African Nationalism from Apartheid to Post-Apartheid South Africa : A critical analysis of ANC Party Political Discourse 9783838254982

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Ellen Wesemüller

African Nationalism from Apartheid to Post-Apartheid South Africa A Critical Analysis of ANC Party Political Discourse

Cover design by Andrea Vollmer Cover photograph by Ellen Wesemüller

Ellen Wesemüller

AFRICAN NATIONALISM FROM APARTHEID TO POST-APARTHEID SOUTH AFRICA A Critical Analysis of ANC Party Political Discourse

ibidem-Verlag Stuttgart

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ISBN-13: 978-3-8382-5-2 © ibidem-Verlag

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Contents Chapter 1: Introduction ................................................................................................. 9 1.1 Embracing the Enemy .......................................................................................... 9 1.2 Nationalism in the New South Africa ................................................................ 11 1.3 Nation as an "Imagined Community"................................................................. 13 1.4 "Rainbow Nation", African Renaissance, or Country of "two Nations"?.......... 14 1.5 The Research Design .......................................................................................... 15 Chapter 2: Nationalism – a Theoretical Perspective ................................................... 19 2.1 Primordialists versus Constructivists ................................................................. 20 2.1.1 Primordialism: Arguments and Critique ...................................................... 20 2.1.2 Constructivism: The Major Theories............................................................ 23 2.2 Different Types of Nationalism? ........................................................................ 31 2.2.1 Ethno-Symbolism and Ethno-Nationalism................................................... 31 2.2.2 Staats- and Kulturnation ............................................................................... 34 2.2.3 Nationalism or Patriotism? ........................................................................... 36 2.3 The African Perspective ..................................................................................... 39 2.3.1 History of Nationalist Thought in Africa ..................................................... 40 2.3.2 Categorisation............................................................................................... 42 2.3.3 Nationalism and other Forms of Identity in Africa ...................................... 45 2.4 Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 49 Chapter 3: ANC and African Nationalism – from Apartheid to the Present .............. 51 3.1 African Nationalism within the ANC before and during Apartheid .................. 52 3.1.1 Moderate Policies: the early Years of the ANC (1912 – 1943) ................... 52 3.1.2 Towards Africanism: Anton Lembede and the ANC Youth League (1944 – 1947) ...................................................................................................................... 57 3.1.3 Charterism: The ANC in the 1950s .............................................................. 63 3.1.4 Return to Africanism: the Formation of the Pan-Africanist Congress......... 68 3.1.5 Black Consciousness and United Democratic Front .................................... 71 3.2 Transition of ANC Nationalism in Post-Apartheid: Continuities and Change.. 74 3.2.1 The Rainbow Nation..................................................................................... 76 3.2.2 Thabo Mbeki: I am an African ..................................................................... 77 3.2.3 The African Renaissance .............................................................................. 79 3.2.4 South Africa: a Country of two Nations....................................................... 81 3.3 Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 81 5

Chapter 4: Analysis and Assessment of the Transition of African Nationalism ........ 83 4.1 Analysis of Nation Concepts in Post-Apartheid South Africa........................... 83 4.1.1 The African Renaissance .............................................................................. 83 4.1.2 "Two Nation"................................................................................................ 86 4.2 Non-Racialism or Racialism?............................................................................. 91 4.3 Political Implications.......................................................................................... 96 Chapter 5: Conclusion and Outlook .......................................................................... 105 References ................................................................................................................. 111

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Nkosi sikelel' iAfrika Maluphakanyisw' uphondo lwayo, Yizwa imithandazo yethu, Nkosi sikelela, thina lusapho lwayo. Morena boloka setjhaba sa heso, O fedise dintwa la matshwenyeho, O se boloke, O se boloke setjhaba sa heso, Setjhaba sa South Afrika – South Afrika. Uit die blou van onse hemel, Uit die diepte van ons see, Oor ons ewige gebergtes, Waar die kranse antwoord gee. Sounds the call to come together, And united we shall stand, Let us live and strive for freedom, In South Africa our land.1

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Prior to South Africa's first democratic elections in 1994, the country had two anthems – an official one, adopted by the apartheid regime, and an unofficial one, marking the fight against it. The apartheid anthem of South Africa was called Die Stem or The Call of South Africa. Written by CJ Langenhoven in May 1918, it was first sung publicly at the official hoisting of the national flag in Cape Town on 31st May 1928. In 1952 the English version was accepted for official use. On 2nd May 1957 the apartheid government declared Die Stem as the official national anthem. The unofficial anthem, Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika, was sung by the majority of the black population. Enoch Sontonga composed it in 1897. The first stanza is generally sung in Xhosa or Zulu, followed by the Sesotho version. Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika was popularised at concerts held in Johannesburg and became a well-known church hymn. Later, it was adopted as an anthem at political meetings. It was sung as an act of fighting and resisting apartheid. In the official anthem of the new South Africa, the two anthems merge into one.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

1.1 Embracing the Enemy On 15th April 2005 Thabo Mbeki, the president of South Africa and leader of the African National Congress (ANC), issued a "Letter of the President" to his fellow South Africans. He complimented those men and women of the New National Party (NNP) for having contributed "towards braking with a past that divided our country into two warring and implacably opposed factions, one white and the other black". The events of April 2005 "and all the April months that are yet to come" would demonstrate that "our people will come together to celebrate freedom for all, in a country they will build together into a winning nation" (Mbeki, 2005b). What had happened? Five days before, the NNP had decided on its dissolution. Eight of the NNP's nine Members of Parliament will join the ANC in September 2005, some of the former party members will be considered for the ANC's next election list. With this decision, the NNP has not only ceased to exist, ending the party's 91-year career. As the successor of apartheid's National Party it has also merged with its historical antagonist. In his letter, Mbeki answered the unavoidable question how the NNP could have virtually become the ANC by arguing that members of both parties "share common African roots and are tied to our country by an emotional bond". This would culminate in a commitment to a "shared patriotism" (Mbeki, 2005b). The events of April 2005 were less surprising than predictable as they marked the last stage of the NNP's merger with the ANC, a process that had started some time before. In November 2001, the NNP announced its new "cooperative" relationship with the ANC in form of a coalition in the province of Western Cape. The new coalition replaced the NNP's previous anti-ANC "Democratic Alliance" (DA) with the Democratic Party (DP) that had entered the political stage in June 2000. Already the breakup of the alliance had inspired some members of the NNP to cross the floors to the ANC. Examining the reasons for the breaking away from the Democratic Alliance, strategical considerations are the most cited and most obvious points of reference. Because the NNP was being threatened to become a non-entity on the political stage, many NNP politicians had changed their position from opposing the ANC towards having fewer principled objections to the ANC's performance in government than the 9

DP. However, the split had not only been about strategical measures, but also about political substance. In fact, the formally aligned parties had been characterised by quite different philosophies: the DP being "rooted in a liberal conception of individual citizenship", the NNP "based on community-centred notions of rights and obligations" (Lodge, 2002:158). Since 1996, the NNP had been giving itself an explicitly multicultural appearance, stressing the cultural rights of all South Africans, especially those of whites. Also since that time, the DP has addressed themes traditionally associated with the NNP, directed at a white constituency and not refraining from racist resentments. In important aspects the DP has therefore positioned itself to the right of the NNP (Bannach, 2004:17). As the differences of NNP and DP are outlined, the question of similarities between NNP and ANC political ideologies arises. As early as 2001, the ANC's electoral strategist, Peter Mokaba, announced that the NNP and the ANC "had much in common" as "African parties" and that former NNP voters would have a shorter distance to travel in joining the ranks of the ANC than adhere to the "liberal international" Democrats (The Star, 2001). Former Eastern Cape NNP provincial chairman Manie Schoeman emphasised his personal and ideological congruence by pointing out that "Afrikaner, brown and black nationalism can be reconciled" (Matisonn, 2001). The ANC-NNP coalition was characterised as being based on newly found common principles and shared beliefs. Statements of NNP politicians suggest that among these principles and beliefs was a discovery of a new South African "patriotism". Afrikaner (white/NNP) and African (black/ANC) nationalists jointly held this commitment opposing the "liberal universalism" of the DP (Van Vuuren, 2002:1). In South Africa's third democratic elections in April 2004, the NNP only gained 1.65 per cent of the votes, while the ANC won a two-thirds majority. Realising that the party had lost its traditional stock of voters and had been unable to establish itself as a "new" alternative to the ANC, the NNP approached the ANC even more. In July 2004, the NNP adopted the Freedom Charter of the ANC. While Bannach calls these developments an "irony of history" (Bannach, 2004:16), Mbeki characterised them as a powerful and moving statement about what our people are ready and willing to do, to translate into reality the perspective contained in the Freedom Charter and the National Constitution, that South Africa belongs to all who live in it, united in their diversity (Mbeki, 2005b).

Furthermore, the changes would stand for "the policy and process that drive our nation", as they would represent an important contribution "towards nation-building and 10

reconciliation" (Mbeki, 2005b). Also Marthinus van Schalwyk, Environmental Affairs and Tourism Minister in Mbeki's Cabinet and leader of the NNP, characterised the dissolution of his party as a "contribution to finally ending the division of the South African soul" enabling the NNP to "throw off the yoke of history" (in: Mail & Guardian, 2005). When NNP and ANC leaders celebrate these developments as an important contribution towards nation-building objectives, what is the problem?

1.2 Nationalism in the New South Africa Most obviously it seems striking that members of two political parties that vehemently opposed each other during apartheid now will simply be members of the ANC. The National Party, in 1994 renamed New National Party, had governed South Africa since 1948. It was bearer and perpetrator of the ideology of Afrikaner nationalism, legitimating the racist legislation and political practice that became known as "apartheid". Opposing white domination, the ANC was founded and, though never unified, criticised both – Afrikaner and African nationalism as undemocratic and racist ideologies. Interpretations regarding strategical considerations to dissolve, as well as the framing of the development as an act of reconciliation on behalf of both parties, seem important yet not entirely satisfying. As the statements on shared principles and common beliefs of both parties above suggest, also the question of a shared nationalism plays a prominent role. While much more research needs to be completed regarding the course of Afrikaner nationalism in post-apartheid South Africa, this study will focus on how politicians of the ruling party ANC (re) enter into a political discourse on African nationalism after the end of apartheid. In fact, debates about the dissolution of the NNP and its implications for ANC ideology, especially regarding its stances on nationalism, are part of a broader picture. In particular under the influence of Mbeki, there has been an increase in ANC party rhetoric concerning the issue of nationalism. The numerous (re) discoveries of a new South African nationalism by the ANC could be representative for a problematic development particularly if it implies an attempt to rehabilitate racial African nationalism in popular consciousness. The study therefore centres around three basic questions. The first question is: Has the ANC's political discourse on African nationalism changed from apartheid until today? And more specifically: Has the majority position moved from an inclusive, 11

non-racial, constitutional nationalism to an exclusive, racial or ethnically defined nationalism? Finally: What implications would a resurrection of nationalism, racial as well as non-racial, have for a newly democratic society, which until only a few years ago was officially racially divided? What qualifies these research questions as problems is that a (re) erection of nationalism poses a threat to the democratic development of contemporary South African society. Nationalism works in both ways: as an instrument of exclusion as well as inclusion. Whereas racial nationalism is often associated with strategies of exclusion, even "non-racial" nationalism has these capacities. Regardless of its racial or non-racial character, nationalism is an instrument that organises cohesion and consent in order to legitimise non-emancipatory politics. Evaluating these mechanisms, I will argue that nationalism creates communities that are exclusive. This exclusion creates discrimination and political incapacitation. I assume that the exclusive consequences of nationalism also apply to the new South Africa and that they pose a threat to the democratic development of contemporary society. Liberal intellectuals often point out that the victims of exclusion will be the former beneficiaries of apartheid and the minority in South Africa, namely whites and Afrikaner. However, much more relates to the assumption that the first victims of national superiority will be refugees or migrants from other parts of the continent, as it is already widely anticipated and documented (Lodge, 2002; Vale, 2003). Also, nationalist exclusion might turn out to manifest itself in feelings of superiority towards other countries of the continent. The revival of nationalism implies a second threat to democracy, this time located in the sphere of "internal" politics. Organising cohesion and consent, nationalism creates problems of: - legitimating non-emancipatory politics - discrediting the arguments of opponents and critics via the "unpatriotic claim" and racial ascriptions - creating conspiratorial enemies and historically identified villains and scapegoats The broad research aims of this investigation will therefore be to: 1) provide the study with an interpretative theoretical framework of nationalism

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2) place the study of post-apartheid African nationalism in its historical perspective by focusing on the major milestones of ANC nationalist discourse before and during apartheid 3) investigate the various dimensions of ANC party political discourse on African nationalism today 4) analyse the character, function and supporters of current discourses on African nationalism and evaluate its implications for the democratic development of South Africa

1.3 Nation as an "Imagined Community" I will be developing my discussion within the conceptual framework of the study of nationalism. The main theories in this field are those of the "primordialists" that stand against the "constructivists". The starting point of my research in relation to the literature in the field will be a focus on the models of nationalism from a "constructivist" point of view. The main thesis, that forms the basis for my subsequent argumentation, is that a nation is "an imagined political community" (Anderson, 1983:6) that is built on the "invention of tradition" (Hobsbawm, 1983:1). Furthermore, it will be argued that the development of national consciousness is strongly linked with economic and political modernisation, the development of capitalism and the modern nation state. Historically, two different models of nationalism can be found: "constitutional" and "ethnic" nationalism. Analytically, both nationalisms function as mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion. However, the specific groups of people these concepts include or exclude differ. While "constitutional" nationalism is characterised as being inclusive towards the inhabitants of a nation, "ethnic" nationalism is perceived to have exclusive consequences even within this political unit. The analysis will show whether categorising nationalism into these two models can be useful for the understanding of African nationalism in South Africa. Moreover, the study will examine how nationalism developed in an African context. Analytically, the study will establish if African nationalism can be evaluated in accordance to the tradition of constructivism. It will also ask whether the newly independent African nations followed the road of a "constitutional" nationalism or the path of an "ethnic" nationalism. Furthermore, it shall be examined whether national13

ism is not only a product of discourse but also one of material conditions. It is therefore important to look for the main advocates and beneficiaries of nationalism.

1.4 "Rainbow Nation", African Renaissance, or Country of "two Nations"? After the transformation of South Africa from a state of apartheid towards democracy, nationalism as an inherent part of political rhetoric has not vanished. This is also true for the ANC's nation-building concepts of the "rainbow nation" and the "African Renaissance" as well as the "two-nation" thesis. What constitutes this nationalism that derives from a consciousness of oppression? Where does it draw on historically derived images of African nationalism? Where is it "new"? Is it a non-racial nationalism that allows seeking alliances within the whole range of the political spectrum? Or does it also draw on racial sentiments in order to contain and secure an electorate that consists mainly of the black majority? Is it, as a third possibility, incoherent, inconsistent and ambiguous so that the ANC can adopt and apply it to fit arbitrary circumstances? If this is the case, what is its impact for post-apartheid South African society? Is it only "functional" or "instrumental" (Young, 1994:77)? Who are the profiteers and where do they find accommodation, either within the party or within other sectors of society? The hypothesis of this work is that the ANC, and especially its political vanguard spearheaded by president Mbeki, draws upon both, racial and non-racial nationalism, to secure its power and influence in South Africa as well as on the African continent. This development is embedded in a context of neo-liberal policies, in the political as well as in the economic sphere, which emerged to be the principle of ANC governance. Yet, an ideology cannot be upheld if it is constituted only upon the minority interests of political leaders. There must be profiteers outside the ANC, for example those who benefit from economic affirmative action programmes. A resurrected nationalism poses a threat to the emancipation and freedom of the South African society because it might turn out to be exclusive and because it might legitimate unequal and undemocratic structures.

