A major societal challenge in post-1994 South Africa is that of questionable
public leadership and the scarcity of ethical and effective leadership. Coupled
with this are high expectations from the public directed at government
institutions, which need to respond to the basic needs of citizens, and private
business institutions, which need to create and sustain economic activity in an
often uncertain environment. These transitional challenges call for outstanding
leadership in public and private institutions.
However, one can make a justified and evidence-based argument that the
state of leadership in South Africa, particularly in the public sector, is not living
up to these expectations. Added to this challenge of poor leadership is a
youthful population that faces numerous challenges. However, from the youth
of today the leaders of tomorrow are to emerge.
South Africa and Africa as a whole are experiencing a youth population boom;
a phenomenon that has been classified as having the potential to either be a
demographic dividend or a ticking time bomb. In order to promote the
development of youths, the South African government has attempted to
respond to the multiplicity of challenges facing the youth by instituting the
National Youth Act; a National Youth policy; the National Youth Service and a
National Youth Development Agency (NYDA). This research submits
evidence that the effectiveness of these interventions has not been
satisfactory and that they do not include the intentional development of
emerging South African leaders.
The question, therefore, arises as to whether intentional development of future
emerging leaders should not be taking place on a greater scale and in such a
manner so as to ensure an improved leadership landscape in the future. This
question necessitates exploratory inquiry into the phenomenon of youth
leadership development in South Africa and represents the central theme of
this research.Non-governmental organizations and university-based institutions have
created leadership development programmes that target an emerging leaders'
cadre in South Africa. These programmes are structured in different ways, but
all have a leadership curriculum with theoretical and practical elements in
common. The goal of this research will be to conduct an exploratory
analysis of this emerging South African youth leadership development
practice and to provide a theoretical and programmatic perspective on it
based on an analysis of two case studies.
The research is divided into four sequential phases. The first phase consists
of a theoretical review of the concepts of leadership and youth leadership
development. The second phase analyzes the context and challenges of
South Africa’s youth and youth leadership development. The third and fourth
phases transpose the theoretical and contextual analysis with youth
leadership development practice in South Africa. This is done by means of the
analysis of two case studies and the responses gathered from a semistructured
questionnaire answered by a sample population of emerging South
African leaders. The cases analyzed are the South Africa Washington
International Programme, a non-governmental organization specialising in
developing emerging South African leaders, and the Frederik van Zyl Slabbert
Institute for Student Leadership Development of Stellenbosch University.
The research showed that the concept of youth leadership development is
theoretically underdeveloped, and limited information could be derived from
the American literature on college student development.
The research also indicated that the scale of youth leadership development in
South Africa is relatively small. However, programmes developed and
implemented by non-government organizations and tertiary-based institutions
suggest an emerging practice of youth leadership development in the country.
This emerging practice is not well researched in the South African context. In
response, this study succeeds in highlighting a number of knowledge gaps
that could address this lack. The research concludes with evidence that suggests that an investment in the
professionalization of youth leadership development programmes will result in
a future generation of ethical and effective South African leaders that will bring
about positive transformational change in the Republic.