For decades, doom-mongers in the country's media have insisted that South Africa’s democracy delivered only failed service delivery, “jobless growth,” and little true socio-economic advancement. The record shows they were wrong, sometimes spectacularly so.

Since the moment South Africa held its first democratic election in 1994, the country has been subject to a relentless chorus of pessimism in the press. Doom-mongers in the South African media warned of service delivery collapse, an economy unable to create jobs, and a society that would struggle to advance beyond its apartheid legacy.

With each new year, headlines predicted “crisis,” “failure,” and “broken promises.” The facts, however, tell a different story – one of the fastest and most far-reaching transformations in the modern emerging world.

Warning

Perhaps no theme was more persistent than the warning of failed service delivery. From the outset, commentators claimed the new government would be unable to keep up with demand for basic services, let alone expand them. The reality is that, by 2008, the proportion of South African households with piped water inside the home had surged from just over 50% to nearly 90%.

Electricity access, long reserved for a minority, rose from just above half of all families to nearly four out of five, and more than 2.6 million formal homes were built, helping to shrink the proportion of families living in informal settlements for the first time since the mid-20th century.

These numbers reflect more than pipes, wires, or bricks. They measure a direct improvement in the everyday lives of millions. Fewer children missed school for lack of water; new electrification allowed homework after dark and powered small businesses; a title deed and a formal address opened doors to credit, security, and dignity. Entire communities moved from the margins to the mainstream, as government investment in infrastructure, health, and education delivered a “democratic dividend” that even sceptical development economists recognised as exceptional.

Underplayed

The doom-mongers in the much of the media consistently underplayed these shifts. Editorials that focused on individual protests or isolated failures missed the national scale of what was achieved. Even today, with the valid frustrations over service backlogs and maintenance failures, the average household’s access to water, electricity, and formal shelter remains far ahead of the pre-democracy baseline, a fact too easily overlooked by those who shape public debate.

A second persistent claim was that South Africa’s democracy had brought “jobless growth,”an economy incapable of translating expansion into work for ordinary people. Once again, the data flatly contradicts the narrative. According to archival data drawn by The Common Sense, formal employment rose from just under eight million in 1994 to nearly 14 million by 2008, a near doubling in a single generation. New jobs appeared not only in construction, but also in trade, finance, public services, and the informal sector. The share of women and young people in the workforce hit record highs, and township and rural economies saw entrepreneurship and micro-enterprise thrive.

No fluke

This period was no statistical fluke. With rising employment came real household incomes, new consumption, and a boom in property ownership. A black middle class began to take shape. As job creation surged, household dependency on single earners fell and aspirations for upward mobility, unthinkable under apartheid, became plausible for millions. By the time of the global financial crisis in 2008, South Africa’s labour market had achieved one of the most dramatic transformations on the continent.

Doom-mongers in our media missed the essence of this quiet revolution. Their warnings about the permanent underclass ignored the emergence of a new generation of skilled, mobile, and ambitious South Africans. While unemployment remains stubbornly high today, a genuine and urgent challenge, the country’s labour force and its opportunities remain broader and more diverse than ever before.

The third and most sweeping media claim was that democracy had failed to deliver true socio-economic progress. Again, the numbers say otherwise. Incomes, university enrolment, and social protection all advanced at record pace. Disposable income per capita and new car sales, for instance, both rose sharply, and the number of students enrolled in higher education doubled from 1995 to 2022. The expansion of social grants from 2.5 million beneficiaries in 1996 to nearly 13 million by 2008 meant that millions of children, pensioners, and disabled South Africans gained a measure of security for the first time. Life expectancy, having fallen with the HIV epidemic, began to recover as healthcare investment and grants stabilised households.

In township and rural economies, the arrival of grants and new incomes sparked local retail and service growth, while households invested in education, health, and small businesses. The murder rate and violent protest numbers, both high in the late apartheid and transition years, fell markedly through to 2008, a direct result of improved stability and rising hope.

Fundamentally misread

While today’s headlines focus, often rightly, on the frustrations of slow growth, backlogs, and persistent inequality, it is easy to forget that the doom-mongers in the South African media fundamentally misread the trajectory of South Africa’s first democratic decades. Instead of decline, the early years delivered an extraordinary improvement in living standards, jobs, and opportunity. Even with the headwinds of the past ten years, household access to goods, services, and security remains far ahead of the 1994 starting point.

The lesson from the past 30 years is clear. For all the complexity and remaining challenges, South Africa’s record since 1994 provides a blueprint for what is possible. The greatest risk now is to lose faith in that possibility, and to let the doom-mongers once again shape the nation’s sense of its future. History proves that progress, properly pursued, is not just a dream but a lived reality.