Die gedigte handel onder meer oor 'n byna uitgestorwe plattelandse lewe met tradisionele gebruike en ambagte. Tog word dit haarskerp en klokhelder verwoord sodat ook die moderne stadsmens aanklank daarby kan vind. Maar hy skryf ewe meevoerend oor die stad (Kaapstad).

Daar is ook aktuele gedigte oor Suid-Afrikaanse toestande, tydlose verse oor die dood en prikkelende maar ook skreiende uitbeeldings van die liefde. Die verse het 'n eie, unieke klank en styl. Die minimalistiese woordgebruik is besonder suggestieryk en skep dikwels meerduidighede - betekeniseggo's wat naklinkend in die leser se kop bly draai.

Die beelde en klanke klou inderdaad aan jou soos knapsekêrels.

Gert Garries: ’n Baaisiekel-babelas word in 2002 by die KKNK opgevoer en gee vleis aan ’n karakter uit Etienne Leroux se roman Magersfontein, O Magersfontein! Die plaaswerker Gert Garries ry vir drie dae met die verbrande liggaam van sy kind op sy fiets rond. Hy wil ’n doodsertifikaat bekom, ’n voorvereiste voordat hy die kind kan begrawe. Weens sy velkleur word hy egter deur die burokrate van bakboord na stuurboord gestuur. Na sy ontmoeting met Le Grange, ’n empatiese verkeersbeampte, ontstaan ’n sonderlinge verhouding tussen hulle. Hierdie verhouding suggereer ’n beter toekoms en menslike identiteit vir Gert, terwyl die kind simbool word van ’n bitter en wrang verlede. Eindelik begrawe Gert sy kind saam met die room van die Engelse.

Die gehoor volg Gert Garries op sy drie dae lange fietsrit en beleef saam met hom ’n prutpot van emosies.

Die drama word gepubliseer in 2019 as Gert Garries: ‘n Baaisiekel-blues.

In Mei 2000 skryf die joernalis Chris Louw ’n ope brief aan Willem de Klerk waarin hy sy griewe lug teenoor die regering wat aan bewind was in die tyd van die Grensoorlog (ongeveer 1966–1989).

Chris Louw, oftewel “Boetman”, is ontnugter deur die patriargale leiding van die Afrikanermans van daardie tyd.

Pieter Fourie het Chris Louw se brief omskryf tot ’n drama waarin verskillende stemme en menings gehoor kan word, onder andere dié van ’n ma wat haar seun in die Grensoorlog verloor het, die joernalis Annesu de Vos wat met Chris Louw ’n debat op LitNet gevoer het en ’n swart aktivis.

Die toneelstuk ontgin nie net Andre Huguenet se lewe as mens en akteur tot met sy tragiese einde nie maar ook die ironiese spel tussen toneel en werklikheid. Ondanks die hoe eise wat hierdie tweekuns aan ’n dramaturg stel, bevestig Fourie opnuut sy vermoe om boeiende, menslike toneel te skep wat toeganklik is vir die gespesialiseerde sowel as die minder ingewyde teaterganger.

Naelstring belig die problematiek van transformasie in ’n nuwe Suid-Afrika en die soms fanatieke eise van swart bemagtiging. Die drama sentreer rondom ’n moeder wat weier om haar pasgebore baba se naelstring te knip. Die baba is egter nie bereid om die absurde situasie gelate te aanvaar nie en neem sy gehoor op ’n reis van swart komedie en deernisvolle maar pynlike interaksie. Pieter Fourie, dramaturg en dramaveteraan, is waarskynlik die enigste Suid-Afrikaanse kunstenaar wat diep spore as toneelspeler, regisseur, artistieke direkteur en skrywer getrap het. Met Naelstring deurbreek die bekroonde dramaturg Pieter Fourie opnuut die grense van sy oeuvre.

