The South African government and the application of co-optive power.

The question of power remains critically important. South Africa provides a salient example of the relevance of soft or co-optive power. This paper investigates the South African government's use of two forms of co-optive power, namely, institutional centralisation and dispositional centralisation. The first refers to the centralising of the state apparatus as evidenced in the reformed Presidency. The second is highlighted in state-society relations as civil society is relegated to the role of implementer of state policy and its political space as an agent of accountability is severely constrained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]