-
Jan 12, 2025 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
One of the most interesting things I read in the last days of 2024 was an appraisal of Jimmy Carter, published only hours after the former US president’s death on December 29, in the journal Reason.
-
Dec 8, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
How much less constitutional freedom should black people living in the countryside have than, say, Gwede Mantashe or Johann Rupert or any of the rest of us who live in towns and cities, just as we please?
-
Nov 24, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
Country is home to a rising number of high-net worth individuals and innovative retail spaces
-
Nov 10, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
Private investor purchases businesses and assets to conclude a successful rescue in six months
-
Oct 27, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
Thoughtful South Africans will have recognised last week’s masterclass in mythmaking, which contrived to show foreigners poisoning our children to death, as nothing less than evil deception. Reliably, sport, arts & culture minister Gayton McKenzie seemed comfortable shrugging off any pretence of responsibility by impulsively recommending that we stop the discussion, close “all these shops” and arrest all of the owners pursuant to their summary deportation.
-
Oct 13, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
If you wanted proof of the power of a dominant idea in politics, I once pointed out that you had only to consult the straight-faced entry in Hansard, the official record of parliament, from an otherwise unremarkable day in March 1990. I might just as well say you have only to consider the question put to judge Phillip Coppin by chief justice Mandisa Maya in his Judicial Service Commission interview last week for a position on the Supreme Court of Appeal. But I’ll get to that in a minute. ..
-
Sep 29, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
How to confront violent extremism and simultaneously contain the influence of heartfelt fury on any strategic response was the theme of a Business Day column I wrote last year, soon after the events of October 7 visited terror, heartbreak and rage on the Middle East. Nil joy arises from sensing that, nearly a year later, the case against enraged revenge is not merely intact but strengthened.
-
Sep 15, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
In a society justifiably obsessed with granting power to the people, it is remarkable how often scant attention is paid to what the people actually want. You could pick any aspect of public administration and find an example of a legitimate public interest being ignored or even undermined. But there are exceptions, and likely more than we might imagine.
-
Sep 1, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
After making an effort to dwell on the names and the lost hopes of the victims of last week’s Jeppestown fire, perhaps the next most important thing for policymakers to think about is the name of the hijacked building that is now a blackened hulk — not its formal name (if it ever had one) but the name it is known by, its truer name. This name, Enkanini means “stubborn” in Zulu.
-
Aug 18, 2024 | 
businesslive.co.za | Michael Morris
After ANC political education head David Makhura implored “capital” to “come to the party” last week (https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/national/2024-08-12-sas-fate-hangs-in-the-balance-anc-ifp-leaders-tell-big-business/) (in order, he seemed to suggest, to ensure that the government of national unity, or GNU, didn’t fail), I couldn’t help wondering if he’d ever concede that rather than chummy approval, vigorous opposition to government policy would more plausibly qualify as an aid to...
