John Daniel

Finningley 1956-1961

John Daniel passed away on 25 July 2014 in Durban after bravely fighting cancer.  He was a South African citizen and helds a BA (1964) in political science from the University of Natal, South Africa, and an MA and PhD (1975) in political science from the State University of New York at Buffalo. He has taught at universities in the United States, Swaziland, the Netherlands, and South Africa. He was active in student politics in South Africa and served two terms as president of the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS).

Dr. Daniel went into exile in 1968 and returned in 1991 to head the International Studies Unit at Rhodes University. In 1993, he assumed the chair (headship) in political science at the University of Durban-Westville. From 1997 to 1999, he was seconded to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) as a senior researcher responsible for documenting the South African state’s gross human rights violations outside South Africa. In 2001, he joined the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC), South Africa’s national social science council, as a researcher in governance and democracy and as the head of its publishing arm, the HSRC Press. From 2002 to 2006, he co-edited and contributed to four volumes in the HSRC’s State of the Nation series.

In recent years his writings have been primarily concerned with issues of transitional justice in South Africa and on the political economy of South African-African relations post-apartheid. In 2006, Dr. Daniel retired from the HSRC.