Commentary

Some time ago I created a blog as an outlet for thoughts about economics, methodology, the dynamics of academia, and philosophy, amongst other things. All of which I have written about from the periphery; I like to think it’s a better vantage point than most. From 2023 I hope to start publishing there more frequently and on a wider range of topics under the broad banner of political economy.

Over the last two decades most of my writing has been for traditional outlets. I have written over 50 opinion pieces, mostly in South African newspapers or equivalent publications. I have also been an occasional columnist for Handelsblatt. These articles primarily concern public policy issues, broadly defined.

In the last few years I have published most of my pieces via The Conversation. Where my academic work might be of direct interest to the general public, I usually try to write a piece for The Conversation that summarises that work. The majority of my commentary pieces, however, have been concerned with more immediate public finance and public economics issues in South Africa. Many of these have been syndicated/republished elsewhere, with more than 800,000 online reads in total.

Earlier commentary on higher education for the Mail and Guardian can be found here.

I am in the process of compiling a list of all public commentary, including television and radio interviews: see the subpages from the Commentary dropdown menu. These subpages and lists will be updated as I go along. Where an article/comment relates to multiple headings it will be listed under each of them.

All commentary pieces are written in my individual capacity and not representing the views of any institution, unless explicitly stated otherwise.