Khadija Magardie
The legal profession, particularly its upper echelons, continues to be dominated by white men, says a recent report by the influential Johannesburg-based think-tank, the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS).
The report critically evaluates several areas within the justice sector in need of reform with particular focus on obstacles facing the implementation of the government’s “Justice for All” maxim. It forms part of a European Union-funded research project entitled Closing the gap between policy and implementation in South Africa.
Of its more striking findings is that representivity within the profession, in terms of race and gender, is “still a long way off”. The “pale male” domination of the legal profession has changed little since South Africa’s transition to democracy.
Describing the need for representivity of the judiciary, especially, as “all the more important in the light of its new political role in giving effect to the Constitution”, the report found that white men continue to dominate the magistracy, lower courts, high courts and Supreme Court of Appeal.
Using data provided by the Department of Justice, the CPS found white men are in the majority of both middle- and high-ranking legal positions.
In July last year white males constituted the majority of judges overall and the majority of regional magistrates. The only senior position where another race group outstripped white men was in the positions of chief magistrate where black males, by a slim margin, are in the majority.
White men also dominate the top positions of the national prosecuting authority, as chief state prosecutors and senior state prosecutors. Of the 95 senior state prosecutors, 39 are black. Black men and women, on the other hand, constitute the majority of junior state prosecutors.
Junior prosecutors are at the coal face of the justice system, yet are among the most inexperienced, overloaded and poorly paid judicial officers. In 1997 the average experience of prosecutors was three and a half years and, in the case of the Western Cape, six months.
The same skewed racial statistics are mirrored in nearly every other area of the legal profession. Advocacy, which has been criticised as elitist and overly collegian, takes a similar hammering in the report.
In July last year there were 71 white male state advocates, followed by 63 white females. Third in line were black males, with 36. By law, advocates are the only legal professionals allowed to appear in the upper courts. Although the law has been amended in recent times to give attorneys, in specified circumstances, right of appearance in the high courts, advocates continue to command the higher fees in many cases earning more than judges.
Advocates in South Africa are either affiliated to provincial Bar councils, falling under the umbrella body, the South African General Council of the Bar, or the Independent Advocates’ Association of South Africa. The CPS has found these organisations are also mostly run by white men.
According to the CPS report, “senior partners in law firms and counsel at the Bar are mostly white men”. By last year there were 13 398 registered attorneys in the country, but there are no available racial breakdowns of this figure.
Government has not done much to ensure representation. The report notes that last year there were 19 white male state law advisers, and seven black males, five black females and four white women.