Who are these rights for?

The preamble to the Constitution asserts that the people of South Africa recognise the injustices of the past and are therefore committed to the attainment of social justice for all who live in the country.

The Constitution has been hailed as progressive. In a society that threatens to be quite conservative, our Constitution stands valiantly. Bold in its inclusiveness, it is coloured in liberal ideas and cloaked in transformation.

Praise for the Constitution extends beyond our borders. Harvard scholar Cass Sunstein called it the most admirable Constitution in the history of the world, and a US Supreme Court Justice hailed it as a “great piece of work that embraces basic human rights”.

The presumption would therefore be that