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1.5 The Research Design Implicit in the focus of this investigation is the assumption that nationalism developed as a necessary component of modernity. As an ideology, it is historically linked to the development of the bourgeois society and the nation state. Political science is a science concerned with questions of power and ruler ship. The perspective of political science adopted in this study relates to the analysis of nationalist ideas and discourses and their transformation in a democratic society. Seen as an ideology, nationalism takes its role in promoting and supporting inequalities. As a means of justifying power-relations, nationalism is (still) a current phenomenon. It could be of great value to analyse how nationalism is transformed in party political discourse and set into practice in terms of legitimating politics in South Africa after apartheid. The research paradigm underlying this study includes elements from perspectives of discourse analysis and ideology critique. To understand the phenomenon of nationalism, the two methodological approaches have to be combined into an "ideologycritical discourse analysis" (Hirseland& Schneider, 2001). Ideology critique analyses the relationship between the thoughts of individuals and their specific and concrete situation in the society they live in, i.e. between their consciousness and its politicalsocial production. The aim of ideology critique is to dismantle and criticise this relationship enabling a critical consciousness. At the same time, discourse analysis allows for the fact that nationalism is not solely a product of the material or objective conditions of a society. The ideas and thoughts of people are much more an expression of a culturally specific "order of knowledge". This means that the analysis of an "objectified" world outside this order is not possible. In this regard, discourses form the entities that produce social subjects and their reality. Linked with ideology critique, a critical discourse analysis can help to lay open the structuring and transformation processes of the social world in and through discourses. The theoretical and methodological premises of a critical discourse analysis are therefore to contextualise and historicise discursive processes, to lay open their latency (i.e. that they eventually mean more than they say), to analyse the power that produces, structures, stabilises and transforms discourses, to make clear their fractures and counterparts and finally to criticise the ideological formations that manifest themselves practically. The methodological strategies will include an extensive literature review, primary and secondary analysis. This selection will provide the best range of sources to understand the persistence and transformation of nationalist discourse in post-apartheid 15

South Africa. This method of inquiry is especially appropriate in obtaining more information on the interests, perceptions and viewpoints of the protagonists of nationalism. The literature review gives an academic background and builds a theoretical framework for the study. The primary analysis covers the analysis of major documents and speeches written or held by rank and file politicians of the ANC. The secondary analysis includes the analysis of documents and speeches written or held by these politicians but collected and / or commented on by others. The first step of the research procedure was to obtain background information and historical data in order to develop an understanding of nationalism in post-apartheid South Africa from official records, newspaper articles and statements by politicians. The second step was to procure and examine all relevant documentation in order to investigate contemporary discourses on nationalism. The third step was to contact relevant recent sources (newspaper articles, articles in periodicals) to get an overview over current debates and discussions on party political discourses. Analytical qualitative procedures entail the generation of categories or patterns and the evaluation and testing of hypotheses against the data. The theoretical framework of this study, introduced in the second chapter, will develop categories of nationalist discourse that can be tested against the data throughout the further analysis. In this study, qualitative data will be presented in the form of quotes, labelled categories and verbal descriptions. Qualitative analysis emphasises the examination and interpretation of the discourses found for the purpose of discovering the underlying, deeper meanings of nationalist rhetoric in contemporary South Africa. The aim of the data interpretation is the emergence of a substantive contribution to the theory of nationalist discourse in South Africa that can be placed in a broader context of nationalism. My interpretation relates to the characteristics of nationalism and focuses on the transition and transformation of party political discourse on African nationalism in postapartheid South Africa. The chapter progression for the remainder of this study includes the following sections: Chapter 2 provides the study with a theoretical base for the interpretation of nationalism. Chapter 3 locates the topic in its historical perspective by focusing on the major milestones of African nationalism before and during apartheid in South Africa. It provides a general overview of the main arguments and changes in African nationalist ideology and investigates the various dimensions of contemporary party political discourse on African nationalism. Chapter 4 analyses African nationalism in ANC party political discourse and assesses its adoption to the 16

new circumstances. The chapter analyses different concepts of nationalism employed by the ANC and compares these models to those discussed in academic literature. Furthermore, it evaluates the function and supporters of African nationalism. Lastly, it gives an outlook on the political implications of a resurrected nationalism. Chapter 5 concludes on how the ANC discourse on nationalism can be situated in the framework of current discussion on nationalism and gives an outlook on anticipated developments of nationalism in post-apartheid South Africa.

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Chapter 2: Nationalism – a Theoretical Perspective Analytical qualitative procedures, such as the assessment of nationalist discourse in post-apartheid South Africa, entail the generation of categories or patterns. Categorising various forms of nationalist discourses will help to analyse African nationalism in its historical and present contexts. It will also facilitate the establishment of the hypothesis that currently the ANC draws upon non-racial and racial nationalism in order to secure its power and influence in South Africa as well as on the African continent. The theoretical framework of the study, introduced in this chapter, will therefore develop categories of nationalist discourse that can be tested against the available primary and secondary sources throughout the further analysis. In order to generate patterns and categories, which are able to capture discourses on African nationalism, it is first of all important to develop an understanding of what is meant by "nationalism". I will therefore be developing my discussion within the conceptual framework of the theories of nationalism. In a first step, the most influential theories that focus on the history and origins of nationalism will be introduced. The main schools of categorising nationalism are those of the "primordialists" that stand against the "constructivists". After briefly stating the arguments of the first group, I will then present the main advocates of "constructivism". Finally, I will draw conclusions in regard to which school of thought I will choose for my further analysis. In a second step, I will draw attention to theoretical defences of nationalism and the question whether nationalist discourse can be divided into different categories. This part will be especially important for the further analysis as it evaluates whether nationalism can be categorised according to a dichotomy principle of inclusion and exclusion. I will briefly state the arguments of either side and then decide whether these categories can be used for understanding African nationalism in apartheid and postapartheid South Africa. Because the main theories on nationalism were developed by intellectuals of the United States and Europe, it is important, in a third step, to shortly recall the history of academic thought of nationalism on the African continent. I will show that the approaches that look at developments of nationalism in Africa can also be divided into a "primordialist" and a "constructivist" school of thought. Additionally, a third perspective on nationalism, called "instrumentalism" (Young, 1994a:77) will be discussed. The relationship between nationalism and other forms of identities like class and race 19

will be evaluated. Finally, I will draw conclusions regarding the particularity of the South African perspective on African nationalism.

2.1 Primordialists versus Constructivists

2.1.1 Primordialism: Arguments and Critique The main representatives of the "primordialist" approach to the study of nationalism will be discussed in the following. Primordial is Latin for "the first order", existing at or from the beginning. Accordingly, the primordialists view national sentiments as deriving from an original source. Generally, these approaches can be divided into cultural primordialism (represented by Clifford Geertz and Frederik Barth), biological primordialism (Pierre van den Berghe) and liberal primordialism (Walker Connor). Cultural anthropologists like Geertz and Barth follow the pathway of primordiality by stressing the culture-creating disposition of human beings. Geertz argues that the "people's sense of self remains bound up in the gross actualities of blood, race, language, locality, religion or tradition" (Geertz, 1996:41).2 These primordial attachments or bonds are assumed givens of social existence that have coerciveness, a socalled "natural affinity". Geertz also links up to modernisation theory3 with his assumption that the First World is more likely to develop civil political communities than the Third World. The "new states" are still permanently threatened by the primordial attachments of their citizens and tend towards forming ethnic communities. The inherent coerciveness of primordial attachments determines political authority 2

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A first version of this essay is Geertz, C 1963: The integrative revolution. Primordial sentiments and civil politics in the new states. In: Geertz, C (Ed) 1963: Old societies and new states: the quest for modernity in Asia and Africa. New York: Free Press, 105-157. Modernisation theory was promoted by scholars within the liberal tradition mainly in the 1950s and early 1960s as the key to the development of the African continent. Following the arguments of economist Walt W. Rostow, it stresses that economically, all countries evolve through the same stages of growth, from agriculturally based societies to industrialised economies with urban areas. With reference to Max Weber and Talcot Parsons, modernisation theory argues that on a social level, "traditional" forms of thinking will be replaced by a more "modern" outlook through urbanisation, mass media, formal education and an industrialised working environment. Ethnic division, a common characteristic of African countries, would fade away. Politically, the key to development is the growth of political participation (see Schraeder, P 2000: African politics and society: a mosaic in transformation. New York: St Martin's Press, 24-26).

and the boundaries of a political unit. Geertz suggests a development through modernisation towards a more civilised world, where politics are, at least to a certain degree, liberated from primordial attachments. My critique is that Geertz uses the people's belief in "primordial attachments" as an analytical category to establish the origins of nationalism. He therefore equates subjective feelings with scientific analysis. The author also essentialises categories like blood, race, language and tradition and does not call into question when and why they came to be perceived as natural. In failing to provide the reader with a genealogy of these categories the author acts not only anti-historic but also anti-political: Questions concerning power and rule, on a political and economic level, are not taken into consideration. I also disagree with the modernising thesis. I think that "old states" are equally in need of legitimising the political unit and are no less playing the primordial card. In fact, modernisation processes and nationalist conflicts are not contradictory but two sides of the same coin. For Barth, ethnic categories are reflections of cultural differences. Even though they are not "objective", cultural contents of ethnic dichotomies can be seen in overt signals or signs (like clothing, language, housing and general style of life) and basic value orientations. These categories function as an "organisational vessel" that creates ethnic units through dichotomisation between insiders and outsiders. It is "the ethnic boundary that defines the group, not the cultural stuff that it encloses" (Barth, 1969:300). The author suggests on the one hand, that not culture, but demarcation mechanisms are at the centre of his analysis. He stresses that exchange with other cultures changes the cultural identity but not the boundaries. While I agree with this part of the analysis, I criticise that Barth does not provide another identity-forming mechanism other than culture. The term culture is not defined nor critically questioned. Where do the "characteristics" of a culture come from? What makes up the "characteristics" of culturally defined boundary? Although Barth pays lip service to a constructed approach of identity, his concept of culture nevertheless seems to represent an a priori assumption. This qualifies him as a cultural primordialist. Sociobiologists like Pierre van den Berghe argue that a selection of kin, often associated with the phenomenon of nationalism, becomes necessary because it is related to elemental instinctual urges of the species. All social organisms are biologically programmed to behave favourably to common ancestry because "altruistic investment in

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unrelated organisms is biologically wasted" (van den Berghe, 1996:57).4 This approach is unscientific because it assumes race as an analytical category. This is not only anti-historic because it fails to recognise the genealogy, i.e. the history of this term, but also empirically wrong. I reject this approach because it does not produce a scientific analytical tool to investigate the origins and history of nationalism. Walker Connor states that a nation is a psychological bond, the shared assumption of a common ancestry. A nation has "tangible" characteristics (size, religion, language, location) that are not the essence of the nation but contribute to its self-image (Connor, 1994:104). Connor assumes that ethno-nationalism is an increasingly important phenomenon because "intuitive bonds" towards an informal, unstructured group are much more powerful than the bond towards a formal, legal state. He therefore associates ethno-nationalism with the loyalty to a group, not a state. The incapacity of the state to redirect the "primary loyalty" of its citizens and transform ethno-nationalism into loyalty to the state is shown in Third World countries on a large scale, but also "old countries" are not immune. Connor's distinction between nation and state and the association of ethno-nationalism with loyalty towards the nation is a very useful distinction. Other authors that will be discussed later on distinguish between culturenation and the state-nation. Connor can be characterised as "liberal primordialist" because he rejects a primordial basis for nationalism. However, much like Barth, he does not specify in turn what kind of "intuitive" links generate a nation: It seems that nations define nations. This makes way for an interpretation of a seemingly indefinable (and therefore primordial) nature of nationalism. Jack Eller and Reed Coughlan formulate a major critique of the concept of primordialism. They claim that its theorists paint a picture of non-derived and socially unconstructed emotions that are of a coercive nature and cannot be analysed. The assumptions of primordialist sentiments are empirically and logically inappropriate to suit phenomena of nationalism. Altogether the authors reject this approach because of its "lack of empirical support and its inherent social passivity and antiintellectualism" (Coughlan& Eller, 1996:51). To summarise the primordial approach, three assumptions of primordialist sentiments can be distinguished: apriority, ineffability and affectivity. Apriority stands for the argument that primordial sentiments are biologically inherited and not a result of socialisation. Ineffability means that primor4

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A first version of this essay is Berghe, P van den 1978: Race and ethnicity. A sociobiological perspective. In: Ethnic and Racial Studies I, 401-411.

dial attachments cannot be described and are hence not analysable for sociologists. Affectivity stresses the emotional bonds between members of a group, in contrast to assumptions of instrumental strategies. Crawford Young appreciates that primordialism explains affectiveness and the passionate dimensions of nationalism that have the capacity to arouse fears, anxiety and insecurity. These would trigger off collective aggression, which cannot be explained through material interest only (Young, 1994a:79). Arguing with Eller and Coughlan, my impression is that an affective issue does not make it primordial. The emotion underlying it has a clear and analysable sociogenesis, which primordialists do not explain at all. Their only credit is that they point the finger at something that needs to be analysed further: the affectivity of nationalist attachments. In my opinion, the fact that modern individuals in large numbers are ready to die for a constructed ancestral community must be analysed with the help of social psychology, but not with methods of socio-biology. To examine the specific psychological conditions and processes will go beyond the scope of this study. However, I would like to point out that every analysis of nationalism would be incomplete without consideration of psychology and the study of the unconscious.5 In this context, Wolfram Stender analyses that the feeling of ethnic belonging and love for an ethnically perceived group corresponds to the hatred towards the alien. Ethnicity as a dominant social and political form of organisation should also be seen as a product of inescapable unconscious feelings and ambiguity (Stender, 2002:63). 2.1.2 Constructivism: The Major Theories The theory of nationalism made a decisive step forward in the early 1980s, when three intellectuals provided the discussion with a new focus: that of historical sociology. The label under which their theories became known is "modernism" or "constructivism". Its major contributors Ernest Gellner, Benedict Anderson and Eric Hobsbawm were supplemented by Anthony D. Smith who stands for the ethnosymbolist approach. I will introduce and criticise these approaches, say why I find them

5

For the further study of nationalism and psychoanalysis see Freud, S 1997: Zeitgemäßes über Krieg und Tod. 8th ed. In: Mitscherlich, A, Richards, A& Strachey, J (Eds): Sigmund Freud Studienausgabe. Fragen der Gesellschaft Ursprünge der Religion. Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 33-60.

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useful for the further analysis of African nationalism and finally apply them to the case of South Africa. Gellner's work Nations and Nationalism (1983) can be seen as one of the starting points of constructivist theory. It describes the rise of nationalism in Europe in the course of industrialisation, which generated the need of a culturally homogeneous group within a defined geographical territory. With a common education, norms and morals, members of the nation could then participate in modern society. Gellner's intellectual points of reference are Karl Marx and Emile Durkheim. For Gellner, nations are "a contingency, and not a universal necessity" (Gellner, 1983:6). Nations do not produce nationalism; rather, nationalism produces nations. Nationalism is seen as a political principle as well as a theory of political legitimacy. It requires that the political unit (the state) and national unit (the nation) are congruent. Nationalist sentiments or movements arise when there is a general feeling that this principle is violated. As an ideology, nationalism draws upon pre-existing images of culture, but transforms and uses them in a selective way (Gellner, 1983:55). Insofar, nationalist thought underlies "pervasive false consciousness": the nationalist myth inverts reality in that it "claims to defend folk culture while in fact it is forging a high [literate, specialised] culture; it claims to protect an old folk society while in fact helping to built up an anonymous mass society" (Gellner, 1983:124). As a phenomenon, nationalism owes its existence only to a very special set of circumstances: that of an industrialised, modern society. Therefore, its roots are not natural, but a necessity of existing conditions of modernity. One of Gellner's basic assumptions is that nationalism developed during the course of industrialisation. The economy of an industrialised society with its new division of labour and specialised workflow depends on social mobility and communication. This can only be achieved through a common high culture (e.g. the mass alphabetisation) that determines the relationship between individuals and their economic and social relations (e.g. the loyalty towards other sub-groups). This high culture can only be developed by a fairly monolithic, standardised educational system provided by a centralised state. A common, homogeneous culture becomes the identity-conferring and loyalty-producing part of the individual's education and formation. The shared, "national" culture represents the smallest common denominator of the nation (Gellner, 1983:142). The absolute distinction between traditional and modern societies that Gellner upholds is not sustainable in my point of view. As to protect himself against criticism 24

