In What Have we Done? Helena Pohlandt-McCormick looks to South Africa's past for explanations of the shadows cast by patterns of division and racial oppression on the present.

For years before his release from prison in 1990, Nelson Mandela walked invisibly, accompanied by a prison guard, through the streets and suburbs of Cape Town, through shopping centres and cafes, and out further afield to Stellenbosch and the edges of the Great Karoo desert. Secret talks on transition from white rule had been underway since 1985 and officials needed him to become reacquainted with a country that had changed dramatically during his 26-year imprisonment.

The period since Mandela's release has been an extraordinary one for South Africa. This book penetrates conventional narratives to reveal the ambiguities and contradictions beneath the surface. Notwithstanding the cliches - land of contrasts, rainbow nation, crime capital of the world, miracle - South Africa reveals the fault lines, challenges and characteristics of a postcolonial, postmodern, globalized world.