§  The year 2010 is a kind of watershed for South Africa. The election in April 2009 went very well, but by 2010 society at large is in a state of suppressed anxiety and unrest. Structures of society are falling apart and no-one seems to care or is able to do anything about it – apart from the odd government statement.

§  The run up from 2010 to 2020 demands some radical new thinking. Existing arguments and concepts no longer provide any meaningful answers to the challenges created by a new environment.

§  This paper is an exercise in the formulation of new thinking and concepts – and it will definitely not be the last! The emphasis will be on new arguments – arguing the unthinkable – in order to outline the environment in which people will have to operate. The supporting facts will be available to the reader in part 1 and 2 and other previous issues of Management Briefing – available from Intersearch (insearch@mweb.co.za).

§  Some of the information is not very comforting and may be considered by the reader as somewhat offensive. For that we apologize. However, in a way the reader has to be introduced to the South Africa of the 21^st century. To a new reality that has to be faced. Whether it is popular or not, is irrelevant.

§  Sometimes information can be so unnerving that people tend to ignore it. Therefore, dealing with it in a rather disturbing and provocative way is the only option to by-pass social apathy and political correctness. It is information the lecturer in political science will not easily tell the students; legal experts refuse dealing with it, for it falls outside the constitution and financial institutions have somehow never incorporated it into their economic forecasts. It is information that has been continuously reported in the media, but with an information overflow of new facts every morning, people tend to read it, but do not understand!

Many people, who live in South Africa and pretend to understand the situation, know in fact very little about the country.