A major task of South Africa's new government in 1994 was to promote racial equity in the state education system. This paper evaluates progress toward this goal using three distinct concepts: equal treatment, equal educational opportunity, and educational adequacy. The authors find that the country has succeeded in establishing racial equity defined as equal treatment, primarily through race-blind policies for allocating state funds for schools. Progress measured by the other two criteria, however, has been constrained by the legacy of apartheid, including poor facilities and lack of human capacity in schools serving black students, and by policies such as school fees. The paper concludes with some thoughts on the future outlook. (Contains 2 tables and 2 figures.) [This paper was prepared for the special issue of "International Journal of Educational Development (IJED)" on "Education Policy and Practice in Post-Apartheid South Africa--Ten Years of Democratic Change." The ideas in this paper are developed more fully in the book, "Elusive Equity: Education Reform in Post-Apartheid South Africa" (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press: 2004)].