How does a country shaped by anticolonial struggle become fertile ground for wealth concentration alongside enduring inequality? This is the paradox Mesrob Vartavarian dissects in Privileged Minorities.

How does a nation like South Africa, which should be striving to shake itself free of colonial and apartheid inequalities, enrich only select groups within the political and corporate spheres, leaving the majority working class behind?

Vartavarian argues that the rise of privileged minorities – small, exclusive groups that dominate political and economic life – parallels the development of successful anticolonial movements. Minorities in anticolonial movements have secured exclusive advantages, defined as benefits and protections, which have enabled material accumulation. Such advantages include land seizures, racialized labour systems, access to coercive institutions, favourable regulatory environments and targeted state expenditures. Though these mechanisms might have fostered overall economic growth, they disproportionately benefit select oligarchies and middle classes.

The book traces how distinct sociocultural groups in South Africa navigated and negotiated these advantages from the Dutch colonial era through the rise and decline of African National Congress rule. Rather than dismantling minority privilege, challenges from marginalised groups often served to reshape entrenched advantages by incorporating new actors into existing structures. These dynamics have produced composite systems of accumulation that sustained inequality. Through this historical
lens, Privileged Minorities offers a compelling framework for understanding how structural advantage persists and evolves, even in the wake of liberation.