Gopaul, KevinVan der Lingen, ElmaOosthuizen, Rudolph2025-06-112025-06-112025Kevin Gopaul, Elma van der Lingen & Rudolph Oosthuizen (2025) The South African Defence industry: A contemporary comparative analysis of its second tier nature, African Security Review, 34:2, 168-187, DOI: 10.1080/10246029.2024.2429392.1024-6029 (print)2154-0128 (online)10.1080/10246029.2024.2429392http://hdl.handle.net/2263/102763The South African Defence Industry has undergone several changes over the past decades, with the end of Apartheid seeing the industry transform itself from a practically self-sufficient one to a smaller one, embedded into foreign firms and achieving international success. However, the recent past has not been kind to the industry, and the calls for government support appear unheeded. By performing an extended literature review, this research attempts to determine whether the second-tier label given to the South African Defence Industry is accurate and if the nation’s changes have affected this categorisation. Further, by comparing its characteristics to those of similar nations’ and exploring African defence industries, it is effectively a contemporary examination of South Africa’s place in the international arms industry.en© 2024 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).South African Defence IndustryDefence industry categorisationSecond tier nationsMilitary spendingGlobalisationDefence innovationArticle