Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) has been a major policy thrust of the democratic governments in South Africa since 1994 in attempting to redress the effects of apartheid. This paper explores the historical precedents to BEE in South Africa, its origins, and its points of contact with the...

In November 2003, the South African wine industry held its first consultative conference on ‘Black Empowerment’. The press reported to the world that the industry was at last entering ‘the new South Africa’. For years, it had been a byword for white power and black exploitation –...