Zapiro: The Work of a Political Cartoonist in South Africa—Caricature, Complexity, and Comedy in a Climate of Contestation

• Published in: PS, political science & politics Vol. 40; no. 2; pp. 315 - 318
• Main Authors: Koelble, Thomas A., Robins, Steven L.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York, USA Cambridge University Press 01-04-2007
• Subjects: Activism; Cartoons; Communist parties; Debate; Females; Global Politics; Government corruption; HIV; Human immunodeficiency virus; Judges; Judicial corruption; Leadership; Liberation movements; Morality; Movement; Organized crime; Plaintiffs; Politics; Presidents; Rape; South Africa; SYMPOSIUM—GLOBAL POLITICS; Trials; Vice presidents; Women
• ISSN: 1049-0965; 1537-5935
• DOI: 10.1017/S1049096507070515

Jonathan Shapiro, better known as Zapiro, is South Africa's most
influential and widely published political cartoonist. His work is
featured in several national daily and weekly newspapers. His cartoons
have also appeared in international publications and he or his work has
been featured in everything from highbrow newspapers to the front page of
real estate advertisement magazines. A member of the anti-apartheid
movement in the 1980s, he exhibits a bias toward a progressive,
Left-liberal conception of what political life ought to be that sits
uncomfortably with the increasingly Africanist tonality pulsating through
the veins of South African political life. His work touches upon the
history of oppression, the reactions of those in and now out of power,
and, in more recent years, on the issues that arise from the
“underbelly” of the liberation movement. He has brutally
caricatured the foibles of liberation movements leaders, be it their AIDS
denial, individuals' cases of corruption, or the hypocrisy of ethnic
or racial mobilization in the context of the new, non-racial dispensation.
His particular wrath is reserved for African National Congress (ANC)
figures who have, in his view, defiled the principles of the liberation
movement. In the last two years, Zapiro has busied himself with a series
of cartoons about the trials and tribulations of the former deputy
president and leader of the ANC, Jacob Zuma.