William M Gumede writes a blog on global politics for the Washington Post. He is on the faculties of the Graduate School of Public & Development Management, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg; and the Democracy & Diversity Institute, New School for Social Research, New York.

Until 2003, he was Deputy Editor of The Sowetan newspaper. Before, he was a founder and chairperson of the Media Institute of Southern Africa, in Johannesburg. He worked extensively in South Africa’s trade union and civic movement, including as a Communications Officer of the Congress of South African Trade Unions - the country’s largest trade union federation. He was a researcher and writer on the groundbreaking 2004 United Nations Human Development Report for South Africa, which measured the country’s human development progress since apartheid.

He is author of Thabo Mbeki and the Battle for the Soul of the ANC. The updated and international edition of the book was released in the US in October by Palgrave MacMillan. His forthcoming book, The Democracy Gap - Africa’s Wasted Years, Zed Books is released in April 2008.

He has won a number of awards, including the South African Courageous Journalism Award (1997), the Forum for Black Journalists’ Excellence in Business Journalism Award (2000); and the continental Diageo African Business Reporting Award (2007).