South African Municipal Elections 2011

[redcommander]

These ward results are really interesting: http://maps.elections.org.za/lgeresults/

Who devises the ward districts in the country? Does an independent commission make the boundaries, or do the provincial governments?

[Verily]

Like ANC DA is not a particularly ideological party. It is the formal heir of the old anti-apartheid Democratic Party, which is well reflected in the top leadership, but is less obvious at the rank-and-file level. These days it is, mostly, a "non-black" party. In some parts of the country, that means "white" (at the last national elections they managed to put up a blonde woman as their top candidate in Mpumalanga, of all places), but in recent years they managed to consolidate the Colored vote as well (the process strengthened by the recent merger w/ the Independent Democrats). As the governing, and now the dominant, party in Western Cape, their main point is "efficient delivery of services".  To a large extent it is similar to ANC as a "big tent party" - I wouldn't search for a party-wide ideology there.

The only other parties of any consequence at this point are COPE (a one-time threatening splinter from the ANC, fast on its way to irrelevance, it seems; IFP - the Zulu-based force, which used to be the main ANC rival in Zululand, but which seems to be increasingly losing its point, especially now that  both ANC and the country are led by a Zulu; and NFP, which I've described above.

Well, the DA is something of a broadly social-liberal party, if there has to be a common strain found. They supported the Supreme Court's decision legalizing same-sex marriage, for example (while the ANC denounced it). And within the non-black community they are opposed to VF+, which is the socially conservative and racist white party.

[redcommander]

Like ANC DA is not a particularly ideological party. It is the formal heir of the old anti-apartheid Democratic Party, which is well reflected in the top leadership, but is less obvious at the rank-and-file level. These days it is, mostly, a "non-black" party. In some parts of the country, that means "white" (at the last national elections they managed to put up a blonde woman as their top candidate in Mpumalanga, of all places), but in recent years they managed to consolidate the Colored vote as well (the process strengthened by the recent merger w/ the Independent Democrats). As the governing, and now the dominant, party in Western Cape, their main point is "efficient delivery of services".  To a large extent it is similar to ANC as a "big tent party" - I wouldn't search for a party-wide ideology there.

The only other parties of any consequence at this point are COPE (a one-time threatening splinter from the ANC, fast on its way to irrelevance, it seems; IFP - the Zulu-based force, which used to be the main ANC rival in Zululand, but which seems to be increasingly losing its point, especially now that  both ANC and the country are led by a Zulu; and NFP, which I've described above.

Well, the DA is something of a broadly social-liberal party, if there has to be a common strain found. They supported the Supreme Court's decision legalizing same-sex marriage, for example (while the ANC denounced it). And within the non-black community they are opposed to VF+, which is the socially conservative and racist white party.

The DA I would consider economically conservative, although besides the VF+ like you said and the ACDP, there aren't really any broadly conservative political parties in South Africa.

[Hash]

These ward results are really interesting: http://maps.elections.org.za/lgeresults/

It's basically a racial map, especially so in urban areas.

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

These ward results are really interesting: http://maps.elections.org.za/lgeresults/

It's basically a racial map, especially so in urban areas.

Well obviously but the nuances in the results are interesting (look at how supportive of the VF+ whites were in 2006 in Bloemfontein and Pretoria). Also, the Coloured and Indian voting patterns are interesting.

[Peter the Lefty]

Well, I guess this is positive.  The DA needs to put some more blacks in its Shadow Cabinet.  But they are also economically neo-liberal, aren't they?  It'd be nice to see the ANC split, and to have a new, nonracial, social-democratic party on the center-left, that could perhaps merge with Cope.  If this party were to exist, I would certainly be a supporter (from abroad.)  I'm not South African, but from what I've read about SA politics, it seems like all of the parties they have now would be impossible to vote for.