Who will free us from ‘service delivery’? Why a supposed solution is a problem

In this Commentary, I challenge the conventional wisdom which sees 'service delivery' as the core task of democratic government.I argue that this view has devalued the role of citizens and prompted widespread dissatisfaction with government.The Commentary therefore points towards a fundamental rethink of government's purpose, which, if adopted, should generate new approaches which place the citizen at the heart of governance.Few phrases are as popular when South Africans discuss government as 'service delivery'.It is assumed to be the prime purpose of governing.Its lack is said to be behind every township protest.There is some debate on how to achieve it, but none about whether to strive for it.There are understandable reasons for this.A core feature of the apartheid system was gross inequality in the provision of public services.The suburbs in which whites lived were well served, while segregated black townships were denied basic services, initially because most black people were meant to leave the cities for rural areas -this lack of basic urban services was a core cause of the urban rebellion against apartheid.It also forced many people to rely on unauthorised services, which posed problems for the effectiveness of the state after democracy was achieved.It follows from this that a democratic government should be expected to provide the services to the majority which apartheid did not.It is also widely agreed that South Africans, particularly the majority who apartheid dominated, do not receive the public service to which citizens of a democracy are entitled.This has prompted a distrust in the government's willingness and ability to serve the people, which is expressed in the public debate as a demand for 'service delivery'.But 'service delivery' is not a self-evident good.On the contrary, the phrase and the thinking which produced it express a deeply undemocratic view of the relationship between the government and citizens.While its frequent use is understandable, it also makes it more difficult to achieve development goals and is the cause of much citizen dissatisfaction with government, particularly its local variety.