What could mobilise an uprising in South Africa

South Africa has long been marked by localised protests, but these sporadic demonstrations remain too fragmented to form the kind of nationwide movements seen recently in Kenya, Nepal, and Madagascar.

Yet, Associate Professor Zwelethu Jolobe from the University of Cape Town’s Department of Political Studies points out that South Africa’s July 2021 unrest showed how quickly social media can change that when people have a unified goal.

Analysts have noted that in recent years, Generation Z (born 1997–2012) has become a driving force in many global protests, using platforms like TikTok, Discord, Reddit, and Instagram to mobilise anti-government movements.

Youth-led uprisings across Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Europe have erupted in response to government repression, corruption, inequality, and inadequate services.

What began with isolated protests, such as Kenya’s 2024 anti-tax demonstrations, has evolved into a global movements amplified by social media.

In Nepal, a government ban on 26 social media platforms, including Facebook, WhatsApp, and YouTube, sparked widespread outrage.

Protests escalated into violent confrontations, resulting in at least 19 deaths and hundreds of injuries. The Prime Minister resigned, and the government dissolved the House of Representatives.

Similarly, in Madagascar, youth-led protests over chronic water and electricity shortages led to at least 22 deaths and over 100 injuries. The government was dissolved, and President Andry Rajoelina dissolved government.

These uprisings, fueled by Gen Z activism and facilitated by digital platforms, have toppled governments, forced policy reversals, and drawn international attention, with hundreds killed.

While each country has its own unique experiences, many South Africans share similar grievances with these recent protests.

For example, the HSRC’s ‘Corruption and Behaviour Change’ study found that 84% of the populace believe that most or all of politicians are involved in corrupt activities.

Discussing the possibility of similar widespread protests in South Africa, Jolobe told Newsday that “patterns of protests in this country are a lot more sporadic than organised and coherent.”

“We sort of don’t really have important and cohesive connections and there is no general level of discontent that ties everybody together.”

That fragmentation, he argues, has prevented South Africa’s deep socioeconomic grievances, unemployment, corruption, water shortages and service failures, from crystallising into a unified protest wave.

“Yes, we do have things like protest action around service delivery and all these things,” Jolobe noted, “but they are very, very irregular in how they happen.”

“They’re very, very isolated, and there is no kind of generalised connections between them.”

He said that social media in the country “has not been a variable that has affected the way in which people protest… but the way in which people mobilise and communicate around these issues.”

The power of social media

An exception, Jolobe said, was the July 2021 unrest, when protests linked to the jailing of former president Jacob Zuma morphed into widespread riots and looting.

The South African government reported that 354 people had died in the riots and estimated the economic damage at R50 billion.

Here, social media proved pivotal. “What the July riots showed us is the potent nature of social media,” Jolobe said.

“The power of social media is that it can bring together things that otherwise would be quite different into one coherent whole.”

By connecting anger over Zuma’s imprisonment with anger over mass unemployment, poverty, and local governance failures, platforms like WhatsApp, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook became accelerants.

The daughter of Zuma, Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla, has appeared in court on terrorism charges over her alleged involvement in the 2021 riots.

She is accused of sharing incendiary social media posts that fuelled the civil unrest, but has pled not guilty.

National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) spokesperson Mthunzi Mhaga said “it is the first time that the NPA is charging a person based on content posted on what we call X… for content that we consider to amount to incitement to commit terrorism.” 

Jolobe said that “the moment that there’s a medium that can tie in things that otherwise would be quite different into one coherent argument, and into one kind of clear target: that’s where social media can be extremely powerful as a mobilising factor.”

This, he argues, poses a dilemma for the state. While the July unrest underscored the risks of ignoring social media’s mobilising potential, it remains unclear whether authorities have adapted.

“It’s very hard to say, because the one thing that experience has taught us is that governments are very slow learners,” Jolobe cautioned.

“Their ability to learn the lessons of mistakes takes time. Typically, governments have a tendency of repeating mistakes until it’s repeated so much that they sort of learn eventually.”

For now, Jolube believes another eruption on the scale of July 2021 is unlikely, largely because discontent remains dispersed.

But he leaves open the possibility that the right spark, amplified by digital platforms, could transform South Africa’s sporadic local protests into something far more coordinated and destabilising.

Governments globally are cracking down

Governments worldwide have grown increasingly wary of social media’s role in fueling protests, with crackdowns now extending well beyond authoritarian regimes.

Jolobe said that intolerance toward online mobilisation has become “a tendency for most governments in the world… irrespective of whether they are democracies or not.”

He describes this as part of a broader “creeping authoritarianism,” adding:

“I think that a lot more governments, even those that are quite liberal democracies, are becoming a lot more intolerant.”

“The main reason being is that it’s very, very difficult to control the kind of protests that use these tools… manuals and operation manuals haven’t really adapted to the pace in which people are shifting how they mobilise.”

Without effective legal or policing frameworks, he said, states default to heavy-handed responses. “Their go-to position is to be authoritarian or to be intolerant or excessive.”

This trend, he noted, is visible even in Western democracies. “That’s why many governments in the West, for instance, are becoming a lot more draconian in how they’re policing social media.

“They’ve come to understand how powerful it is in bringing things that otherwise would be not connected.”

States have responded by shutting down platforms, restricting internet access, or monitoring online activity of citizens, which the Professor noted triggers even greater unrest.