How Ruth First’s activist research can inspire anti-corruption advocacy in South Africa

As we celebrate Women’s Month during August in South Africa, Ruth First’s life and work remain a powerful reminder that research, when combined with political purpose and moral clarity, can become a weapon for justice.

Her intellectual activism was never detached from the realities of those on the margins of society. It was rooted in evidence gathered from a deep engagement with lived experience, starting with her fearless work as an investigative journalist exposing injustice and, afterwards, her rigorous academic studies examining grassroots conditions in Namibia and Mozambique. This combination of on-the-ground inquiry and critical analysis informed and influenced policy and practice.

More than 40 years after her assassination by the apartheid government, her approach to what authors of the recently published book Research and Activism: Ruth First and Activist Research, Saleem Badat and Vasu Reddy call “activist research,” offers vital lessons for confronting one of South Africa’s most corrosive contemporary crises, systemic corruption.

Today’s anti-corruption landscape is paradoxical. South Africa has a strong constitutional framework, independent oversight bodies, and a vocal civil society. Yet corruption scandals in procurement, public enterprises, and political party funding continue to erode public trust, drain resources, and entrench inequality.

The task for anti-corruption advocates is not simply to expose wrongdoing but to mobilise evidence, ideas, and communities in ways that shift both political will and public consciousness toward integrity. This is where First’s research ethos can serve as a guide.

One of the enduring concepts associated with her work in Mozambique’s Centre for African Studies (CEA) was “critical support”. First believed that research should align with the overarching objectives of a liberation project, but not become uncritical cheerleading. Support meant commitment to the cause. Criticality meant honest evaluation to strengthen impact.

In anti-corruption advocacy, this balance is equally relevant. Civil society organisations, investigative journalists, and policy advocates often work alongside government departments and political leaders who claim to share their goals. Proximity can create either complacency or self-censorship.

Drawing on First’s example, advocates should affirm progress where it exists while rigorously interrogating gaps and failures. The credibility of anti-corruption work depends on this ability to praise and criticise in equal measure, ensuring that advocacy does not drift into legitimising superficial reforms.

Equally important is her insistence that finding the right question matters more than finding the right answer. In Mozambique, this meant asking why agrarian policy prioritised state farms over small-scale agriculture, even when politically sensitive. In South Africa today, anti-corruption work often focuses on “who stole” rather than “why systems enable theft” and “how those systems can be dismantled.”

Scandal-driven responses tend to chase symptoms, while the structural enablers remain untouched, including political financing rules that incentivise patronage, procurement loopholes, weak whistleblower protection, and community disenfranchisement that allows corrupt networks to thrive. Asking the deeper, systemic questions can redirect advocacy toward reforms that change incentives and close avenues for abuse.

First also championed a collective approach to research, exemplified by the CEA’s Development Course, which brought together students, officials, and communities. Research was conducted not on people but with them, combining different experiences and forms of expertise.

In South Africa’s anti-corruption context, this could mean building investigative and monitoring collaborations that unite whistleblowers, journalists, honest officials, reform-minded business figures, and affected communities.

Corruption manifests differently across contexts, from municipal service delivery to national infrastructure projects, and understanding these variations requires multiple perspectives. Reports emerging from such collaborations, like those produced under First’s leadership, would be methodologically rigorous and politically actionable.

Her rejection of South African exceptionalism is another valuable lesson. First understood that national political economies are shaped by regional interconnections. Labour migration, trade flows, and shared infrastructure linked the fate of Mozambique to that of its neighbours. Corruption is rarely contained within borders. Cross-border illicit financial flows, procurement cartels operating across jurisdictions, and transnational organised crime demand a regional lens.

Anti-corruption advocacy that draws on her approach would foster partnerships across Southern Africa, sharing data, coordinating investigations, and jointly advocating for stronger asset recovery mechanisms.

First’s career also speaks to the balance between objectivity and political engagement. She rejected the pretence of value-free research, arguing instead for objectivity rooted in methodological rigour, transparency, and openness to challenge. In today’s political climate, where corruption allegations can be weaponised for factional battles, this insistence on credibility is crucial.

Advocacy that can demonstrate rigorous methodology and verifiable data stands a better chance of influencing both public opinion and policy. Maintaining this standard also means challenging false or unfounded claims, even when they come from allies, to protect the integrity of the anti-corruption cause.

Equally aware of the power dynamics that shape research relationships, First’s work often required navigating tensions between researchers, political actors, and communities. As the feminist activist scholar committed to socialism, Dr Asanda Benya, reminds us in Chapter 8 of Research and Activism: Ruth First and Activist Research, reflecting on similar dynamics today, class, positionality, and institutional privilege create both influence and blind spots.

Anti-corruption advocates, particularly those in well-resourced NGOs or academia, must recognise these realities and ensure that partnerships with grassroots actors are genuinely collaborative, with shared decision-making and benefits. Humility about the limits of reach and influence is essential. Dismantling entrenched systems is a collective, long-term effort.

Finally, First understood that political work is a long game and that endurance matters. She worked relentlessly but also valued rest, conversation, and joy as strategic resources for sustaining struggle. In the anti-corruption field, where burnout, threats, and disillusionment are real risks, this is more than a personal wellness issue – it is about movement resilience. Whistleblowers need protection and psychosocial support. Investigative teams need solidarity networks. Campaigns need to celebrate wins, however small, to keep morale alive.

Ruth First’s activist research was never just about producing knowledge. It was about shifting the terms of debate, empowering those on the frontlines, and insisting that truth-telling is a form of solidarity. In South Africa today, where corruption corrodes trust and undermines development, adopting her principles could reinvigorate advocacy.

Holding power to account with critical support, framing questions to address root causes, building collective and interdisciplinary platforms, integrating regional analysis, insisting on rigour without neutrality, acknowledging positionality, and sustaining the people in the fight are all part of this legacy.

The battle against corruption is not only legal and technical, but also political, cultural, and moral. It requires evidence that speaks to courts and commissions, communities and consciences. By fusing the rigour of research with the urgency of activism, anti-corruption advocates can honour Ruth First’s legacy and help shift South Africa toward a more accountable and just future.