ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses South Africa's gateway position in Africa. It shows that the gateway narrative indeed ties into South Africa as sub-imperial middleman on the continent. The chapter analyses South Africa's mining sector and, against this backdrop, discusses the four features of sub-imperialism: expansionist economic policy; relative dependency on foreign capital; capital export of state-run industries and lax capital controls; and exploitation of labour. It discusses the Marikana mining massacre of August 2012, which was the single most lethal event in post-apartheid history. The chapter shows that South Africa's deep integration into the global imperialist architecture indeed contributed to escalation of the situation. It discusses the role civil society has played in challenging the extractivist-state nexus more recently and how anti-extractivist movements have restructured their opposition after Marikana. The Marikana massacre showed the ugliest face of the extractivist-state nexus. International capital together with the national ruling elite waged 'class war' against workers.