Gellner states that there was also cultural chauvinism in the agrarian world: but unlike in a modern society, this was an option, not a necessity. He also admits an occasional overlay of pre-industrial structures and national sentiments (Gellner, 1983:138). However, he still clings on to the division of tradition and modernity and follows up a very idealistic model of development that does not take into consideration different levels of industrialisation. His suggestion of a certain conformity in the development of industrialisation also resembles modernisation theory. As a result, Gellner does not elaborate on nationalist movements in pre-industrialised or not fully industrialised countries. This failure in the analysis is especially severe if one tries to test its applicability to African societies and nationalist movements under colonialism. My argument is firstly, that there are different stages of modernisation and industrialisation. Furthermore, traditional elements very often do not vanish but persist in new, modern structures. Lastly, this approach does not explain nationalist movements in pre-industrialised or not fully industrialised countries of the Third World. One answer to the problem of nationalism in pre-modern times could be that the term "nationalism" has been used to cover both, collective self-ascription and the doctrine of the state. While the first use can be analysed in many times and places, the second one is a modern phenomenon (Minogue, 2003:95). Others however argue that the loyalty to the state should be termed "patriotism", the loyalty to the nation "nationalism" (O'Leary, 2003:102). This discussion will be developed in the next chapter. In my view, Gellner's approach is also too functionalistic. Societies seem to be composed only of elements that fulfil a certain function. There seems to be no irrationality, no unconsciousness. The functionalist approach does not explain the passion generated by nationalism, the psychological, emotional side of its political agenda. Processes, which form identities and borders, are not discussed. Also, the approach is too structuralist: The individual actor is not important; important are only structural dispositions of a society like units and systems. There seems to be no subjectivity to nationalist sentiments: "Who said or wrote precisely what, doesn't matter much […] What matters is whether the conditions of life are such as to make the idea [of nationalism] seem compelling, rather than […] absurd." (Gellner, 1983:126). Lastly, Gellner does not critically question the "uniting culture", e.g. analyse it as a phenomenon of exclusion or inclusion as well as an instrument of power and rule. With O'Leary I would argue that political ideas on nationalism are important, but in some contexts they resonate more than in others. Modernisation and democratisation of the modern state facilitate the resonance of nationalism (O'Leary, 2003:103). 25

For the further analysis, various aspects of Gellner's theory are valuable. Firstly, nationalism arises out of the feeling that a nation has no state. This feeling does not arise out of natural instincts, but is a product of nationalist movements. Secondly, nationalism uses uniting images of history and culture in a selective and transformed way. Finally, nationalism arises in the context of a modern, industrialised society. Thus, nationalism has no traditional or primordial base but is a new phenomenon. Anderson's attempt to contextualise nationalism in the course of history is presented in his 1983 book Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. It is aimed at deconstructing national identity by characterising it as a unit that does not consist of a set of cultural givens, but is much more a problematic entity that has been created in modern times. This approach, like Gellner's, can be seen as a counter draft to primordialism. National identity in Anderson's concept is seen as a product of human agency, it is a creative social act. Anderson also recognises that cultural codes and speech become consciousness, but this identity is always subject to change, permanently transacting and redefining itself. In the first chapter, Anderson gives his definition of a nation: "In an anthropological spirit, then, I propose the following definition of the nation: it is an imagined political community – and imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign." (Anderson, 1983:5f) It is imagined because the members of a nation do not know each other, and therefore they have to imagine the community. Gellner makes a comparable point when he rules that nationalism is not the awakening of nations to self-consciousness: rather, it invents nations where they do not exist. Anderson criticises that Gellner assimilates "invention" to "fabrication" and "falsity", rather than to "imagining" and "creation". This evokes the impression that "true" communities exist. According to Anderson, all communities are imagined. Communities are to be distinguished, not by their falsity or genuineness, but by the style in which they are imagined. The nation is imagined as limited because no nation comprises the whole world but distinguishes itself towards other nations. It is imagined as sovereign because nationalism developed during the time of Enlightenment and Revolution, which destroyed divinely defined, hierarchical dynastic power structures and set in its place the sovereign state. This links up to Gellner's statement that nationalism strives for the congruency of nation and state. Finally, it is imagined as a community because, even though there is inequality and exploitation, members of a nation see themselves in terms of comradeship or fraternity.

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Historically, Anderson situates the development of nations at the end of the eighteenth century with its beginnings being as early as the fifteenth century. The cultural roots of nationalism lay in the decline of the belief that there is a sacred text (e.g. the bible) that irrevocably embodies truth. Changes in the religious community gave rise to the belief that nationalism was a secular solution to the question of continuity. This also led to the demotion of the sacred languages (e.g. Latin) and the growth of secular languages by the sixteenth century, which threatened old elites. Furthermore, nationalism was rooted in the decline of the belief that "society was naturally organised around and under high centres – monarchs who ruled under some form of cosmological (divine) dispensation" (Anderson, 1983:36). As stated above, these were the beginnings of the sovereign state. Lastly, the idea of a "homogeneous, empty time" developed in which "a sociological organism moving calendrically through [it] is a precise analogue of the idea of the nation, which also is conceived as a solid community moving steadily through history" (Anderson, 1983:26). Along with the above-mentioned historical changes that led the path to nationalism, print-capitalism facilitated the imagining of the nation. The expansion of the book market contributed to the vernacularisation of languages. Print languages created unified fields of communication, which enabled speakers of a diverse variety of languages to communicate with each other via print and paper. Consequently, these people became aware of the existence of the millions who shared their language, which gave rise to feelings of simultaneity and common identity. Print-capitalism also gave fixity to language creating a sense of antiquity. Finally, the notion of print capitalism gave dominance to a few selected languages for their printability: dialects that were close to print languages were more commonly used and became persistent through history (Anderson, 1983:44ff). Secularisation led to the "primordialisation" of culture, tradition, language and memory into excluded and exclusive identities. Forgetting a pre-national past resulted in a historicised essentialism of "identity" that was drawn upon by nationalism (Anderson, 2001:578). "Naturalisation" of "foreigners" was less and less possible. There are four phases of nationalism: With the French Revolution of 1789 and the disintegration of the colonies in America (1790 – 1830) the ideology of nationalism took off. The literacy nationalism in Europe and the beginnings of capitalism represent its second phase. Official nationalism (1890 – 1945) is characteristic for the third phase and the last wave of nationalism wiped through the world with the decolonisation in Africa and Asia. Due to Europe's imperialistic military power, capitalist pene27

tration, industrial civilisation and administrative as well as educational modernisation in the colonies, nationalism in Africa emerged for the same kinds of structural reasons as in the Americas and Europe (Anderson, 2001:576). The language of African nationalism was that of the colonised countries, its territorial reference was that of the administrative units of imperialism. Still, it has specific characteristics in that it took advantage of the new means of mass communication and mobilisation through centralised political parties, trade unions, peasant leagues, women's association etc. Resembling Gellner's approach, Anderson's theory also has shortcomings on the psychological side of nationalism. However, what is important for the further analysis is that nations are imagined communities (as the idea of a group among equals), imagined as both limited (therefore by definition exclusive) and sovereign (therefore striving towards a sovereign state). Secondly, there is no strict distinction between modernity and tradition. To the contrary, both form a relationship permitting the continuation of one in the other. Thirdly, nationalist points of reference like culture appear as "natural", due to amnesia of its genealogy. Fourthly, nationalism is situated in a context of economic as well as political, cultural and technological change. Fifthly, there are different phases of nationalism, the last one being the independence movements of the colonised world. Finally, African nationalism emerged for the same structural reasons as in Europe but had different historical points of reference and means of mobilisation. According to Stender, Anderson earns credits for pointing out that like the vanished religious systems, nationalism has the function of suggesting a sense of security and collective identity. But unlike religious communities nationalism is a modern form of thinking. Its distinctiveness does not derive from the fact that it produces imagined communities, but that it does so in a horizontal-secularised (abstract time, no language of truth, no holy dynasty) and historical (cosmology and history are not congruent) way (Stender, 2002:54f). Eric Hobsbawm, together with Terrence Ranger, edited The Invention of Tradition in 1983. This work is not primarily concerned with nationalism, but with ideas of common tradition and culture. Because these are exactly the points of reference of nationalist ideology, it complements the previous works on nationalism very well. Additionally in 1990, Hobsbawm published Nations and Nationalism since 1788. Programme, Myth and Reality, this time explicitly examining nationalism. Like Gellner, Hobsbawm argues that nations are facing a paradox: They claim to be antique while they are novel, and they claim to be natural while they are constructed (Hobsbawm, 1983:14). Nations and nationalism are among the most recent historical 28

inventions. The national phenomenon cannot be adequately investigated without attention to the appearance and establishment of traditions. At the centre of Hobsbawm's analysis is the thesis that traditions, which appear or claim to be old, are often quite recent in origin and sometimes invented. He introduces the term "invented traditions" to refer to those traditions, that are actually invented and those who's origins cannot be easily traced. Invented tradition means "a set of practices, normally governed by […] rules and of a ritual or symbolic nature, which seek to inculcate certain values and norms of behaviour by repetition, which automatically implies continuity with the past" (Hobsbawm, 1983:1). Traditions are invented by semi-fiction, forgery and the introduction of entirely new symbols in a process of formalisation and ritualization, characterised by reference to the past: "It is clear that plenty of political institutions, ideological movements and groups – not least in nationalism – were so unprecedented that even historic continuity had to be invented." (Hobsbawm, 1983:7). Myths and inventions are crucial for politics of identity especially in times of insecurity and change. Therefore, invented traditions occur more frequently when there is rapid transformation. Mainly, they serve three purposes: the creation of social cohesion, groups and communities, the establishment of institutions, status and authority and finally the socialisation of members of the community via common beliefs, behaviour and values. Because inequality and hierarchy characterise industrialised modern societies, the equality-promoting nationalism has to bridge that contradiction. It does so in fostering feelings of superiority among the elites without explicitly enforcing feelings of inferiority among the majority. In the past, this was done through smuggling in symbolic assent to a social organisation that is de facto characterised by hierarchical structures (like the British coronation ceremony), but more often, elites were assimilated to pre-bourgeois ruling authorities (like militarist / bureaucratic groups or the "moralised gentry"). Alternatively, reference to esoteric "traditions" fostered selfconfidence among groups like whites in the colonies (Hobsbawm, 1983:10). Ranger addresses the phenomenon of "invented traditions" in colonial Africa, which have decisive implications for the concept of African nationalism. Ranger states that both, black Africans and white settlers used European invented traditions as points of reference. While white settlers needed to define and justify their roles of superiority, invented traditions also offered Africans access into the colonial world (Ranger, 1983:227). It is important to keep in mind for the further analysis that invented traditions were not only means to secure the power of a small European elite but were also 29

used by Africans. Availing them of invented traditions, the colonised transformed and used these to serve their own purposes. In the 1890s in Kimberly, a town in South Africa where diamonds were discovered, petty bourgeois aspirations of mission educated Africans illustrated the creative use of these "invented traditions". Because the British liberal universe represented freedom and equality under the common law, property rights and entrepreneurship, Africans were eager to symbolise their citizenship of the Empire. With the help of invented traditions of Europe, they even outdid whites in their loyalty to the Crown and in supporting British sport (Ranger, 1983:238f). As hopes of equal treatment were disappointed, British nationalism transformed into African nationalism and posed a serious threat to colonial power. New states expressed their national sovereignty with national anthems, flags and rallies (Ranger, 1983:261). Georg Elwert contributes to this picture by stressing that in times of conflict around displacement and self-classification in colonial Africa, the colonised cited traditions, which were perceived as being very old, but were in fact elaborated very recently. Systems of division of labour, neighbourhood and ancestry were reinterpreted according to the European ideal of a nation and its history. Like in Europe, traditions were invented, often on the basis of colonial ethnology, but also resulting in political organisations opposing colonial rule (Elwert, 1994:174ff). To preclude misunderstandings of Hobsbawm's and Ranger's concept of "invented traditions" it is important to draw attention to two major points: Firstly, invented traditions are not based on pure fiction and imagery. Hobsbawm states that "only the minority of intolerant ideologies is based on simple lies or an invention" (Hobsbawm, 1994:49, translation E.W.). More often, facts and beliefs are imagined in a wrong chronological order. If traditions were fictional they could not have developed any noteworthy effect and influence among the majority population. Furthermore, only because traditions are invented they are not less effective or powerful. In fact, as nationalism shows, invented traditions produce highly affective bonds that people are willing to die for. In his work Nations and Nationalism, Hobsbawm does not supply the reader with an a priori definition of what constitutes a nation because in his view, objective (culture, language, ethnicity) and subjective criteria (consciousness, choice) are equally misleading (Hobsbawm, 1990:8). In his analysis, phenomena of nation and nationalism are situated in their social, historical and local dimension. Hobsbawm's basic five assumptions are that firstly, resembling Gellner, nationalism strives for the congruency 30

of the political and the national unit. Hobsbawm ads that this striving overrides all other public obligations. Secondly, again according to Gellner, the nation is no natural entity. Its concept belongs to a particular and historically recent period. It is nationalism produces states and nations. Thirdly, nationalism does not only possess a political dimension but is also an expression of a technical, administrative and economic development. Fourthly, in criticism of Gellner, nationalism is not only modernisation from above but also from below. Even though Hobsbawm admits that it is difficult to discover what implications nationalist action and propaganda have for "ordinary persons", he sees that ideologies of states and movements are not necessarily those of ordinary citizens. Furthermore, national identification does not preclude other forms of identity and is also subject to constant change and shift. Fifthly, national consciousness develops unevenly among social groupings and regions of a country and in historically different phases. The further analysis will draw on the assumption that nations claim to be natural and historically derived but are in fact constructed and recent. Nationalist ideologies draw upon an invented notion of history and tradition. Among other things, their task is to bridge the gap between an equality promoting theory and an unequal practice of the nation-state. In Africa, invented traditions that derived from Europe were also used by Africans and led to threats to colonial power in the form of African nationalism.

2.2 Different Types of Nationalism?

2.2.1 Ethno-Symbolism and Ethno-Nationalism Anthony D. Smith is also often quoted as being one of the most important theorists on nationalism. Even though Gellner was his doctoral thesis supervisor, Smith can neither be seen as a perpetuator of constructivist theory, nor is he a primordialist. Rather, he describes himself as "ethno-symbolist".6 His major work is The Ethnic Origins of 6

The term "ethno" itself seems to be unclear. Its inconsistency however makes out the attractiveness of the term: its emotional connotation suggests that ethnicity is something "natural" or real. Nnoli defines ethnicity as a quasi-natural phenomenon "associated with contact between cultural-linguistic communal groups within societies […] It is a phenomenon linked directly or indirectly to forms of affiliation and identification built around ties of real or putative kinship." (Nnoli, O 2001: Ethnicity. In: Krieger, J (Ed): The Oxford Companion to Politics of the world. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 265-267, here 265).