Die trauma van die "has been" ontsnap niemand nie. Die liggaam bly die gewildste prooi van tyd. Vir die hoogste bome wat die meeste wind vang, is dit dikwels pynliker en hierdie mense se opstand daarteen is pateties en vernederend. In Jasmyn word ’n vervalle ou skoonheidsikoon, Beulah, genadeloos belig vanuit ’n ongewone invalshoek: as prooi en as begenadigde. Die verstand wat in haar vervalle liggaam gehuisves word, is egter nog naaldskerp. ’n Onverwagte erflating deur ’n eertydse miljarderminnaar word die hoogtepunt en afloop van die drama. Beulah erf R40 miljoen, mits sy ’n minnaar werf wat ten minste 20 jaar haar junior is, ’n verjongingsprogram voltooi met riglyne rakende dieet, plastiese chirurgie, sielkundige berading, hormoonmanipulasie en nuut geskepte ikoonstatus. Laasgenoemde word moontlik gemaak deurdat die oorlede minnaar geld nalaat om ’n nuwe skoonheidseep, Beulah Jasmine, internasionaal vry te stel.

Drie hopies grond van drie grafte en die drie mense aan wie die grafte behoort: Vytjie, Basjan en Gulu. Elkeen moet vertel hoe hy of sy aan sy dood gekom het. Trien is die sameroeper van hierdie byeenkoms na die dood. Sy behartig die post mortem. Hoe het dit gebeur dat haar man, haar huiswerker en plaaswerker dood is? In hierdie drama deur Pieter Fourie moet Basjan, Vytjie en Gulu aan Trien vertel en demonstreer wat gelei het tot hul dood. Dit word duidelik dat Trien se pienk pilletjies haar blind gemaak het vir die dinge wat rondom haar gebeur ...

Boet Cronje is hardkoppig, arrogant en ontken dat sy bruin regterhand op die plaas eintlik sy halfbroer is. Maar met God as vennoot, 'n familieplaas en 'n erfgenaam lyk die toekoms vir Boet aanvanklik belowend. 'n Langdurige droogte en die dood van sy seun laat hom egter in opstand teen God kom. Die koggelaar vertel die verhaal van 'n man wat oortuig is dat God hom tart; ironies genoeg word hy die een wat koggel.

Deernisvol verken die digter in hierdie bundel ’n denkbeeldige gemeenskap met herkenbare karakters. Die gedigte verbeeld samehorigheid en verlies in ’n spektrum van komiese en dramatiese emosies. Polsend van liefde en die lewe, deurspek met legendes en mites, word die dorpie in sy tydlose volheid vertoon. Uiteindelik vind die leser in die karakters se universaliteit sy of haar eie kleurvolle menswees terug.

This book maps the emergence of health in global development discourse and governance since 1990. It argues that health norms have emerged, diffused, and subsequently become internalised through the various direct and indirect negotiation processes that created the global development goals. Covid-19, Ebola, and HIV/AIDS are prime illustrations of the fact that health is supremely political. Governments – whether they are local, national, international, or multilateral – make decisions about their policy responses, coordinate their response, and channel the necessary resources. Such decisions are informed by local and global conditions as well as sets of values, norms, and standards that determine policy and interventions. As states and regions become more interconnected, the politics of health are increasingly relevant to the sustainable future envisioned by global governance. This book explains how considerations of global health have come to inform and infuse the United Nations development agenda. It identifies processes, actors, institutions, and interactions in global health by analysing two related case studies: the Millennium Development Goals and the Sustainable Development Goals. Providing an overview of, and insights about, the context of global development thinking and practice, the subtleties of global health, and global health governance, this book is an innovative contribution to the literature. It is suitable for students and scholars of global health, development studies, and international relations.

The past decade has witnessed a significant increase in the construction of health as a security issue by national governments and multilateral organizations. This book provides the first critical, feminist analysis of the flesh-and-blood impacts of the securitization of health on different bodies, while broadening the scope of what we understand as global health security. It looks at how feminist perspectives on health and security can lead to different questions about health and in/security, problematizing some of the 'common sense' assumptions that underlie much of the discourse in this area. It considers the norms, ideologies, and vested interests that frame specific 'threats' to health and policy responses, while exposing how the current governance of the global economy shapes new threats to health. Some chapters focus on conflict, war and complex emergencies, while others move from a 'high political' focus to the domain of subtler and often insidious structural violence, illuminating the impacts of hegemonic masculinities and the neoliberal governance of the global economy on health and life chances. Highlighting the critical intersections across health, gender and security, this book is an important contribution to scholarship on health and security, global health, public health and gender studies.

