The political economy of government spending on small business and entrepreneurship in South Africa
Date
2018
Authors
Hassen, Ebrahim-Khalil Goolam Mohamed
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Abstract
Can a highly unequal country – in this case, South Africa – resolve its distributional challenges through the proliferation of small businesses? This study discusses this question through the lens of a transversal budget analysis of government spending on small business and entrepreneurship. The National Development Plan (NDP) answers this question affirmatively arguing that small, medium and micro-enterprises (SMMEs) will contribute ninety (90) percent of all new jobs by 2030. This report argues that such an affirmative answer is questionable. This questioning of the NDP assumptions is derived from a method of doing transversal budget analysis and applies it to small business and entrepreneurship in South Africa. The report argues that South African government efforts to support small business can be described as the actions of a “reluctant tactical state”. The paper identifies four rationales in governments attempts to support small business. These are (a) atomistic (b) enabling (c) relational and (d) holistic. In terms of recommendations, the paper argues that four possible pathways exist and argues for a pathway based on escaping current constraints. The paper motivates for a pathway called ‘escape’ which tackles distributional questions alongside market-based reforms. The value of the paper also derives from a new methodology of transversal budget analysis using methods from grounded theory and from critical realist inspired methodologies of real evaluation.
Description
A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Management by Research and Dissertation, July 2018
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Citation
Hassen, Ebrahim-Khalil Goolam Mahomed, (2018) The political economy of government spending on small business and entrepreneurship in South Africa, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, https://hdl.handle.net/10539/28593