- Anonymity and identifiers. The survey does not request your name, surname, or any government-issued identifier. Before analysis or any publication, all responses are anonymised and presented only in aggregate or de-identified form.
- Email address (limited purpose). We request an email address solely to (i) send you a copy of your survey submission and/or (ii) contact you for a voluntary 20–40 minute follow-up interview if — and only if — you explicitly consent. You may use a work or personal address at your discretion.
- Consent and withdrawal. Participation is voluntary. You may exit the survey at any time before submitting. If you consent to a follow-up interview, you may withdraw that consent later without consequence.
- Data handling & storage. Survey data are transmitted over encrypted channels and delivered to a secure CGI email gateway for controlled processing; no on-site database storage is used. Access to study data is restricted to the research team for scholarly analysis and thesis preparation.
- Retention & disposal. Identifiable contact details (email/phone) used for interviews are kept only for the duration necessary to schedule and complete interviews and are then securely deleted. Analytical datasets used for the thesis retain only anonymised variables.
- Sharing & publication. Findings will be reported in aggregate, with illustrative quotations de-identified. No personal contact details will be disclosed. Where replication materials are shared, they will contain only anonymised data and publicly available secondary series.
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- Queries. Questions about ethics or data protection can be directed to info@stratinnovexia.com. We will respond promptly to requests regarding consent, correction, or deletion.
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