Latest News Archive

Please select Category, Year, and then Month to display items

UFS Reflection Series webinar: The quality of our democracies under COVID-19

04 August 2020 | Story Dr Nitha Ramnath

Apart from its devastating impact on people’s lives and livelihoods, the COVID-19 pandemic has also affected the nature and quality of our democracies – democracy read in its widest sense here as collective and individual self-determination. Formal, institutional democracy has beencurtailed through the imposition of states of emergency or disaster and the logistical difficulties associated with social distancing. Extra-institutional democratic work, such as protest and social-movement activity, has suffered from prohibitions imposed by law and through state suppression related to ‘lockdown’. The nature (and perhaps democratic quality) of public conversation has changed – for better or worse – from increasing reliance on ‘science’ and ‘scientists’ to justify public choices. The crisis has brought to the fore already existing characteristics of our democracies, such as the prevalence and power of special-interest bargaining, the extreme inequality of our societies, and chauvinist nationalisms that force us to ask whether we have ever had democracy at all. What will be the long-term effects of these impacts of the crisis on our democracies? What will democracy look like post-COVID? What does the crisis teach us about what our democracies have always been?

Join us for a discussion of these and other democracy-related issues in these troubled times by a panel of four hailing from Colombia, India, South Africa, and the USA.

Date: Thursday, 13 August

Time: 14:00-16:00 (South African Standard Time – GMT +2)

Please RSVP to Mamello Serasengwe at serasengwemsm@ufs.ac.za no later than 12 August 2020 upon which you will receive a Skype for Business meeting invite and link to access the webinar

Panel

Prof Natalia Angel Cabo (University of Los Andes, Bogota, Colombia)

Dr Quaraysha Ismail-Sooliman (University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa)

Dr Usha Ramanathan Independent Law Researcher (Delhi, India)

Prof Katie Young (Boston College, Boston, USA)

Moderator

Prof Danie Brand (Free State Centre for Human Rights, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa)

News Archive

Ahmed Kathrada to launch his book, ‘Triumph of the Human Spirit’ on 18 August 2015 on Bloemfontein Campus

2015-08-17

Ahmed Kathrada, struggle icon and former prisoner at Robben Island, will launch his latest book, Triumph of the Human Spirit, at the Bloemfontein Campus. The book details Kathrada’s 300-odd visits to the island with guests ranging from heads of state and celebrities to school children. The photographs give a sense of the bleakness of the island and how, now a World Heritage Site, it has been transformed into a monument celebrating lives of courage.

Details of the event:
Date: 18 August 2015
Time: 12:00
Place: Centenary Complex, Bloemfontein Campus

In Kathrada’s words, “While we will not forget the brutality of apartheid, we will not want Robben Island to be a monument of our hardship and suffering. We would want it to be a triumph of the human spirit against the forces of evil; a triumph of wisdom and largeness of spirit against small minds and pettiness; a triumph of courage and determination over human frailty and weakness; a triumph of the new South Africa over the old.”

Prof André Keet, Director of the Institute for Reconciliation and Social Justice, and Dr Lis Lange, Vice-Rector: Academic, will join Kathrada on stage to discuss his book.

As an added bonus, Kathrada’s visit coincides with the art exhibition, 21 Icons: 21 Years of Freedom Collection, in which he also features. The exhibition is hosted by the Johannes Stegmann Art Gallery, situated in the UFS Sasol Library, from 12 August to 18 September 2015.

Back

Economic and Management Sciences

Education

Health Sciences

The Humanities

Law

Natural and Agricultural Sciences

Theology and Religion

Open Distance Learning

Business School

We use cookies to make interactions with our websites and services easy and meaningful. To better understand how they are used, read more about the UFS cookie policy. By continuing to use this site you are giving us your consent to do this.

Accept