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Nations of 1986. I will introduce his theory briefly and, with the help of some of his critics, establish the value of his thesis for my further analysis. According to Smith, one of the key problems of the modernist perspective is its failure to account for the passions generated by nationalism. Why should so many have "fought and died" for their nation, when nationalism was only a tool created by its beneficiaries for the sole purpose of economic gain and cohesion? Smith argues that nationalism draws on the pre-existing history of the "group" and attempts to fashion this history into a sense of common identity and shared history. This is not to say that this history should be academically valid or cogent – indeed, Smith asserts, many nationalisms are based on historically flawed interpretations of past events and tend to mythologize small, inaccurate parts of their history. For Smith, nationalism does not imply that members of a "nation" should all be alike. They should only feel an intense bond of solidarity towards the nation and other members of the nation. A sense of nationalism can derive from any existing dominant ideology in a given locale. It builds on pre-existing kinship, religion and belief systems. Though it is a modern phenomenon, it builds on a basis. Smith distinguishes between nation and ethnie. What make out an ethnie are its collective name, its myth of common descent, its common history, its specific culture, and its connection through a common territory as well as a minimum of solidarity among its members. Ethnies develop and demise; they can also become a nation. Nations like ethnies have a common name, myths and historical memories, but unlike them, common mass culture, territory, economy as well as rights and duties of its members characterise nations. The distinction between nation and ethnie has its precedents. In 1908 Friedrich Meinecke already distinguished between Staatsnation as a self-determining political community and Kulturnation as a cultural community (Meinecke, 1908). Smith translates them into the "Western" or "civic" model of the nation, associated it with territorial nationalism, and into the "non-Western" or "ethnic" model of the nation, associated with ethnic nationalism. The characteristics of civic nationalism are that it is a territorial conception, that it is associated with the idea of patria (according to Smith a community of laws and institutions with a single political will), that it encounters a sense of legal equality and finally that it contains a common culture and civic ideology. One might add that this conception would follow an "open" or "inclusive" model of nationalism, as it would be tolerant towards immigrants that are willing to "integrate" themselves into the "common culture" and become "good" citizens. Ethnic na32

tionalism on the contrary is composed of an emphasis on presumed common descent, culture, custom and language as well as on popular mobilisation (as reference to the "will of the people" but unlike "Western" nationalism in its primordial, apolitical sense). This type would represent the "closed" or "exclusive" nationalism. Because of its emphasis on common descent, it would never be possible for immigrants to "integrate". However, as Smith states, all nationalisms contain ethnic and civic elements. Despite of this, the author also stresses positive elements of nationalism: […] its defence of minority culture; its rescue of 'lost' histories and literature; its cultural renascences; its resolution of 'identity crisis'; its legitimation of community and social solidarity; its inspiration to resist tyranny; its ideal of popular sovereignty and collective mobilization; even the motivation of selfsustaining economic growth. (Smith, 1991:18)

Smith's findings that nationalist sentiments are not primordial do not make him a constructivist. In fact, even liberal primordialists like Barth assert that what is important is not what is, but what people feel. Contrary to the concept of an "imagined community", Smith suggests a "core" of ethnicity, a material, which lays the basis for nationalist sentiments. But what exactly is this "common culture" or "common history" that – in his analysis – make out the character of a nation? The constructed nature of those "invented traditions" is not the concern of the author. He therefore cannot be regarded as a constructivist, but rather as an ethno-symbolist. Some intellectuals even prefer to call him a "moderate primordialists" (Stender, 2002:59) because of his efforts to re-establish a natural basis of national identity. Flaws in the analysis are also noticeable in Smith's differentiation between territorial and ethnic nationalism. Though he asserts that these models are nowhere to be seen in their ideal type, he elaborates on them very intensely to reinforce their validity. To me, the barriers of distinction that he draws between the two nationalisms seem more permeable. For example, a "common culture" is a feature of "civic" as well as "ethnic" nationalism. Furthermore, this dichotomous model might lead to the assumption that there is a "good" (open, inclusive) and a "bad" (closed, exclusive) nationalism. Finally, these notions combined with the adjectives "non-Western" and "Western" suggest a racist distinction in character between nationalisms of the centre and the periphery. Also problematic is that ethnic identity is mystified as the natural or quasi-natural historical basis for existing or pre-existing nations. Nationalism is seen as the political awakening of ethnic groups, nations as the product of this consciousness-forming process. Not only is this view expressed by ethno-symbolists like Smith but also by 33

biological primordialists like van den Berghe and "liberal" primordialists like Connor. The theory of "ethno-nationalism" therefore leaves doubt. Regarding original revolutionary nationalism, the dimension of ethnicity does not play a role (Hobsbawm, 1990; 1992); hence the thesis of "rediscovering one's nature" is doubtful. Today, there will be no nationalist movement that is not also ethnic, but historically and conceptually these are two different phenomena. I do not share Smith's assumption that national solidarity can entail positive elements. Its defence of national culture can actually lead to the exclusion of people, who are said to have a different culture (the victims being mainly immigrants); its legitimation of community and social solidarity can turn into national "solidarity", which excludes those who are not perceived as members (foreigners as well as political opponents). I also think it is important not to neglect that national identity exists. But that does not mean that one has to adopt a nationalist agenda. Quite the contrary, it demands the critical analysis of nationalist thought and movements and the disclosure of its mechanisms and functions. I will dedicate the next two subchapters to the further analysis of the two major problems arising from Smith's work, i.e. the distinction between different types of nationalism and the existence of a "good" nationalism. 2.2.2 Staats- and Kulturnation Even though they do not establish themselves in their ideal forms, the distinction between Staats- and Kulturnation might be useful as an analytical tool to distinguish different nationalisms. Many intellectuals agree on this. O'Leary for example draws a line between "liberal" nationalism and "cultural" or "ethnic" nationalism. Liberal nationalism, which was developed in the USA, Great Britain, France, Ireland and Latin America, entails the doctrine that the nation should be the source of political legitimacy. "Cultural" or "ethnic" nationalism emerged in central Europe (O'Leary, 2003:101). Stender distinguishes between constitutional nationalism, as seen in France, and Volks-nationalism,7 as seen in Germany (Stender, 2002:53). The former addresses the nation as a historical, political and democratic community, the latter promotes an understanding of the nation as a biological and territorial unit, a primordial blood-tied community with a shared past and future. Volks-nationalism is how7

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"Volk" is a German term, deriving from the nineteenth century, describing a unity of people by blood and common heritage.

ever not specifically German: it can be interpreted as the archetype of ethnonationalism. Like Volks-nationalism, ethnic nationalism promises equality and superiority at the same time. Also like Volks-nationalism, ethnic nationalism facilitates social anxiety. Both nationalisms have state-hostile tendencies and both do not regard the nation-state as point of reference, but a biological or cultural homogenous, prepolitical community. Therefore, ethno-nationalism is not a modern but a totalitarian ideology:8 It is the longing for a community without ambivalences, which can only be realised by methods of terrorism. Both, constitutional and Volks-nationalism, are products of capitalistic secularisation. Both have an ideological function, but their ideological structure is different. Volksnationalism consists of a pre-historic notion of culture and a pre-political sense of a people that constitute the nation. It resembles an exclusive nationalism (concerned with the integrity of a people), which stands against an inclusive nationalism (concerned with the sovereignty of a people) of constitutional nationalism. The Volksnationalism of imperialist times seems to transform itself into an ethno-nationalism of the global capitalistic era. Hobsbawm's thesis, which considers ethno-nationalism as the last stage of nations and nationalisms with transitional quality that will lead to their demise, is therefore not sustainable (Stender, 2002:64). Stender's division into Volks-nationalism and constitutional nationalism resembles Smith's model of "ethnic" and "civic" nationalism. Unlike Smith, Stender denies any "realness" to ethnic sentiments and places them in the context of capitalistic development and secularisation. Nor does he distinguish between a "Western" and a "nonWestern" model; in fact he assures that what Smith describes as ethnic nationalism has its roots in the Western world, namely Germany. Important for the further analysis is that historically, two different models of nationalism can be analysed. Deriving from the opposing concepts of Staats- and Kulturnation, these nationalisms can at best be termed constitutional and ethnic nationalism. Analytically, both nationalisms function as mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion, but the specific groups of people these concepts include or exclude differ. However, even in the historical analysis these distinctions resemble an ideal type. I think that in reality the two models often mix and claims of primordial bonds as well as constitu8

For further insight into totalitarian ideology see Arendt, H 1951: The origins of totalitarianism. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 468-475. The process that Arendt describes for

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tionalism can be found in both nationalisms. Differentiating nationalism also entails the danger of suggesting that constitutional nationalism is immune against racism. Common to both nationalisms is that they are a product of capitalist secularisation and fulfil an ideological function. It is important for me to stress that there are different kinds of nationalisms, and that I strongly object the notion that all nationalisms are the same. Similarly, not all nationalisms will eventually lead to racism and destruction. However, all nationalisms arise out of a common context that is, as shown above, the context of modernisation, industrialisation and globalised capitalistic economy. Nationalism as a political ideology arises out of these special circumstances, not as a perfidy of a conspirational capitalist class, but formulated, articulated and borne by individuals, intellectuals, workers, politicians and others to serve their means. 2.2.3 Nationalism or Patriotism? The question whether a distinction can be made between different types of nationalisms – and whether one model is more likely to be identified with positive or less negative impacts on societies than the other – also raises the issue of defences of nationalism. To sustain their point, supporters of "constitutional" nationalism often link it to the concept of "patriotism". The authors discussed above make different statements towards this issue. Gellner does not draw a distinction between nationalism and patriotism. Anderson stresses that nationalism does not only provoke hate but also love for one's fatherland: this amor patriae is known as patriotism (Anderson, 1983:142). With this interpretation he includes patriotism as one phenomenon or outcome of nationalism and not as something distinct from it. Hobsbawm does not distinguish between nationalism and patriotism, either. He states that patriotism, much like nationalism, is an invented practice that is very unspecific as to the nature of the values, which it encounters. However, the practices symbolising patriotism are virtually compulsory, like saluting the flag or singing the national anthem (Hobsbawm, 1983:10f). He also states that analysts and defenders of nationalism can never be identical because "nationalism requires too much belief in what is patently not so" (Hobsbawm, 1990:12). The only analyst who tries to distinguish nationalisms into two clear-cut categories is Smith, as the Volks-nationalism in Germany in the nineteenth and twentieth century finds various equivalents in the twenty-first century.

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shown above. He is also the only analyst who tries to emphasise the positive impacts of nationalism (Smith, 1991:11f, 17f). Even though the major theorists discussed above already touched on the question of "good" and "bad" nationalism, I will enrich this discussion further with some analysts that especially addressed this issue. The first interpreters of nationalism – among them Hans Kohn – in their historical and philosophical analysis saw nationalism at the heart of repeated crises and wars in Europe (Kohn, 1943; 1975). Others drew a distinction between the aggressive and destructive nationalism of Europe and the liberating nationalism of the Third World (Emerson, 1960). The latter also included African nationalism that developed under apartheid in South Africa. "Liberation" nationalism evoked international solidarity and represented legitimacy for many because it developed out of and fought against a racist system. In later analyses, the findings seem reversed: With a few exceptions, First World countries seem to have come from a "hot" to a "cold" nationalism, whereas in Third World countries nationalism, especially of the ethnic type, seems to generate bloody conflicts. Even though it carries the historical legacies of colonialism and apartheid, the new South Africa seems to have replaced "hot" by "cold" nationalism. Two examples of this approach will be illustrated regarding David Archard's Defence of Nationalism (1995) and Margaret Moore's Normative Justifications for Liberal Nationalism (2001). Archard does not deny the myths that nationalism plays with, but states that there could be something valuable to it. Firstly, he argues, myths of nationalism, like the belief in common characteristics, always have a grain of truth in them. Besides, there are actually objective characteristics like race, language and territory. Secondly, myths can "enlighten by simplifying, dramatising, synthesising and suggesting what is the case" (Archard, 1995:477). They are also stimulating because the imagination of a past suggests motivation for behaviour in the present. My critique is that this approach, much like Smith's, does not deny the mythical character of a nation but at the same time assures that there is some "foundation" to it. To substantiate his point, Archard uses primordial categories to characterise a nation. The postulate of positive impacts of nationalism remains weak because the author hides behind rather unspecific terms like "enlighten" or "stimulate". It seems to me rather abstract to claim that national myths inspire towards a positive behaviour, regardless of their content. They can also inspire towards a behaviour that is determined by feelings of superiority and divine mission to enforce domination. Even without determining their

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specific content, I think that historical myths cannot by definition enlighten those, who believe in it. Moore outlines a normative defence of nationalism, that links shared nationality with liberal values and democracy. From her point of view, shared national identity facilitates democratic governance. Representation and participation through "relations of trust" generate a "vertical dialogue" (Moore, 2001:8). Nationalisms of just states should be supported while nationalisms that endorse illiberal practices or unjust regimes should be seen as illegitimate. The phenomenon of "relations of trust" is also enclosed in Anderson's theory of nationalism. He explains it as an outcome of the idea of simultaneity: reading the newspaper, and imagining that millions do the same, people generate the idea of same knowledge at the same time which then again produces faith in unknown people's actions. However, the fact that there are limits to these "relations of trust", i.e. the need to define who belongs to the nation, is not disclosed by Moore. In doing so, she suggests that nationalism is solely an inclusive phenomenon that generates love, trust, tolerance and dialogue. On the contrary, I think that nationalism is also characterised by its exclusiveness and that the definition of who does not belong to the nation, not primarily as a matter of citizenship of the state, but also as a member of a national community, will lead to undemocratic practices. This is especially true concerning immigrants and refugees but also political adversaries. Moore's approach also lacks political and economic analysis, as it does not touch on the question of origins and functions of nationalism. In regard to the question of "good" nationalism and its association with patriotism, it is interesting to evaluate Michael Billig's work Banal Nationalism (1995). Billig uses the term "banal nationalism" to reveal the ideological habits of Western nations used to reproduce their identities. He claims that in the common use of the term nationalism, a distinction is made between countries of the periphery that are nationalistic, and countries of the core, that are "only" patriotic. Nationalism is widely seen as an irrational force, therefore it has to be projected into the outer other. This leads to a perception, where only "others" are nationalist. In contrast to this perception, Billig suggests to term nationalism that occurs within a crisis and is often associated with violence, "hot" nationalism and to replace the term patriotism with "banal" nationalism. In relation to Hobsbawm, Billig describes how, through routine, the daily reproduction of the history of nationalism is forgotten. The term "banal" refers to this reproduction of beliefs, assumptions, habits, representations and practices in an ordinary, 38

everyday world. "Banal" does not mean benign or harmless: it is also linked to military armament and triggers off wars. The common feature of all nationalist identities is their embodiment in all habits of social life, not only in times of crises. Additionally, the aura of nationhood always operates within the contexts of power. Nationalism – as a political discourse as well as an ideology – has the function "to make any social world appear to those, who inhabit it, as natural world" (Billig, 1995:37). In answering Connor, who states that nationalism and patriotism should not be confused, Billig replies that the distinction into an irrational, fanatical, instinct nationalism and a rational, value-possessing patriotism uses the language of psychology without providing psychological evidence for the distinction (Billig, 1995:56). To back the distinction with quantitative research is in fact very hard: the "objective" difference between patriotism and nationalism might not reveal a reality, but the readiness of the respondents to claim such a difference. Billig's analysis lacks the elaboration on the functions and profiteers of nationalism. The only threat nationalism seems to pose to the world is located in the international sphere in form of bloody conflicts and wars. In fact, there are multiple layers of interest groups, not only in the political, but also in the economic and social sphere, that profit and promote nationalism. Furthermore, nationalism also leads to exclusion within states between people that consider themselves part of the nation and those who should be excluded. Useful elements of Billig's analysis are that patriotism is "banal" nationalism – therefore not distinct from it. It is no less produced, no less dangerous, no less embodied in all habits of social life and no less aligned with power. The differentiation is a result of an intellectual amnesia that forgets the conditions of production of nationalism. It cannot be proofed psychologically or through qualitative research.

