Mdladlana was speaking at the 23rd Annual Labour Law Conference on the challenge of implementing labour laws -- "Justice on the Job".
"This challenge is further hardened by the fact that South Africa's democratic dispensation coincided with the phenomenon of globalisation, virtually dictating to the country what kind of policies we should adopt if we are to get the support of economically powerful forces," he said in his prepared speech.
"At that point, a developmental discourse was biased in favour of prioritising macro-economic stability, with a higher proportion of the budget channelled towards debt servicing.
"Our economy was characterised by poor growth, lower levels of investment, and slow levels of job creation," Mdladlana said.
If developmental challenges were not addressed by government, business and civil society, the country's democracy was at risk.
"There is no doubt that both the economic and institutional constraints were significant enough to derail the state's ability to meet the expectations of the people.
"Today's state of affairs, however, paints a very mixed picture of how we have fared in meeting the expectations of a democratic state," he said.
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