In 1996, while I was teaching at the University of Cape Town, I was invited by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to be an in-house critic at a town hall it had organized. A member of the largely black African audience told this story:

“Tom and John were neighbors. One day Tom stole John’s bicycle. They did not speak for years until the day Tom extended his hand to John and said, ‘Let us reconcile.’

“‘What about my bicycle?’ John asked.

“‘Forget the bicycle,’ Tom said. ‘Let it not stand between us.’”

John’s question has now turned into a growing social movement. Students and labor movements in South Africa are leading a mobilization of transformative potential by focusing on the land question to address the social and economic legacy of apartheid in the country.

President Cyril Ramaphosa, who was re-elected in May, conveyed his awareness of the challenge during his inauguration speech, saying that the country “can no longer abide the grave disparities of wealth and opportunity that have defined our past and which threaten to imperil our future.”