South Africa is in Africa but, if its response to Covid-19 is a guide, not of it.

Strangely, for a country whose public debate is usually loud and polarised, there was little discussion in 2020 of how well the country fared in combatting the virus. In the mainstream, it was simply assumed that it did well, despite over three-quarters of a million cases and over 20 000 deaths by late November. This was followed by a more severe ‘second wave’ which proved at least twice as deadly as the first. None of this caused alarm in the public debate. It was, throughout the year, common to encounter people who insisted that South Africa was ‘doing well’ in limiting Covid-19's effect.

But on what was this claim based? We were never told. Since South Africa's case numbers were at one stage fifth highest in the world and, by the end of November, still in the top 15 although it is only the planet's twenty-fifth biggest country,1 the self-congratulation seems unjustified. It certainly did not ‘do well’ compared to the countries of East Asia, most of whose case and death figures were a fraction of this country's (or New Zealand, which appears to have largely defeated Covid-19). It did not ‘do well’ compared to the rest of the African continent. For a long while, it experienced as many cases and deaths as the rest of the continent combined. While its share of both dropped towards the end of the year, it was still, by a large distance, the African country with the most cases and loss of life. But this made no impact on the South African debate. The virus's impact on Africa was rarely reported on by the media and the comparison between South Africa's experience and that of the rest of the continent was ignored by the debate.

The rest of Africa would seem to be the most obvious area to which South Africa should be compared. Covid-19 cases and deaths may not simply be a consequence of how well governments have done in combatting the virus. Climate might matter since the virus is airborne and spreads more rapidly indoors (and so also in countries where climate forces people inside). Age profile might also affect figures because young people were, during 2020, less likely to suffer severe illness or to die of the virus.

One of democracy's core functions is to hold power accountable. ‘Mainstream development orthodoxy’ also tells us that accountability is essential to ensuring that government serves everyone, including people living in poverty.

In most conventional accounts, that usually means holding the government accountable. Because citizens enjoy rights, they are able to speak, organise and act in concert to ensure that those who govern tell them what they are doing and why they are doing it. If what they are doing is not what citizens want, they face vocal pressure to change. But, contrary to the claims of devotees of the unfettered market, accountability is not restricted to government – it can equally well be demanded of private interests whose actions and decisions affect the lives and interests of the citizenry.

Accountability is rarely a product of the efforts of individuals. It stems from institutions and organisations and how groups use them. The media (digital as well as conventional), the academy and citizens’ organisations enable the people to demand answers and to insist on change if they do not like what they hear. This should ensure government that is more responsive to the needs of citizens. While the real world of democracy is much messier than this account suggests, accountability understood in this way has, across the globe, forced the holders of power to accommodate the needs and wishes of citizens. There can be few issues on which this is more needed than a country's response to a pandemic which threatens the health and well-being of everyone who lives within its borders. Democracies should be better equipped to deal with pandemics than authoritarian societies because those who decide how to respond are more likely to be forced to explain and to correct behaviours and policies which do not meet citizens’ needs. But accountability is more complicated than that.

Democratic rights make accountability possible but they do not make it inevitable unless people can and will use them to hold power to account. Not all citizens enjoy the same power to hold government to account. Citizens who have a pressing interest in making themselves heard are often powerless and so the accountability relationship simply does not work for them. A consequence of the realities discussed in chapter 1 is that, in South Africa, it is the ‘insiders’ who join the organisations and make use of the institutions which hold power holders to account.

The sense that the government and scientists are working together to fight a threat is meant to instil in citizens confidence and hope and to encourage them to support the battle against the common danger. In South Africa, this unity lasted all of a few weeks.

Initially, the public debate rallied around the common effort. We don't know how most citizens felt because in a country divided into two worlds, most of the country is not heard. But, among those whose voices are heard, there were few, if any, dissenting voices when the government declared the state of disaster and then imposed a lockdown on 27 March 2020, three weeks after the first case was reported. Organised business pledged support for the campaign against the virus despite the fact that economic activity would be curtailed. This goodwill was enhanced by relief that the government was listening to ‘the science’ and was not pursuing a ‘political agenda’.

This support for official efforts to fight the virus was fairly common across the planet. What made it unusual in South Africa was that, for the past decade, the government and the debate has been at war and so the voices that are heard rarely if ever supported anything it did. The complicated nature of South Africa's divisions means that conflict within the ‘First World’ between the government and the insiders is suspended during national sporting events such as the 2010 football World Cup or the national rugby team's World Cup victories, the most recent of which had occurred only a few months before the lockdown. For a while, the debate seemed to have decided that the virus, too, required some temporary harmony prior to the resumption of hostilities.

This atmosphere prevailed despite the fact that restrictions were severe. The government's ‘risk adjusted strategy’ introduced five levels of lockdown, of which level 5 was the strictest – it began at this level. Like many other countries, it imposed bans on movement within the country as well as between it and other countries and closed all businesses except those which offered ‘essential services’. No movement outside homes was allowed unless the movers were essential workers or could show they were on their way to buy necessities or seek medical help.