2.3 The African Perspective Although the theorists considered above draw upon the special conditions under which nationalism arose in colonised countries, their main focus rests on the analysis of nationalism in the Western world. Before analysing South African nationalism it is therefore valuable to shortly recall the history of African nationalism. I will introduce some approaches that captured and categorised African nationalism. Furthermore, I

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will evaluate the relationship between African nationalism and other forms of identity like class and race, already taking into consideration South African experiences. 2.3.1 History of Nationalist Thought in Africa Evolving modes of African national consciousness and ideology can be illustrated according to a good overview given by Crawford Young (1994a). When the idea of nationalism came up in Africa in the early 20th century, there was much more emphasis on its political agenda than on elevating a political theory of nationalism. In academic literature, anti-colonial resistance was therefore not always considered as nationalism. Hailey for example, a central figure in colonial political thought in Britain, insisted that anti-colonial sentiments should not be termed "nationalism". Rather, "Africanism" was the driving idea behind anti-colonial agitation (Young, 1994a:62). Additionally, the territorial demarcation of a liberated Africa was far from clear. Very often, the negative "other" (the colonialist) was more outspoken than the boundaries of a future nation. One of the results evoked by the lacking clear-cut definition of the boundaries was the expression of African nationalist thought, even as early as 1945,9 within the framework of "Pan-Africanism". Nationalism as a form of protest developed into a distinctive ideology when, in accordance to Gellner's definition, the idea became prominent that the national unit (the nation) and the political unit (the state) should be congruent. Thomas Hodkin, in his concept of African nationalism, states that the evolving nationalism identified the nation as the given colonial territory but at the same time generated the demand that the subjects of this territory have the right to rule themselves (Hodkin, 1961). A "national liberation movement" was supported to mobilise the masses and defeat the colonial subjugation as well as the inner enemies of tribalism and feudalism. It is interesting to note that many scholars in African political thought during that time formed a close symbiosis with the political leaders of the national liberation movements (e.g. Coleman, Hodkin, Apter, Wallerstein, Schachter-Morgenthau, 9

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Unlike earlier Pan-Africanist congresses, representatives from Great Britain’s African colonies who anticipated decolonisation and self-government dominated the Manchester conference of 1945. The conference denounced the artificiality and illegitimacy of the territorial partition of the colonial domain. It also passed a resolution criticising the discriminatory policies of the South African government, but neither did South Africa play a major role in the postwar movement nor did the deliberations of the conference attract much attention in South Af-

Davidson). These social scientists believed that nationalism was the essential ideology of a modern elite revolting against the colonisers on the one hand and the traditional chiefs on the other. The result was that nationalism in Africa was constituted "in the symbiosis between its practitioners and its scholars, as a triumphant discourse of political decolonization" (Young, 1994a:66). Soon, nationalism developed into a paradigm. The essential factor of political change was seen in the nationalist thought and its vehicle was represented in the political party. In the course of decolonisation, Frantz Fanon sophisticated nationalist ideology most significantly in his work The Wretched of the Earth (1963) in which he warns of the "pitfalls" of national consciousness. His concern is that a petty bourgeoisie, which unlike the bourgeoisie in First World countries has no power to fulfil its historical role as an agent of development, will annex the benefits of independence. The bankruptcy of the national bourgeoisie cannot only be found in the economic and institutional sphere: also in an ideological sphere, the national bourgeoisie is incapable of extending its vision of the world sufficiently and bring about national unity. The narrow nationalism of the national bourgeoisie leads to its incapability of providing a programme with humanist content. In particular, the national bourgeoisie takes a racist turn: "From nationalism we have passed to ultra-nationalism, to chauvinism and finally racism" (Fanon, 1963:125). Due to its lack of confidence and strength in all spheres, the racist doctrines of the national bourgeoisie have to be seen as racism of defence against its own demise. Therefore, Fanon argues that in Third World countries the bourgeois phase is a completely useless phase that should be skipped altogether. On the level of ideology, a new programme has to be developed that would have to consider the economic sphere (i.e. the distribution of wealth and social relations) and the idea of humanity. Nationalism made the people rise against the oppressors, created unity and prevented tribalism but after independence it stops short. A rapid step must therefore be taken to deepen national consciousness with political and social consciousness, otherwise national consciousness becomes an "empty shell". One of the later and most elaborate critics of nationalism was Amilcar Cabral who warned of the deepening gap between the political elite and civil society in the decolonised African states (Cabral, 1969). As nationalism developed into a doctrine of the African nation-state it lost its appeal as an icon of liberation. The essential mis-

rica (see Frederickson, G 1995: Black liberation. A comparative history of Black ideologies in the United States and South Africa. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 278).

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sion of nationalism became "to legitimate state power and those that exercised it" (Young, 1994a:69). Nationalism therefore disconnected from its liberating intentions and developed into an ideological legitimation of domination and inequality. Even some of the former propagandists of nationalism now became their greatest critics. Basil Davidson for example claimed that nationalism "has become a lifeless shell of bureaucratic or personal tyranny, corruption and defeat" (quoted in Young, 1994a:69). The main argument was that nationalism had become "alienated" from its history and from the people. At the same time, the notion of an African heritage was in the centre of the theory of négritude (Césaire, 1956) and the reinterpretation of African history (Diop, 1962). 2.3.2 Categorisation The first period of studies on nationalism in an African context was characterised by interpretations that Young calls "instrumentalist". This period was followed by theories on nationalism according to "primordialism" and "constructivism", in which African scholars drew on the approaches of Gellner, Anderson, Hobsbawm and Smith. Gellner's definition of a nation as a „contingency, not a universal necessity“ and Anderson’s „imagined community“ also holds for Africa. The main protagonists of the theory of "instrumentalism" are Nelson Kasfir, Robert Melson, Howard Wolpe, Crawford Young and Joseph Rothchild. Elaborating on the argument of Coleman, ethnicity is seen as a "weapon in political combat and social competition" (Young, 1994a:77). Ethnicity is contingent, situational, and circumstantial and represents one available identity in the repertoire of many social roles, which can be mobilised whenever it is of advantage. The instrumentalist school achieved a substantial audience because its focus on the material sources of identity politics was compatible with other paradigms in political science, namely neo-Marxism10 and ra10

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Neo-Marxism developed in the 1970s and 1980s as a critique to previous approaches within the critical tradition, most prominently dependency theory and circulationist approaches. Firstly, the representatives of the neo-Marxist approach disagreed that the expansion of capitalism had a permanent regressive effect on Africa; rather, it was seen as one developmental stage on the way towards socialism. Secondly, they assumed that African countries could achieve dependent development within the capitalist world system. Thirdly and most importantly, the scholars applied class analysis to explain the historical evolution of African politics and society especially concentrating on the bureaucratic, commercial and petty bourgeoisie as well as the development of a state elite (see Schraeder, P 2000: African politics and society. A mosaic in transformation. New York: St Martin's Press, 43-62).

tional-choice-theory. For neo-Marxists, the centrality of class could be affirmed. Ethnicity was seen as a form of consciousness, if not false, at least not fundamental, available for manipulation by petty bourgeois politicians pursuing class interest. For rational-choice theorists it was compelling to regard ethnicity as a tool to position people against each other, according to their ethnic identities, to pursue other interests. For me, instrumentalism seems to be little more than an explanation of the concrete use of nationalist ideology and the knowledge of its meaning. It cannot be regarded as a separate category, like primordialism or constructivism, nor does it represent a sub-category of one of them. It seems to me that the different levels of theory and practice are being mixed here. Apart from different paradigms in the study of nationalism in an African context, the question of different types of nationalism arises. I will firstly consider the value of the model of Staats- and Kulturnation in an African context before examining the applicability of the concept of "ethno-nationalism" more closely. Benyamin Neuberger stresses that the African view on the relation between nation and state is very much in accordance with classic nationalist thought of nineteenth-century Europe. Deriving out of a colonial legacy, African states were often regarded as states without nations. Most African leaders therefore promoted a development that sought for a congruence of political and national unit. In their majority, African leaders therefore followed the Staatsnation concept, i.e. the achievement of a nation-state "from state to nation" (Neuberger, 1994:235). However, politicians developed quite different approaches in legitimising nationalism. Some politicians used universal humanistic reasoning to justify the concept of nations. In 1960 Mamadou Dia, Senegalese politician and publisher, wrote in Nations africaines et solidarité mondiale: The concept of 'African nations' finds a justification in theory and praxis […] what is primarily important is the consciousness to exist, the will to be born, to participate in the growth of the world and demand justice among the nations. This is the meaning of the revolution, that takes place before our eyes and that withdraws the initiative from the West. According to this reading, nationalism is something completely different to a theory that is based on a racist or religious idea. Nationalism with a racist or religious basis does not build upon national consciousness but on mass psychosis […] This is blind and stubborn nationalism, deaf for the concept of nation as solidarity, as universal humanism. This is why the African nations of tomorrow do not want to be Negro-, Berber-, or Arab nations, no Christian, Islamic or Animistic nations […] most of all, they want to be syntheses – or they won't be at all; Lets say: 'une civilisation'. Then they will build an active element of the post-Marxist revolution of the 20th century. (Dia, 1998:37f, translation E.W.)

Others however justified the new nation-state with appeals to images of a past, resembling both, the "invention of tradition" of Hobsbawm and the "imagined community" of Anderson. In particular, references to previously existing nation-states justi43

fied the new territorial ruler ship. Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana, announced on 18th May 1956: The government proposes, when the 'Gold Coast' will have gained independence, to change the name of the country into the new name 'Ghana'. The name Ghana is rooted deeply in the old African history […] It awakens the achievements and the glory of a great middle-age culture in the fantasy of the modern African youth, that our forefathers built through many centuries, before the European penetration and the following rule over Africa began. According to oral history, the different tribes of the Gold Coast were originally members of the great Ghana-empire that developed in the middle ages in western Sudan […] On the basis of this rich historical past, the name Ghana was suggested as a new name […] We are proud of this name, not out of romantic reasons but because it entails commitments for the future. (Nkrumah, 1998:37, translation E.W.)11

African secessionist leaders, to the contrary, followed the Kulturnation model: Nationalisms in Biafra, Eritrea, Southern Sudan and Somalia sought for the achievement of a nation-state through the path "from nation to state". My criticism of Neuberger's approach is that his universalism might overlook differences between African and European developments. The difference in my point of view is that in colonial Africa, nationalism was also developed as a political concept aiming at the liberation from colonial oppression. Furthermore, even in Europe the dichotomy of Staats- and Kulturnation cannot be substantiated in all points, as the author himself suggests. Also, the dichotomous approach does not take into account interpretations of the national concept in Pan-Africanist terms, as it became prominent especially in the 1960s. However, it seems convincing that given the colonial territory, the new African political elite did not try to enter into a political discourse that saw the state as a product of the realised nation, but rather focused on establishing a nation out of the state, in accordance to the model of a Staatsnation. Regarding "ethno" nationalism in an African context more closely, it has to be noted that at the time of anti-colonial movements, it was indeed risky to play the card of ethnicity. This would have been to the advantage of those who sought to divide the struggle. Even after independence, there was the fear that "tribalism" would destroy the historical mission of the nation-state. However according to Young, broken promises and disillusionment with the new political elite led to the disengagement of society with the concept of nationalism and to the emergence of other forms of identities, such as ethnic identities. Other sources of ethnic consciousness were the new urban 11

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It is interesting to note that the ANC congratulated Nkrumah and sent delegates to the PanAfricanist conference that the president of the newly independent Ghana hosted in 1958. A faction emerged within the ANC that identified strongly with Nkrumah and his brand of (noncommunist) Pan-Africanism.

environment,12 the structuring of ethnic units through colonial administration, the drive to validate African culture and to take part in political competition. Young contests a tendency in literature that divides nationalism and ethnicity according to a modern / traditional dichotomy. The result is to banalise ethnicity and to associate it with "tribalism" and backwardness. Nationalism seems to necessarily represent the progressive side of the dichotomy, ethnicity the retrogressive side. Arguing against the dichotomy that regards ethnicity as something completely different from nationalism, Young sees ethnicity as a regionalisation of nationalism. His hypothesis is that "nationalism has vanished as paradigm" and ethnicity as ideology and consciousness has emerged (Young, 1994a:81).13 2.3.3 Nationalism and other Forms of Identity in Africa Nationalism and class Is nationalism, as Connor writes, "everywhere a bourgeois ideology pressed into service by that class in order to divert the proletariat from realising its own class consciousness" (Connor, 1984:10)? Or is it, as Anderson states, not an ideology, in the sense of a political or philosophical product comparable to conservativism or liberalism, but a product of modernity with the tendencies of political and economic change on the one hand and transformation of technology and culture on the other (Anderson, 2001:574)? For Karl Marx, critique of the present conditions has to be the critical analysis of the modern state and its realities (Marx, 1961:384). Ideas, images and consciousness that are produced by humans are linked to their material occupations and their material relations. Though humans are the producers of their images, ideas etc, they are conditioned through specific developments in their methods of production. Their consciousness can never be abstracted from the conscious existence as the real learning process of humans. The starting point of Marx' ideology critique is therefore not what people say, think or imagine, nor the said, thought and imagined human for the pur12

13

The new social requirements of the city induced the creation of ethnic associations to serve a multitude of purposes. Mainly these centred on issues of economic and social self-help, mutual aid and political communal representation. For a discussion of the crisis of the post-colonial state and the legacy of colonialism also see Mamdani, M 1996: Citizen and subject. Contemporary Africa and the legacy of late colonialism. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

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pose of drawing conclusions to the real, existing human. The starting point is the real, active human. The development of an ideology as a reflection to this material existence can be illustrated according to real life processes. The "foggy" constructions in the mind of humans are necessary sublimates of their life process, which is linked to material and empirically verifiable conditions. Ideology and its counterpart consciousness do not develop independently from those conditions. They do not have a history, or a development. Rather, humans change their thinking and the products of their thinking through changing their material production and developing their material relations (thus their reality). To quote Marx: "Not the consciousness determines life, but life determines consciousness." (Marx, 1970:16, translation E.W.) Thought and action of every person are a reflection of economic conditions. People think they act with a priory norms and values while these are in fact reflections of economic conditions. As long as this it not seen or realised, one speaks of an ideological view (Engels, 1961:491f). Although Marx does not elaborate on a theory of nationalism, he still makes some comments on how national identity is being produced. For him, the main problem of modern times is the relation between the industry and the political world. One example that he cites to illustrate the mediation between the two spheres is the introduction of national protective tariffs in Germany. Suddenly, the traders of cotton and iron become German "patriots". This shows that national sovereignty within a nation-state was produced by national sovereignty directed towards other nation-states (Marx, 1961:382). These examples illustrate that nationalism was invented in the course of industrialisation to mediate between the economic and political sphere. These mediation processes were however not unified. In Europe, the rise of nationalism is not only associated with the French Revolution but also with the emergence of a new commercial, industrial and professional middle class as well as scholars that contributed to the ideology of nationalism. In Africa, carriers of the nationalist ideas were the "modern elites", activists leading political parties. Especially within the neo-Marxist school of thought, the most pressing question discussed was the relationship between economic and political spheres in the newly independent African countries. One quote that is often referred to in this context (Young, 1994a:71; Schraeder, 2000:55) is Sklar's statement that in Africa "the class relations, at bottom, are determined by relations of power, not production" (Sklar, 1979:537). Accordingly, the dominant class is primarily determined by its hold on state power, so that it becomes the principle advocate and beneficiary of the 46

idea of nationalism. The statement represents a shift from an economic to a political focus on competition between classes. However, the argument does not neglect the economic factor but shows that there is a wide range of possibilities that exist in terms of class domination and control. This corresponds to Antonio Gramsci's concept of hegemony that incorporates the shift from a narrowly economically defined analysis to the inclusion of culture. Culture is seen as a controversial field, in which political power has to define and legitimate itself in order to gain hegemony for the consolidation of a political supremacy. The basis / superstructure model of Marxist theory is enriched by the level of civil society. To rule, a social class must be leading in moral and intellectual questions. To sustain its hegemony, consensus not coercion is needed. Intellectuals are the main agents in securing hegemony in that they provide ideologies that organise civil society. The concept of hegemony does not marginalise the socio-economic context but enriches it with the factor of consensus. Rule must be secured outside the economic sector. However, people appropriate the given conditions in a creative way. Thus, Gramsci's neglect of self-determined actions has to be criticised. The historical process is not pre-determined, it always contains a potential for alternatives. Rather, hegemony is contra- and interactive as well as conflict ridden. The practices and ideologies of the state and the capitalist economy are always marked by internal dynamics of resistance.14 Coming back to Connor and Anderson's seemingly contradictory statements, it can now be argued that they can be reconciled. While it could be shown that nationalism is a product of industrialisation and the development of a class society, it is also an ideology. In this understanding, ideology is neither a purely political or philosophical product, nor a direct expression of class interests. Rather, material conditions favour the invention of a common "nation" and "tradition", but these inventions manifest themselves in the cultural sphere. Here, they can develop a life of their own, i.e. exist relatively independently from their material conditions. When nationalism becomes hegemonic, not by imposition but by consent, it can support existing political power structures.

14

For the application of Gramsci's concept to an African context see Küster, S 1994: Neither cultural imperialism nor precious gift of civilization. African education in colonial Zimbabwe 1890-1962. Münster: Lit.

