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Johannesburg - South Africa is a society moulded by race, said Enoch Godongwana, head of the ANC's economic transformation policy committee, on Thursday.
"We need to address imbalance of the past," he said during a Black Management Forum debate in Johannesburg on affirmative action.
"Unless black South Africans feel part of this society there will not be stability."
Godongwana said it was because of the African National Congress's policies that there was an increase in the black middle-class.
Affirmative action was an important tool.
Godongwana was debating Democratic Alliance leader Helen Zille, Solidarity's deputy general secretary Dirk Hermann, and the BMF's deputy president Koko Khumalo.
Zille argued that the country needed to find mechanisms for inclusivity which did not entrench race issues permanently.
"We want people to be judged by their character not on the colour of their skin.
"We need to look at the biggest barriers of inclusion," she said.
The barriers included education and the slow rate of economic growth.
Zille said her party supported Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment Act but was opposed to race classification.
Hermann said affirmative action had failed.
"Affirmative action has failed... not only here but also globally," he said.
"We need a new social dialogue in South Africa on affirmative action with a view of a new national consensus."
Hermann said the country had radical ideas about race and minorities were being alienated.
