Predicting a major political shockwave has been standard fare among South African pundits for some time. The sheer depth of the socio-economic crisis in the country, best encapsulated in a broad unemployment rate of 42%, made it something of a safe bet.

Recently that shockwave arrived, but in a form that was perhaps less expected. It’s trigger was not the increasing prices of necessities or the failing provision of basic services. Instead it was the jailing of former president Jacob Zuma, the man arguably most responsible for the parlous state of those services. It’s embodiment was not mass occupations or demonstrations against an indifferent government. Instead it was the widespread looting of shops and malls, tinctured by outbursts of ethnic violence and outright criminality. It was not civil society organizations or radical opposition parties that led the unrest, but a faction of the ruling party itself.

This has made it far harder to grasp the political meaning of these events and to anticipate their consequences. Amidst a flood of analysis and reporting, interpretations of the unrest, not least within the Left, continue to diverge sharply.

There is a general consensus that the unrest had these two main facets. On the one hand a seditious campaign waged by Zuma-aligned elements (henceforth Zupta) intended to sow instability. On the other, a more spontaneous attempt by desperate people with little or no connection to Zupta ,to secure food and basic necessities—a “bread riot.” But that consensus breaks down on the question of how to understand the interrelation of these facets and the relative importance of each in the overall arc of events, and thus how to characterize the episode as a whole. Most commentators have tended to strongly foreground one side or the other.

A widely circulated editorial published on July 12 on the South African website, New Frame (NF), put the emphasis firmly on the latter element. It argued that the influence of Zupta forces, beyond tossing the initial match, was marginal. Reports from NF’s journalists suggested that a substantial majority of those taking to the malls and streets had been driven there by desperation rather than any concern for Zuma. Consequently NF saw the unrest as infused with progressive potential and drew analogies to the bread riots that preceded revolutions in the Middle East and Europe. It saw some chance that they may evolve into a more overtly political mobilization, cohered around a clear set of demands, and even that middle class and other elements may join in on this.

Subsequent posts over the following days by NF editors, sounded a somewhat different note. By this stage, widespread reports of deliberate acts of sabotage targeting strategic infrastructure, as well as a flood of anecdotal evidence pointing to the intervention of well-organized groupings, appeared to show that Zupta forces were more than simply the pilot light for the unrest. Yet NF still drew a very strong distinction between its two facets, contending the acts of sabotage were an entirely “different phenomena” from the food riots and that the latter were “spontaneous … emerging from widespread desperation.”

Writing in Jacobin on July 15, the historian Ben Fogel bent the stick in the other direction. Although not denying that simple desperation was a motivation for many on the streets, he firmly denied that these events could be characterized as “bread riots.” Instead he saw them as a part of a deliberate political campaign with clear objectives. In contrast to NF, he emphasized the ethnic and xenophobic dimensions of the unrest. While the title of NF’s editorial announced somewhat loftily that the riots had “turned the wheel of history,” Fogel’s exuded pessimism, declaring there to be “no silver lining” to what had transpired.

These diverging interpretations seem to arise partly from a dispute over facts, specifically about what caused the unrest. New Frame sees it as having been a spontaneous outburst with distinct organized currents, Fogel sees it as having been orchestrated. Clearly, it was neither one nor the other. It could not possibly have been purely spontaneous because we know at the very least that there were active instigators. At the same time we know it had spontaneous elements; it drew in a great mass of people who were acting at their own behest and for their own objectives. The real question then is about the degrees of orchestration and spontaneity.

We are not yet in a position to know precisely what those were. But as more information is becoming available, it does seem to be pointing to a higher degree of orchestration than appeared to be the case at the start. Leaked WhatsApp messages testify to a very active role played by ANC counselors and other local leaders. They suggest that shopping malls were deliberately targeted because they constituted symbols of “white monopoly capital.” Anecdotal evidence points to the widespread busing in of looters and the involvement of well-resourced gangs in bussing out stolen goods. This also encompassed various harder to reach (and typically well-secured) targets, including warehouses, factories and shipping containers, some of which appear to have come under coordinated attack.

The geography of the uprising also suggests the importance of organized elements. If the unrest had been driven by people acting autonomously, based on a “demonstration effect,” we would have expected it to be quite diffused. Instead it seems to have remained concentrated in areas where Zupta elements have influence.

It now appears that many of the reports of attacks on water and communication facilities were false. But a number of other incidents, such as the burning of a chemical plant, attacks on transport and food infrastructure and the theft of ammunition depots, still indicate orchestrated subversion unfolding under the cover of the chaos.

Given all this, NF’s insistence that the two facets of the unrest should be seen as “distinct phenomena” is an odd one. Its point, it seems, is political rather than sociological. The intent, I think, is to ringfence the actions of the mass of rioters from those of the instigators in the name of preserving the former’s agency and progressive potentiality from the sordidness that started to overtake events as they progressed. Normatively that may be a valid move. But emphasizing distinction too strongly as we try to come to grips with the political meaning of these events is, in my view, a mistake for several reasons.

First, doing so once again imputes a degree of autonomy and spontaneity to the riots for which there simply isn’t justification. This isn’t solely a concern for historians or academics. Understanding the precise role of active legitimation and orchestration in driving people onto the streets may be important for many of the bigger conclusions we will draw from these events. It will have a large bearing, for example, on what we think the riots tell us about the political mood of working class people in the country more broadly, and of the likelihood of similar occurrences.

Second, the fact that the riots took place under the aegis of the “Free Zuma” campaign is not irrelevant to understanding the political impacts they will have, or the interpretive frames that will be applied to them by other social actors. I argue in some detail below that the overweening influence of the ANC on both sides of the contest inhibited the capacity of the riots to organically develop their own political direction as NF hoped.

A third issue pertains not so much to the drawing of rigid distinctions, but as to the way that this has facilitated an excessive focus on one side of the issue at the expense of the other. With notable exceptions, Left commentary has leaned heavily towards framing the unrest as a symptom of socioeconomic crisis while downplaying or ignoring its political causes. This might have been justified had the social dimension been otherwise overlooked or deliberately obscured, but, in fact, there is a striking degree of consensus in the public sphere about the importance of unemployment and inequality in explaining what happened.

In light of this, the unwillingness to give proper attention to the political forces behind mid-July’s events appears symptomatic of a widespread failure on the Left to take seriously the growing imperilment of our democracy. All too frequently Radical Economic Transformation (RET)/Zupta are seen as just another faction of the elite, embroiled in a fight with other elites which does not concern us. But as last week made all too clear, those forces are, in fact, a serious threat to the constitutional order and the Left should spare nothing in opposing them. Acknowledging that what happened was not just a bread riot but also a serious assault on democracy seems important in that regard.