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Nationalism and race Anthony Marx examines the important linkage between nation-building and racial conflict in his work Making race a nation (1998). In his case study of South Africa, the United States and Brazil he finds that the stabilisation of the social order was central to the nation-building process. Political and economical elites built institutions of coercion and coordination to maintain power, legitimacy and economic growth. According to Gramsci's model of hegemony, ruling elites of the state had to structure relations between state and civil society, shaping norms and reinforcing social as well as political identities. In all three countries, the state instantiated "white" nationalism, producing racial identities among the included but also among the excluded. On the one hand, "white" nationalism spurred racially defined solidarity among its members and loyalty towards the nation-state. On the other hand, it also initiated contention and resistance against it. In South Africa, the need to establish "white" nationalism emanated inter alia from the urgency to reconcile and strengthen solidarity among whites, namely English and Afrikaners. Before the establishment of South Africa as an independent and sovereign state, there was a set of quasi-states, including Boer republics and colonial fragments. The Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) ended with the defeat of the Afrikaners. As a result, in 1910 the Union of South Africa was established federating British colonies and Boer republics. The ruling elites of the newly founded state were facing enormous problems of white disunity,15 exacerbated by disputes over the future treatment of blacks. Resulting from racist prejudices about the inferiority of blacks, Afrikaners – even though much smaller in number – were perceived as a greater threat to the nation-building project than the African majority. Enforced by an increasingly strong central state, "white" nationalism diminished intrawhite conflict ideologically and institutionally by means of white unity and domination. Building the basis for apartheid in 1948, Daniel Francois Malan's United National Party took over government and established an Afrikaner ruled state. During apartheid, the ethnic classification policy had been pursued most systematically:16 race became the principle of discrimination (Young, 1994b:228). Racial domination how15

16

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Most importantly this was due to the war, where the predominating British troops established concentration camps in which more than 27,000 Afrikaner women and children died. The four main racial categories were European, Indian, Coloured and African that were again divided into various subgroups.

ever also consolidated counter-mobilisation, which challenged the very national unity it was trying to create: Consequently, the racial consciousness dimension of African nationalism clearly arose in response to that categorisation (Marx, 1998:20). State institutions and laws against the rights and freedoms of blacks provoked efforts for black racial unity, which most prominently came into an organisational form with the 1912 founded South African Native National Congress (SANNC), renamed African National Congress (ANC) in 1923. Black identity was therefore shaped and reinforced by dominant state institutions but then asserted itself and again pressed for change in the institutional sphere. Various methods, isolation as well as cooperation, militancy as well as accommodation, were adopted. The character and strength of these protest movements were not only resulting from experiences of deprivation but also from the availability of resources (allies, finance, internal organisation) and political opportunities (reforms or repressions). Although Marx states that not only deprivation, social factors and official policies of exclusion shaped identities, he does not elaborate further on how exactly an "autonomous process of identity consolidation" could have been brought about.

2.4 Conclusion To answer the question whether the ANC's "rainbow nation", "two nation" and "African Renaissance" are nationalist discourses and if so, how they can be categorised, it is useful to draw some conclusions from the above. Following the constructivist analysis, nationalism arises in the context of a modern, industrialised society. Nationalism is a discourse and an ideology, favoured by specific social, political and economical conditions. Especially, it arises out of efforts of mediation between the economic and political sphere. Nations are "imagined communities" that construct themselves around "invented traditions". Historically, two different models of nationalism can be analysed. Deriving from the opposing concepts of Staatsnation and Kulturnation, they can at best be termed "constitutional" and "ethnic" nationalism. Analytically, both nationalisms function as mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion, but the specific groups of people they include or exclude differ. However, these distinctions are ideal types: In reality, components of both nationalisms often mix. African nationalism emerged for the same structural reasons as in Europe but had different historical points of reference and means of mobilisation. The newly independ49

ent African nations mainly followed the road of "constitutional" nationalism. "Ethnic" nationalism increasingly emerged after disillusionment with the new political elites. "White" nationalism in South Africa represented a form of "ethno" nationalism that was promoted by political elites in the course of nation-building to stabilise the social order. Racial domination however also consolidated counter-mobilisation, which challenged the very national unity it was trying to create. To analyse the present state of nationalist discourse in the ANC, it is important to take a look back in history. The next chapter will therefore examine relations between the ANC and African nationalism from apartheid until the present date.

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Chapter 3: ANC and African Nationalism – from Apartheid to the Present The rival concepts of nationalism that form central points of reference throughout the study have been analysed as "constitutional" and "ethnic" nationalism. In a South African context, they find their equivalent in concepts of non-racial nationalism (promoting racial integration and equality before the law) and racial nationalism (promoting racial exclusion). As demonstrated above, in most African countries "constitutional" nationalism emerged as a force of liberation building a Staatsnation. In South Africa however, racial nationalism persisted as a potent power throughout the colonial, post-colonial and apartheid era. During apartheid, race functioned as a marker of the state to define the political community and to construct a Kulturnation. However, racial domination also began to foster solidarities among lines of colour. At least in the beginning, opposition was formed according to the racial categories that the apartheid administration set up (Wallerstein, 1991; Compton, 2003). Therefore, "race was imposed and then embraced as a basis of resistance" (Marx, 1996:196). Consequently, central themes that arose in response to racial nationalism in black political thought were racial consciousness, citizenship and national identity. In this Chapter, I will demonstrate how and why the two streams of nationalism, also referred to as "African nationalism" and "multi-" or "non-racial nationalism" developed within the ANC historically. As I have stated in the previous chapter, I will illustrate why I do not consider these two concepts as mutually exclusive. Though it is important to stress their divergent historical and philosophical points of reference, I think that racially conscious and non-racial discourses are interdependent. In their majority, ANC members always decided against racial nationalism. However, it is remarkable that throughout history, the party continually played with its appeal (Halisi, 1999:1). Often, it was not so much a matter of choosing between integrationist cosmopolitanism and racially pluralistic nationalism as a basis of political action, but "finding a way to reconcile them so that blacks could find fulfilment in two ways at once – as the generic human beings of liberal theory and as a special people whose unique historical experience could be represented or symbolised by reference to colour" (Frederickson, 1995:23). Rather than to account for one side, it is more interest-

51

ing to regard the tension between both nationalisms as a valuable basis for the interpretation of African nationalism in apartheid and post-apartheid South Africa.

3.1 African Nationalism within the ANC before and during Apartheid This chapter will regard the reverberation of African nationalism within the ANC before and during apartheid. The origins of African nationalism in South Africa can be traced back to the middle of the nineteenth century, when the Ethiopian movement came into existence (Chirenje, 1987; Frederickson, 1995; Cuthbertson, 1998; Vale, 2003). Members of the young ANC were clearly influenced by mentors of early black political thought and movements. While during the first three decades of its existence, the ANC has been characterised by moderate politics, especially in the 1940s African nationalism gained support and influence. 3.1.1 Moderate Policies: the early Years of the ANC (1912 – 1943) In 1909, the national convention that worked on a constitution for the Union of South Africa released a draft proposing to deny blacks their voting rights in three of the four provinces and restrict the membership of parliament to Europeans. These proposals provoked efforts of a small number of highly educated Africans to unite blacks across the country in order to register opposition to the constitution. Exceeding earlier African political activity that had been restricted to tribal or provincial lines, the South African Native Convention was called into existence. Among the delegates were members of the educated African elite some of whom would play a prominent role in establishing the South African Native National Congress three years later. Despite protest, the constitution was adopted in 1910. However, the reaction of the Convention turned out to be quite moderate. Those believing in the British tradition of fairminded liberalism were eager to plea the cause of blacks in South Africa to the British parliament. Other leaders of the Convention were hoping that the white minority would "rule benevolently" and extend political rights gradually to "civilised" blacks. These expectations were to be disappointed when it became clear that the first government of the Union of South Africa, with Louis Botha as its president, sought to harmonise the interests of English and Afrikaners at the expense of Africans. The first two years of the Union advanced the systematic segregation of whites and Africans. With these threatening developments as a background, a group of African pro52

fessional men pushed forward to form a permanent organisation that could defend the rights and interests of blacks against a white government that had revealed its discriminatory intentions. The move towards a native congress mainly came from four Johannesburg based lawyers: Alfred Mangena, Richard Msimang, Pixley ka Izaka Seme and George Montsioa. It was Seme who took the lead in summoning a new congress. During his stay in the United States, the law student was influenced by nineteenth-century Black Nationalism, which had come to completion with Afro-American thinkers like W.E.B. Du Bois and Booker T. Washington. In his 1906 article "The regeneration of Africa", Seme made obvious references to Du Bois' "The conservation of races" by emphasising the unique "genius" possessed by each race of mankind. Africa, with Egypt as its cultural legacy, was seen as no exception. The dormant "genius" was reviving as blacks developed a healthy "race consciousness": The African already recognizes his anomalous position and desires change […] The basic factor which assures their regeneration resides in the awakened race-consciousness […] The African people, although not a strictly homogeneous race, possesses a common fundamental sentiment which is everywhere manifest, crystallizing itself into one common controlling idea. Conflicts and strife are rapidly disappearing before the fusing force of this enlightened perception of the true intertribal relation, which relation should subsist among a people with a common destiny.17

This reference already shows the tendency to embrace race as a category of resistance against white domination. Race is also used in determining the nation, which in this case is expressed in Pan-Africanist terms. According to Hobsbawm's "invention of tradition" Seme combines references to an "ancestral greatness" with the notion of a "common destiny" and future of African glory. One year prior to the founding of a national congress of Africans, Seme, who should become its first treasurer, called for "all the dark races […] to come together" and overcome "the demon of racialism".18 According to Frederickson the call for a congress as an agency for African selfimprovement and cooperation across ethnic and regional division did neither advocate "de-tribalisation" nor the merging of black and white into a single, non-racial nation. This is undermined by the fact that chiefs and traditional leaders were to be given a prominent place in the organisation and its members maintained a strong ethnic identity. Rather, Seme and others called for the subordination of ethnic or re17

18

Seme, P 1906: The regeneration of Africa (5th April 1906). In: Carter, M& Karis, T (Eds) 1972: From protest to challenge. A documentary history of African politics in South Africa.1882-1964. Volume 1: 1882-1934. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 71. Seme, P 1911: Native union (24th October 1911), From protest to challenge, vol. 1, 72.

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gional identities to a broader conception of black nationality (Frederickson, 1995:118). In 1912, the SANNC was founded. Its first leaders were influenced by Du Bois' concept of black organisational protest and Washington's concept of racial solidarity and self-help. However, the South African context hardly provided any possibility for actions of self-help. This became especially clear when the South African government passed laws interdicting blacks to leave their work and purchase or rent land. These developments made it more obvious to vote for the agitation for equal rights under the law before economic and entrepreneurial activity of the African population in the spirit of "self-help" could take place. Constitutional rights were regarded as a precondition for the participation in a competitive, capitalist society. In its early years, the SANNC therefore mainly expressed hopes for reform from above. This is documented in numerous petitions addressed to the British parliament and the crown, where the members describe themselves as "most loyal and humble subjects".19 The attitude of the Congress towards African nationalism can be exemplified in two ways: by analysing official statements and by evaluating its policy of membership. With regard to the first point, Seme described the aim of the SANNC as "creating national unity and defending our rights and privileges as subordinated Africans rather than as distinct tribes".20 This call already includes the belief that rights could only be defended if Africans became part of the political community of the nation-state. However, by creating an image of African "sameness", the call for national unity also had a cultural connotation. With regard to the second point, the SANNC was only open to Africans. Although it maintained close cooperation with the African Political Organisation, mainly constituted of coloureds, institutionally it kept its distance to non-Africans. According to Frederickson, the Pan-Africanist rhetoric and the all-African membership were however no reflections of the exclusive nationalism expressed in Marcus Garvey's slogan "Africa for the Africans".21 It was more the absence of white liberals 19

20

21

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South African Native National Congress 1914: Petition to King George V (20th July 1914), From protest to challenge, vol.1, 125. Seme, P 1912: Founding speech (8th January 1912). In: Walshe, P 1971: The rise of African nationalism in South Africa. Berkley: University of California Press, 34. Marcus Garvey, born in Jamaica in 1887, was founder of the Universal Negro Improvement Association that had the general aim to deal with the common problems of New World and African blacks. In a South African context, Garveyism was transitional between the nineteenth-century Ethiopianism and the largely secularised Pan-Africanism that succeeded it. See

than the strength of the Africanist ideology, more the pragmatic necessity of a young organisation than its racially defined concept of African nationalism that lead to the exclusive membership. The official objective of the Congress was to build a common democratic society in which Africans, whites, coloureds and Indians would equally take part. However, the subsequent history of the congress would be filled with tension between universally and ethnically defined perspectives on nationalism but would see the "inclusive and incorporationist perspective – called at different times 'multi-racialism' or 'non-racialism' – prevail again and again" (Frederickson, 1995:121). Following the First World War, racially defined nationalism, or African nationalism, emerged as an increasingly important force. It represented a rival concept to the official doctrine of the SANNC and the nationalism which had dominated the thinking of pre-war elites. Especially one version of African nationalism – the populist Garvey movement that developed to its full potential in the 1920s – found approval in the organisation. In his 1921 address, the SANNC premier of the Western Cape Province, Rev. Z.R. Mahabane, made strong references to Garveyite rhetoric: The European came to Africa, robbed the African of his God-given land and then deprived the African of all rights of citizenship in a country originally unintended by Providence to be his home. Why, did not the Almighty in His wisdom and prescience divide the earth into four continents – Europe, Africa, Asia and America? The man whom He created was planted on his earthly planet. He made them white, black and yellow. To the white man He gave Europe to be his abode, Africa He gave to the black man and Asia He allocated to the yellow man. America God seems to have intended as the land of the surplus population of each of the three great divisions of mankind named above. The amazing thing today is that the white man claims Africa as the white man's country, and by his legislative action he has practically excluded the black man. This is injustice.22

As described in chapter 2, Gellner traced the origins of nationalism to the rise of the feeling that a national unit (the nation) is not congruent with a political unit (the state). Mahabene confirms this assumption by stating: "We are living in an age of democracy, when all the peoples of the earth have become conscious of their divine right to rule themselves by men chosen by themselves, and for the benefit of themselves". However, the African is an "alien or political slave in his own country”, but “a race of people cannot be held in a sort of 'political slavery'".23 It must be pointed out though that Mahabene did not suggest that blacks reclaim their rights by force.

22 23

Frederickson, Black liberation, 92-93, 152-172; Jacques-Garvey, A (Ed) 1969: Philosophy and opinions of Marcus Garvey, vol.1+2. New York: Arno Press/ New York Times. Mahabene, Z 1921: The Exclusion of the Bantu, From protest to challenge, vol.1, 294. Ibid, 296.

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Rather, he advocated to "launch a big constitutional fight" (Frederickson, 1995:163), aiming at the extension of franchise and citizenship rights to all, with the help of the "full and free cooperation of all the white and black races of the land". Mahabene therefore sets an example of the combination of African nationalism expressed by Garveyite rhetoric with a nationalism of a moderate, constitutionalist approach. Another example of increasing African nationalist rhetoric is James Thaele, who was active in the ANC branch of the Western Cape since 1923. In 1925, he founded "The African World", a newspaper functioning as the official organ of the Western Cape ANC. In its caption the paper carried the slogan "Africa for the Africans and Europe for the Europeans" (Frederickson, 1995:162) that again shows parallels to Garveyite rhetoric. However, this did not implicate that white settlers should be forcibly removed from Africa. Rather, Thaele was advocating Gandhian non-violent resistance. Thaele was also an important figure in the context of membership policy: Because of his coloured mother, he remodelled the image of the Congress as a strictly "black" organisation and recruited many new coloured members. Much like Mahabene and Thaele, the policy of several ANC leaders was not to fully embrace Garveyism but rather to use it in an eclecticistic manner. Their political ideology combined the need for black self-determination with a moderate and at times even accommodationist attitude towards white presence in South Africa. The Garvey heritage might also have inspired the more Pan-Africanist sounding name "African National Congress" which was adopted by the SANNC in 1923. In addition to replacing South African with African, the term congress instead of council spoke for the self-image of a colonised people addressing imperialism.24 In this regard, the Congress represented a "straightforward national consciousness" (Frederickson, 1995:120). In 1935, the ANC again underlined its inclusive understanding of nationalism: A resolution called for a political identity that would ensure the "ultimate creation of a South African nation in which they [the various racial groups] will be bound together by the pursuit of common political objectives". This could only be achieved by "the extension of the rights of citizenship to all groups".25 To conclude, many members within the young ANC remained sceptical or indifferent towards African nationalism. When emphasis on racial pride and solidarity was invoked it was 24

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The prototype of such a "congress" can be seen in the Indian National Congress, which was founded in 1885.

more often "for the purpose of improving the position of blacks within a segregated society than for the revolutionary goal of overthrowing European domination" (Frederickson, 1995:164). 3.1.2 Towards Africanism: Anton Lembede and the ANC Youth League (1944 – 1947) Because its policy was focussed on expectations of change from above, popular support for the ANC remained low. The organisation also kept its distance to more radical groups like the Industrial and Commercial Workers' Union (ICU) and the Communist Party (CP). This distance was not only a result of ideological differences but also due to the economic composition of its membership: the ANC provided a home for a small black middle class that shied away from radical economic reforms. However, during the Second World War, especially when Prime Minister Smuts pulled back from reforms after 1943, the ANC shifted its policy from polite petitioning to mass mobilisation. One important factor that contributed to the shift in policy was the launch of the ANC Youth League (CYL) in April 1944. The "Congress Youth League Manifesto" promoted a philosophy that made strong references towards African nationalism. "Africanism" meant the "struggle for development, progress and national liberation" with the aim that Africans could "occupy their rightful and honourable place among nations in the world". In their creed, the Youth League made references to the old Ethiopianist and Garveyite slogan "Africa for the Africans" by stating: "We believe in the divine destiny of nations". This nation was an all-African nation, defined in Pan-Africanist terms: "We believe in the unity of all Africans from the Mediterranean Sea in the North to the Indian and Atlantic Oceans in the South…and that Africans must speak in one voice." One of the aims of the Youth League was to "arouse and encourage national consciousness and unity".26 Pan-Africanism is an excellent example of the imagination of a community through "invented traditions". Resembling other concepts of nationalism, Pan-Africanism works with a distorted notion of history, suggesting cultural sameness where non ex-

25

26

All African Convention 1935: Proceedings and Resolutions of the ANC (15th –18th December 1935), From protest to challenge, vol.2, 32. Congress Youth League Manifesto (March 1944), From protest to challenge, vol.2, 300, 308; Constitution of the ANC Youth League 1944, Ibid, 310.

