Implementation Dilemmas of
Date
2011-04-19
Authors
Malgas, Johannes
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Abstract
This research report examines institutional change in South Africa, with particular
attention to the vexed issue of border management. Border control in South Africa is
the responsibility of a range of government departments and agencies with unique
and often overlapping mandates.
The status of lead agency in border control has vacillated between main border
control agencies over the years. Leadership has been handed from the South African
Police Service to the Department of Home Affairs and, in February 2007, to the
South African Revenue Service. The lead agent has always been at the mercy of
voluntary cooperation from the other departments and agencies responsible for
border control. It does not have statutory powers to enforce cooperation, resulting in
individual border control departments and agencies retreating to narrow mandates to
avoid “interference” from “outside”.
Due to strong principal-agent relationships among political and bureaucratic elites as
a result of the ruling party’s cadre deployment strategy, very little real change has
been achieved during the last sixteen years.
The current stalemate will only be broken through strong leadership at the top. A
scan of the various models for integrated border control shows a great diversity in
approaches. Consistent with all transformation of border management, is the attempt
to make a clean break with the inefficiency and ineffectiveness of a proliferation of
agencies or departments responsible for border control. Government must decide on
the type of model it intends to follow to transform border control. Critically, a change
in legislation to enable the required institutional change might very well be the first
step out of this impasse
Description
MM - P&DM
Keywords
Integrated border management, Border management, South Africa