This book analyses the first two years of South Africa's response to the COVID-19 epidemic, from its emergence in early 2020. Drawing on the perspectives of a range of public health experts, economists and other social scientists and development practitioners, the book argues that understanding this early response will be essential to moderate and improve future policy thinking around health governance and epidemic readiness. The book provides systemic analysis of not only the epidemiological progression of COVID-19 in South Africa, but also the socio-political factors that will be key in determining the future of the country as a whole: including health system challenges, socio-economic disparities and inequalities, and variable (often contradictory and tardy) policy responses. Overall, the book exposes Manichean thinking and the spurious policy dichotomies that pitch public health against human rights, economic recovery against viral vector control, and science against ideology, with lessons not just for South Africa, but also for elsewhere on the African continent, and beyond. This book will be perfect for researchers and practitioners across Public Health, Health Policy, and Global Health, as well as those with an interest in South African politics and development more generally.

Successive South African governments have had controversial views on HIV and AIDS which have led to allegations that South Africa is in a state of denial about the AIDS epidemic. This book attempts to determine the validity of such claims of government denial by formulating and testing a denial hypothesis. The hypothesis is contextualized with an overview of the South African epidemic as well as a review of allegations of government denial. It reveals possible political factors that may motivate policy-makers to resort to official denial and tentatively concludes with a confirmation of the allegations contained in the denial hypothesis. However, this is done within the broader notion that denial is inherently vague and couched in language (rarely in writing) and therefore difficult to test with certainty and as such this book's real value lies in the insights gained into the complex politics of denial. By exploring the dynamics of denial and denialism and applying this to the South African AIDS epidemic, this study provides a comprehensive analysis.

In 2013 and in 2014 respectively, the South African Association of Political Studies (SAAPS) and Politikon (the South African Journal of Political Studies) celebrate their 40th anniversary. Also, in April 2014 South Africa celebrates twenty years since the advent of the post-Apartheid democracy, and the birth of the 'rainbow nation'. This book provides a timely account of the birth and evolution of South African politics over the past four decades, but also of the study of Political Science and International Relations in this country. Fourteen political scientists contribute chapters to this volume, situating the study of politics within its global context and recounting the development of politics as a field of study at South African universities. The fourteen contributions evaluate the state of the discipline(s) and suggest conclusions that are surprising and in many instances unsettling, not only with regards to what and how politics is taught, but also how its study has variously gained and lost pertinence for South Africans' understanding of their own polity as well as its place in the world. The implications are uncomfortable, and pose interesting challenges for South African scholarship, pedagogy and national self-reflection. This book was published as a special issue of Politikon.

This book maps the emergence of health in global development discourse and governance since 1990. It argues that health norms have emerged, diffused, and subsequently become internalised through the various direct and indirect negotiation processes that created the global development goals. Covid-19, Ebola, and HIV/AIDS are prime illustrations of the fact that health is supremely political. Governments - whether they are local, national, international, or multilateral - make decisions about their policy responses, coordinate their response, and channel the necessary resources. Such decisions are informed by local and global conditions as well as sets of values, norms, and standards that determine policy and interventions. As states and regions become more interconnected, the politics of health are increasingly relevant to the sustainable future envisioned by global governance. This book explains how considerations of global health have come to inform and infuse the United Nations development agenda. It identifies processes, actors, institutions, and interactions in global health by analysing two related case studies: the Millennium Development Goals and the Sustainable Development Goals. Providing an overview of, and insights about, the context of global development thinking and practice, the subtleties of global health, and global health governance, this book is an innovative contribution to the literature. It is suitable for students and scholars of global health, development studies, and international relations.

The past decade has witnessed a significant increase in the construction of health as a security issue by national governments and multilateral organizations. This book provides the first critical, feminist analysis of the flesh-and-blood impacts of the securitization of health on different bodies, while broadening the scope of what we understand as global health security. It looks at how feminist perspectives on health and security can lead to different questions about health and in/security, problematizing some of the 'common sense' assumptions that underlie much of the discourse in this area. It considers the norms, ideologies, and vested interests that frame specific 'threats' to health and policy responses, while exposing how the current governance of the global economy shapes new threats to health. Some chapters focus on conflict, war and complex emergencies, while others move from a 'high political' focus to the domain of subtler and often insidious structural violence, illuminating the impacts of hegemonic masculinities and the neoliberal governance of the global economy on health and life chances. Highlighting the critical intersections across health, gender and security, this book is an important contribution to scholarship on health and security, global health, public health and gender studies.