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ists. With strong symbolic metaphors it insists on the common destiny of the African continent as a whole. Paradoxically, this interpretation of history is challenged by other nationalisms. Pan-Arabism for example imagines quite a different community: Here, northern Africa is perceived as being part of the "divine destiny" of an Arabian nation. The main intellectual figure of the CYL was its president Anton Lembede who, as a student of philosophy, elaborated on the idea of African nationalism. Lembede distinguished between Europeanism that he allocated to materialistic rational and individual concepts, and Africanism, that he associated with spiritualistic, intuitive and communal approaches. He rejected Marxism as a point of reference and demanded to overthrow Western intellectual and economic domination. In February 1945, Lembede wrote an article called Some Basic Principles of African Nationalism in which he argued for its "philosophical", "scientific", "historical" and "economic" basis. Philosophically, he rejected communist as well as "biological interpretations" of nationalism. However, scientifically he legitimised nationalism citing Charles Darwin, who represents a common point of reference for (quasi) biological interpretations of nationalism. Adding religious imagery, Lembede demonstrated hid the influences of earlier Black Nationalist movements like Ethiopianism and Garveyism: One can never find two leaves of plants that are exactly and in all respects the same, nor two stems, nor two flowers, nor two animals, nor two human beings, nor two nations. Each nation has its own peculiar character or make-up. Hence each nation has its own peculiar contribution to make towards the general progress and welfare of mankind. In other words each nation has its own divine mission.27

According to Van Vuuren, the image of a "mission as a nation" is one aspect of nationalism that makes its agenda appear to be a historical duty. Suggesting a means-initself, the claim of a "divine mission" was also used by Afrikaner nationalism to preside over the logical unfolding of apartheid. Accordingly, Lembede sees African nationalism as the fulfilment of the nation's "historical destiny" (Van Vuuren, 2002:9). This might be one of the reasons why analysts like Frederickson state that "at times he [Lembede] seemed to be propounding an Africanised version of the message that Afrikaner nationalists had derived from some of the same sources" (Frederickson, 1995:280).

27

58

Lembede, A 1945: Some basic principles of African nationalism (7th April 1945), From protest to challenge, vol.2, 315.

Lembede's attempts to justify African nationalism historically can be analysed according to Hobsbawm's concept of "invention of tradition". Citing Paul Kruger, president of the former republic of the Transvaal, Lembede states: "One who wants to create the future must not forget the past." In order to establish an African history, he calls for the erection of "monuments to commemorate the glorious achievements of our great heroes of the past, e.g. Shaka, Moshoeshoe, Hintsa, Sikhukhuni, Khama, Sobuza, and Mosilikazi, etc. […] these men served their people and did their duty noble and well".28 Moreover, Lembede invents a socialist and democratic tradition of Bantu society. As a basis for African nationalism, he also creates the image of an "ethical system of our forefathers". Another element of the invention of the past is the emphasis that Egypt (and therefore Africa) had been the cradle of civilisation (Gerhart, 1978:59). Furthermore, it is valuable to regard Van Vuuren's analysis that nationalist mythology combines images of a romanticised history with a heroic present struggle and a future of nationalist utopia. Through the restoration of a "heroic and absolutely virtuous past" Lembede envisages a "future of national freedom". This "divinely ordained future" is rooted in a "present struggle against a mortal threat to Africans" (Van Vuuren, 2002:8). In fact, it is not concealed by Lembede that there is a linkage between African nationalism and the present struggle against the "decay and decline of morals [that] brings about the decay and decline of society". Lembede's aim was to elaborate on an ideology of African assertion that could be used as a resource in the unequal struggle against white domination. In his understanding, the new philosophy would lead to further unification of Africans and greater mass participation. He summarises these strategic considerations with the statement: "It is only African Nationalism or Africanism that can save the African people."29 In May 1946, Lembede wrote a second article entitled Policy of the Congress Youth League in which he affirmed the exclusive character of African nationalism. He stated that "an African must lead Africans" due to the fact that "no foreigner can ever be a true and genuine leader of the African people because no foreigner can every truly and genuinely interpret the African spirit which is unique and peculiar to Africans only." Lembede also specified on whom the African nation should incorporate. All Africans are of one nationality, united by their colour: 28 29

Ibid. Ibid, 316.

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Africa is a blackman's country. Africans are the natives of Africa, and they have inhabited Africa, their Motherland, from times immemorial; Africa belongs to them. Africans are one. Out of the heterogeneous tribes, there must emerge a homogeneous nation. The basis of national unity is the nationalistic feeling of the Africans, the feeling of being Africans irrespective of tribal connections, social status, educational attainment, or economic class.30

Lembede's concept of an African nation can be interpreted according to Anderson's "imagined community". Lembede's imagined community was not some specific historical nation that was seeking to regain its lost independence but rather black Africa as a whole. Demanding the union of the continent, he can clearly be situated in the Pan-Africanist tradition of nationalism. To mark the limits of the nation and to undermine its exclusively African character, Lembede referred to an imagined cultural sameness of its members. In his eyes, the common African environment produces a common spirit, which is resistant to "minor insignificant differences of language and customs" (quoted in Gerhart, 1978:61). This African spirit is diametrically opposed to European culture in that it strives for social responsibility and human unity. Again, it can be noted that the construction of a Pan-African community cannot be completed without references to invented sameness. Accordingly, Lembede interpreted African nationalism as bridging over continental differences (through a perceived common culture) but not over perceived racial differences. The Africanist idea of nation is therefore exclusive to Africans and cannot be shared with or understood by nonAfricans, who, according to Van Vuuren, are intolerantly viewed as "foreigners" and racially defined as "Asiatic or European" (Van Vuuren, 2002:7). The nationalism Lembede advocated was therefore a racial nationalism, legitimised in cultural terms. With respect to the South African context, the rediscovering and emphasising of indigenous African cultures and values represented a break with preceding whiteorientated perspectives. Especially Lembede's version of African nationalism opposed the "nation within a nation" approach of the ANC's old guard. Both concepts agreed to eradicate tribalism and unite Africans. However, Lembede and the Youth Leaguers comprised Africans not as a nation within the boundaries of South Africa but (due to their indigenousness and number) as the nation, and the only nation entitled to rule the country. This turn in black political thought opened the perspective towards emphasising racial identity and formulating a creed of orthodox nationalism for black South Africa (Gerhart, 1978:54).

30

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Lembede, A 1946: Policy of the Congress Youth League (May 1946), From protest to challenge, vol.2, 317.

To analyse the new dimension of nationalism, it is valuable to not only regard the self-ascription of African nationalists, but also their attitudes towards other groups. Within the Youth League, there were various and even contrasting views on the "white question". The literature of the CYL in this period repeatedly considered whites as "somehow inherently evil" (Gerhart, 1978:70). However, others saw the struggle as being not against whites but against white domination and expressed hopes of future reconciliation. Regarding the practice of cooperation across racial lines, a central theme in the debate was whether to include whites in the struggle. Again, there was a multitude of views: some favoured open cooperation; some preferred their exclusion until Africans had achieved enough self-reliance. Lembede and others considered the question of cooperation with "good" whites irrelevant for, or even harmful to, the nationalist cause. He stressed that ethical values should entail the love of Africa and the defence of African interests. After liberation, those whites accepting African majority rule could stay in South Africa. Lembede therefore accepted to be considered as "anti-white". Regarding cooperation with other groups, Lembede stressed that this could only be aimed for when Africans had achieved a high degree of cohesion, self-confidence and compact organisation as to realise their national aspiration. Lembede was also strongly opposed to cooperation with the Communist Party, firstly because of ideological reasons, as he saw race-conscious nationalism and not class-consciousness as the only possibility to rise for action, 31 and secondly because the CP was also open to non-Africans. According to Gerhart, the ambiguity concerning whites was due to the focus on uniting Africans and moving them towards action rather than specifying on future South African race relations. Another reason was the hesitation to break with older Congress leaders by too radical stances. Additionally, doubts that the economy could be managed without whites and the absence of examples of modern independent non-European states in this period of history prevailed. Lastly, moral and ethical

31

The Communist Party in its early years tried to reconcile African nationalism and communism. In the 1920s it adopted the position that South Africa should become "an independent Native republic, as a stage towards a workers' and peasants' republic, with full equal rights for all races, blacks, coloured and white". This was however widely rejected by members and dropped several years after (see Gerhart, G 1978: Black power in South Africa. The evolution of an ideology. Berkeley: University of California Press; Lodge, T 1983: Black politics in South Africa since 1945. Johannesburg: Raven Press).

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values, Christian ideals and upbringing hindered most members to assert a more extreme position (Gerhart, 1978:73). When Lembede suddenly died in 1947, he left behind some nationalist thinkers of his own striving, but no well-structured group that could have popularised his theories or transformed them into an ideological basis on which a plan of action could be drawn. This is made explicit in the Basic Policy of the CYL in 1948, which takes on a more moderate view on African nationalism: Now it must be noted that there are two streams of African Nationalism. One centres on Marcus Garvey's slogan – 'Africa for the Africans'. It is based on the 'Quit Africa' slogan and on the cry 'Hurl the whiteman to the sea'. This brand of African Nationalism is extreme and ultra-revolutionary. There is another stream of African Nationalism (Africanism) which is moderate, and which the Congress Youth League professes. We of the Youth League take account of the concrete situation in South Africa and realize that the different racial groups have come to stay. But we insist that a condition for inter-racial peace and progress is the abandonment of white domination, and such a change in the basic structure of South African society that those relations, which breed exploitation and human misery, disappear. 32

The new Youth League manifesto sought a middle ground between Lembede's African nationalism and universal liberalism. It did not call for a decision between European or African civilisation but promoted a view that saw good elements in both. It exchanged the extreme or revolutionary nationalism of Garvey for a moderate nationalism, which did not have complete Africanization as its goal. Still it affirmed the principle that Africa was a "blackman's country". Furthermore, Lembede's influence was present in the principle of non-cooperation with coloureds and Indians as well as Communists. In 1949 Nelson Mandela, then national secretary of the Youth League, affirmed: "The ground plan and cornerstone of our policy is African nationalism which is the exact antithesis of Communism." (quoted in Frederickson, 1995:281) Lembede's version of nationalism exercised within the ANC was by no means all embracing. Even the 1944 "creed" of the Youth League still stated that there were both, the belief in "the divine destiny of nations" and "the scientific approach to all African problems".33 While the latter approach gained most support, the former belief was, especially after Lembede's death, predominantly ignored and only revived in the late 1950s with the formation of the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC). The reluctance to fully embrace culturally defined African nationalism was also due to the fact that many black intellectuals focused on white-orientated perspectives. The concept of a distinctive African culture stood against the "assimilationist dream" of the black mid32 33

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Basic Policy of Congress Youth League 1948, From protest to challenge, vol.2, 328. Congress Youth League Manifesto 1944, From protest to challenge, vol.2, 308.

dle class (Gerhart, 1978:67). It was not until the wave of independence swept through Africa, and black philosophers in America and the Third World gained prominence in the 1960s, that a change occurred. However, the ANC never broke completely with the liberal integrationist values of the past. Lembede's through-going cultural nationalism never became the party's predominant ideology. In its majority, the ANC remained deeply embedded in cosmopolitanism and universalism. 3.1.3 Charterism: The ANC in the 1950s With apartheid unfolding in 1948, the ANC adopted more forceful tactics. The Congress' annual conference in 1949 passed a Programme of Action calling for nonviolent disobedience and massive protests. In the aftermath of this strategical and ideological turn, a significant number of Youth Leaguers were voted into leadership positions within the ANC. Repudiating earlier stances, they were responsible for developing a closer working relationship with coloured and Indian organisations as well as with the Communist Party that was banned in 1950. In 1952 the Defiance Campaign was launched resulting in membership numbers rising up to 100,000. In the spirit of inter-racial cooperation, a Congress Alliance was formed. Despite divergent goals (Frederickson, 1995:245), the Alliance passed the Freedom Charter in 1955, calling for a non-racial democracy in South Africa. The 1960 Sharpeville massacre of peaceful pass law protestors brought about an explosion of black protest as well as increased state repression, which culminated in the banning of the ANC and all oppositional groups. The 1949 Programme of Action proposed tightening measures to resist apartheid legislation. The programme was the most militant statement of principles adopted by the ANC to that date. At its centre stood concrete actions like civil disobedience, strikes, boycotts, stay-aways, extra-legal tactics, mass action and non-collaboration. However, the ideological principles of the programme remained rather unclear. Though it called for "national freedom", "political independence" and "self-determination", the exact content of these terms remained undefined. The programme ends with the statement that "the people will be brought together by inspired leadership, under the banner of African Nationalism".34 According to Lodge, the programme was a product of an eclectic range of influences: "political independence" and "self-determination" derived from the Africanist legacy of the 1940s, the strategic component from experi34

Programme of Action (17th December 1949), From protest to challenge, vol.2, 337, 339.

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ences of the Indian Congress, the Communist Party and other popular struggles and the "self-help" theme represented concepts of (Afro-American) "economic nationalism" of the 1930s (Lodge, 1985:26). Later, Africanists often referred to the Programme of Action as the commitment of the ANC towards an exclusive nationalism. However, by the contents of the programme, this is not justified. African nationalism is proposed but not clearly defined and no explicit parallels to Lembede's conception can be found. The majority did not share the outstanding importance of an African „nation-building“ ideology. What was more important to them was that the approaches of the old ANC guard had been replaced for bolder political actions. Overall, "it was for action – not ideological theorising – that the ANC and its new leadership now geared itself" (Gerhart, 1978:84). The adoption of the programme had major implications on the leadership level: Not only was A.B. Xuma, president since 1940, succeeded by James Moroka. Moreover, a significant fraction of the elderly guard was virtually replaced by Youth Leaguers like Walter Sisulu, Oliver Tambo and Nelson Mandela. These men were to predominate in African nationalist politics in the 1950s. However, the leadership was still highly divided into several fractions. The elderly guard consisted of a small fraction of Marxists and a majority of liberals. Representative for the last fraction was National Executive Committee member Professor Z.K. Matthews, standing for traditional liberal African political leadership. Matthews was to be one of the key intellectual influences on the elaboration and preservation of a conciliatory and racially inclusive form of nationalism (Lodge, 1985:28). It is more difficult to categorise the younger generation of ANC leaders. It consisted of the "national-minded bloc" that opposed the growing influence of communists and Indians in the ANC, of communists35 and trade unionists who had connections to white oppositional forces and of heirs of Lembede's Africanist movement. The ideological pressures and counter-pressures of the 1950s shaped the debate on nationalism for the years to come. The two opposing conceptions of nationalism disclosed themselves as "multiracial" and "racial" nationalism. To the multiracial nationalists of the ANC mainstream, Lembede's nationalism of race-consciousness and self-reliance represented a "black version of Afrikaner ideology" (Gerhart, 1978:90). 35

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The communist influence in the ANC had grown slightly stronger since 1950, resulting from the banning of the Communist Party. Many communists sought for a new political home

If they believed in nationalism at all it was broadly defined as "South African nationalism" which was dedicated to the building of a united multiracial "nation" in which the equal rights of all races would be constitutionally guaranteed. While the majority of ANC members and communists drew together into an alliance around the principles of multiracialism, most orthodox nationalists gradually coalesced into a movement that would eventually break off as the racially exclusive Pan Africanist Congress. In practice however, none of the ideological camps could impose its version of nationalism on the organisation as a whole. Hiding differences rather than solving them, the nationalist question was often addressed in unidentified terms. In order to avoid a clash within the organisation, Mandela declared in his 1951 presidential address to the Youth League: "I do not think we differ concerning our ideas and the aims of African Nationalism". The aim of nationalism was a "free, independent, united, democratic and prosperous South Africa" (quoted in Gerhart, 1978:92). This definition was however not less vague. The ANC was in danger of becoming ideologically arbitrary again, a fact that was criticised by Youth Leaguers the decade before. Its conceptions remained close to most issues of earlier generations. As in the past, political objectives were mainly the winning of political and civil rights within the basic framework of the parliamentary democracy, as it existed in South Africa. To further examine the ANC's stance on nationalism, it is useful to regard its policy of cooperation. During the 1950s, the ANC implemented a new strategy of alliances with other racial groups and organisations. In its majority, the newly elected ANC Executive Committee also repudiated its earlier stances of non-cooperation with the Communist Party. The personal contacts during the Defiance Campaign of 1952 and the following arrests and trials welded together what was to become a strong working relationship with the Indian Congress, the South African Coloured People's Organisation and the South African Congress of Democrats, latter consisting of dissident whites. In 1953, Matthews called for "a Congress of People, representing all the people of this country irrespective of race or colour to draw up a Freedom Charter for the democratic South Africa of the future" (Carter& Karis, 1977:105). The multi-racial Congress Alliance was formed. In 1955, the Congress of the People became reality, representing the participating organisations in equal numbers. .

within the ANC. Still it would be wrong to ascribe ideological changes within the Congress solely to a "communist infiltration" as their influence remained marginal.

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The Freedom Charter, drafted in 1955 and ratified a year later, was a decisive step towards a new standpoint on African nationalism. In most respects, it can be considered as a reinvigoration of liberal principles. This was due to its contents as well as its policy of political cooperation. Regarding the contents, the Freedom Charter clearly turned against Lembede's exclusive conception of nationalism, which claimed that South Africa belonged to the indigenous people. Instead, it declared in its preamble: "South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white". In his presidential address, Chief Albert Lutuli stated that the ANC envisaged an "all inclusive nationalism […], which embraced all people under African nationalism regardless of their racial and geographical origin".36 Hodkin, in an analysis prepared for the defence council at the treason trial, described the language of the Charter as "Rousseauian democratic nationalism" (Carter& Karis, 1977:64). The Charter demanded an end to all discriminatory legislation and the right for all citizens of South Africa to vote, hold office, enter civil service, be equal before the law, travel, own land and trade, form trade unions, receive education and social service. It envisaged a bourgeois democracy based on human rights, liberalism and formal equal opportunity for individuals. Underlying these goals was a complete rejection of colour, race, sex or belief as criteria of discrimination and the acceptance of liberal democratic institutions as the ideal form of government. Democracy was strived for to guarantee the freedom of everyone, including minorities: All national groups shall be protected by law against insults to their race and national pride; All people shall have equal right to use their languages and to develop their own folk culture and customs; The preaching and practice of national, race or colour discrimination and contempt shall be a punishable crime.

Democracy and domination appeared as two mutually exclusive concepts. Rather than African majority rule, the Charter stood for a policy of ethnic federation: "All national groups shall have equal rights […] There shall be equal status in the bodies of state, in the courts and in the schools for all national groups and races."37 Dispelling fears of whites, Lutuli emphasised his sympathy for a multi-racial South Africa at a public meeting for whites organised by the Congress of Democrats: There is a growing number of people who are coming to accept the fact that in South Africa we are a multi-racial community […] We are all here and no one desires to change it or should desire to change it.

36

37

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Lutuli, A 1955: Special Presidential Message (17th December 1955), From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 213. The Freedom Charter 1955, From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 205.

And since we are all here, we must seek a way whereby we can realise democracy, so that we can live in peace and harmony in this land of ours.38

The Freedom Charter is also remarkable because it is diametrically opposed to the Youth League's conviction of the 1940s to negate multi-racial cooperation and cooperation with communists. The decision of the ANC to intensify cooperation across the racial line also reinforced resistance against racially based nationalism: the strategy of building a multi-racial united front made the adoption of any racially exclusive standpoint politically impossible. Both, the contents of the doctrine and the practice of cooperation were called "multi-racialism". Explanations why the Freedom Charter turned out to be so moderate or "pragmatic" are various. First of all, Lembede's former comrades had moved into a position of influence within the ANC and had modified their attitudes as to assure majority support. Also, the ANC's main focus remained on white politics and the belief that if the government did not react to the pressures of the Defiance Campaign than at least the opinion of white voters would swift towards a more conciliatory standpoint. Furthermore, many Congress members were committed to a certain Christian morale frowning racial exclusiveness. Lastly, the ANC hoped to gain international credit and support for its aims by representing the morally superior attitude. Indeed, international recognition followed when Lutuli received the Nobel Peace Price in 1962. Another important reason for the "moderateness" of the Charter can be seen in the social strata of the ANC political elites. While at local and provincial level workers represented the majority, the men who were elected into the National Executive Committee of the ANC were almost always middle or upper-middle class. For example in 1952, out of the 23 men elected more than half belonged to the "elite": they were lawyers, doctors, ministers, professors and business men. Especially the economic part of the Charter was therefore a reflection of middle class values and interests. The ANC visualised a redistribution of wealth towards blacks but not an attack on class differences as such. Also, it wanted to reallocate land to give Africans their just share, but its aim was never to abolish land ownership. Nationalisation of mines, banks and monopoly industries was always thought of within the framework of capitalism. However, this middle class became more and more threatened, as the policy of apartheid was to close off every possibility of black middle class privilege. Instead of focussing on white authority, the leading squad now sought the support of the dis38

Lutuli, A: Freedom is the apex, From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 458.

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possessed masses. According to Gerhart, the more pressure was exerted on this group, "the more the recognition of an identity of interests between all strata of African society was bound to develop" (Gerhart, 1978:110). Compared to other parts of the continent, Hodkin finds "a close resemblance – as regards both languages and ideas – to the texts of comparable charters" of African nationalist movements during colonial rule. There were however decisive differences: The Freedom Charter was "more moderate in tone", emphasising liberties rather than independence and aiming for the "continuance of multi-national rather than an essential Negro-African state" (Carter& Karis, 1977:64). The Freedom Charter's position on nationalism was therefore a "clear repudiation of the Africanist view that South Africa was similar in all essential respects to black nations that were struggling for independence elsewhere in the continent" (Frederickson, 1995:282). 3.1.4 Return to Africanism: the Formation of the Pan-Africanist Congress Despite more militant tactics, the ANC remained moderate. It called for a democratic revolution without simultaneously demanding fundamental economic transformation (Lodge, 1995:234). It called for the abandonment of racial categories in a non-racial state while simultaneously recognising and incorporating them as they had been imposed (Marx, 1996:199). Soon, more militant African nationalists within the Youth League challenged the multi-racialist line of the ANC. The tensions between multiracial and African nationalism surfaced dramatically in 1959 when the Pan Africanist Congress separated from the ANC. After the separation, quite some tension developed between the ANC and the PAC, especially among those members who remained sympathetic to African nationalism within the ANC. The group most opposed to the Freedom Charter's "multiracial" premises was the Africanists that advocated an exclusive nationalism. According to Van Vuuren, one ideological component of exclusive nationalism is the identification of "enemies of the nation" (Van Vuuren, 2002:6). Indeed, Robert Sobukwe, one of the most articulate Africanists not only underlined his commitment to Lembede's version of nationalism but also made clear what he thought of his opponents. In his position as the editor of The Africanist, he stated in an article in 1955: There can be no question on the ideological plane as to the correctness and dynamism of African Nationalism as an outlook for giving the African people the self-confidence and subjective liberation, without which no national oppression can be effectively challenged. And from our inception we have stood for the return to orthodox Lembede stand. In our opinion the situation has not changed to warrant a compromise

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or somersault on principles. We have found it absolutely impossible to tolerate deviationists and pacifists.39

In 1959, Sobukwe headed the break away of the Pan-Africanist Congress. Due to the Charter's guarantee of "equal status […] for all national groups and races", the Africanists charged the ANC for invigorating race as a category. Therefore, they accused the Charter of "multiplied racialism". In return, the Africanists denied that colour was of any significance and preferred to call themselves "nonracialists" or "anti-racists" as opposed to "multiracialists". In line with the tradition of Western liberalism, they argued that only individuals not groups or classes could be the bearer of rights. However, there were various contradictions. Firstly, the term "multiracialism" is not mentioned in the Charter, and prominent ANC members like Matthews and Lutuli also preferred the name "nonracialism" (Carter& Karis, 1977:65). Secondly, the Africanists themselves never lived up to the claim of nonracialism. Though race was not stressed in a biological sense, its importance was all the more emphasised on a symbolic level. For example, central to the dispute with the ANC was the feeling that the Freedom Charter had given away the African right of "ownership" of South Africa. To demonstrate their diverging answers to the national question, Sobukwe cites the old Garveyite slogan: "We claim Africa for the Africans; the ANC claims South Africa for all." In his opening address to the PAC congress, Sobukwe emphasised the existence of various "national groups" in South Africa with "shared historical experiences". Europeans were considered as a "foreign minority group" and as such responsible for the "degradation of the indigenous African people". Also, Indians were regarded as a "foreign minority group". Though constituting an imposed category, racial identity was seen as an unavoidable legacy of racism. Therefore, racial sentiments should be embraced as a means of mobilisation: African masses constitute the key […] of any struggle for true democracy in South Africa. And the African people can be organized only under the banner of African nationalism in an All-African organisation […] only the Africans can guarantee the establishment of a genuine democracy in which all men will be citizens of a common state and will live and be governed as individuals and not as distinctive sectional groups.40

Four months later, another statement appealed to racial identity:

39

40

Sobukwe, R 1955: The editor speaks: We shall live (December 1955), From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 210. Sobukwe, R 1959: Opening Address (4th April 1959), From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 515f.

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The African people, therefore awake! They are waiting […] to battle for the reconquest of the continent of Afrika which for over 300 years has been the prostitute of the philanderers and rakes of western capitalism […] Afrika for the Africans. (A democratic rule of an African majority.)41

However, the question was not answered how racial sentiments, once independence was won, could be turned off again (Frederickson, 1995:284). Other differences between ANC and PAC were the question of a class-based analysis of the struggle and multi-racial cooperation. In 1959, Sobukwe addresses the latter contestation: "we differ in our attitude to 'co-operation'. We believe that co-operation is possible only between equals. There can be no co-operation between oppressor and oppressed, dominating and dominated. That is collaboration, not co-operation." Especially regarding whites, he insists: "on the material level we just cannot see any possibility of cooperation […] we know that a group in a privileged position never voluntarily relinquishes that position." Another contestation with the ANC was the question of "exceptionalism" of the South African case. The ANC represented the attitude that it might be justified for other African countries to disregard European or Asian residence and conceive of their nationalism as a pure reflection of African culture and personality, in South Africa, this was not the case. It constituted a multi-racial, multi-cultural society, where nationalism should derive from common political and economic interests rather than from the cultural identity of a single group, even if it represented the majority. The PAC however saw South Africa as no essentially different from other African countries. Sobukwe placed the Africanist movement in line with the continental struggle against colonialism: "History is already vindicating our stand as far as the continent is concerned. We are in step with the continent. And the reason is that we correctly interpret the aspirations of the African people."42 In the opening address of the PAC congress he states: "Our contention is that South Africa is an integral part of the invisible whole that is Afrika. She cannot solve her problems in isolation from and with utter disregard of the rest of the continent."43 Therefore, South Africa should be incorporated into a future United States of Africa.

41

42

43

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Sobukwe, R 1959: The state of the nation (2nd August 1959), From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 543. It is interesting to note here, that "Afrika" is spelled with a "k" in order to draw a distinction to English-speaking South Africans. Future of the Africanist movement (January 1959), From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 506510. Opening Address, From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 516.

The Africanist movement met with criticism from various positions within the ANC. Joe Matthews for example, president of the CYL in the mid 1950s, denounced Sobukwe's "refusal to guarantee the rights of minorities" and linked it to German Nazism and Afrikaner nationalism: "The Nazis practised oppression of the Jewish minority by the majority. It is the 'democratic German majority' which oppressed the Jews […] The Africans do not want to repeat the mistakes of Afrikaner nationalism." Instead, he insisted on the "rights to minority groups".44 However strong the critique regarding exclusive African nationalism, the ANC's ideology also remained ambivalent: It persisted as a racially exclusive organisation and consciously made use of its power as an institution of the African majority. As Frederickson notes: "An implicit Africanism persisted among ANC supporters to that extend that they noted with satisfaction that an all-African organisation was the flagship in the anti-apartheid fleet and would in the end have the strongest voice deciding South Africa's future." (Frederickson, 1995:285) 3.1.5 Black Consciousness and United Democratic Front It would go beyond the scope of this study to exemplify in detail the developments of African nationalism within the ANC until the end of apartheid. However, some general tendencies leading up to the nation-building concepts in post-apartheid South Africa shall be outlined in the following. Under Hendrik F. Verwoerd, prime minister from 1958 to1966, apartheid's racist legislation and practice reached its culmination. At the same time, the concentration in urban centres facilitated black political organisation. The Sharpville Massacre45 of 1960 contributed to the radicalisation of black

44

45

Matthews, J 1959: "Africanism" under the Microscope (July 1959), From protest to challenge, vol. 3, 539. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission found in its report that the police deliberately opened fire on an unarmed crowd that had gathered peacefully at Sharpville on 21st March 1960 to protest against the pass laws. The South African Police failed to give the crowd an order to disperse before they began firing and continued to fire upon the fleeing crowd, resulting in hundreds of people being shot in the back. As a result of the excessive force used, 69 people were killed and more than 300 injured. The police failed to facilitate access to medical and/or other assistance to those who were wounded immediately after the march. Many of the participants in the march were apolitical, women and unarmed, and had attended the march because they were opposed to the pass laws. Many of those injured in the march were placed under police guard in hospital as if they were convicted criminals and, upon release from hospital, were detained for long periods in prison before being formally charged. (Truth and Rec-

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political protest. In the same year, political organisations like ANC and PAC were banned and the Black Consciousness movement (BC) was rising to fill the vacuum. The BC was an attempt to transcend sub-identities and construct black unity as a new culture of resistance. One can therefore hypothesise that the high tide of racial domination also produced the high point of unified racial identity. During the 1960s, the New Left, mainly consisting of student activists who had international connections, characterised black political thought. The most important current in the context of this study is the Black Consciousness movement that was called into being in 1969 by Steve Biko. BC elaborated on an ideology that cut across official racial categories. According to the movement, "black" meant all those "nonwhites" including coloureds and Indians as far as they sided with the struggle against racial oppression. Blacks who chose to collaborate with the apartheid government were in turn considered as "nonwhites". Race was therefore not culturally or biologically defined but regarded as a political choice. The implicit message was that "one was as black as one felt" (Frederickson, 1995:301). The BC's approach to "race" was therefore giving credit to constructivist rather than primordialist approaches. The example of a new conception of "race" shows that the black liberation movement tried to confront and come to terms with the old antinomy in black political thought: non-racialism and racial nationalism. By the inclusive definition of "black", the movement departed from its Pan-Africanist roots. BC also rejected the Pan-Africanist notion of "African tradition" as the basis for people-hood and "national solidarity". Rather, it assorted social facts of racial domination as its common ground. Black nationalism was ranked as superior to African, Indian or coloured nationalisms that were considered as ethnic. Black Consciousness championed for programmatic unity among existing "black" organisations, a fact that resembled the Charterists' idea of multi-racial cooperation. However, the BC also broke with the ANC's multi-racialism in that it revitalised a tradition of racial populism, one that Charterists had worked to banish. It asserted the race-conscious view that the land belonged to black people, although it induced a broader meaning of "black" as previous African nationalists. In Biko's words: "We black people should all the time keep in mind that South Africa is our country and that all of it belongs to us" (quoted in Frederickson, 1995:300). This probably was a

onciliation Commission 1998: Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa report, vol.3, Chapter 6. Cape Town: The Commission).

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conscious repudiation of the Freedom Charter's statement "South Africa belongs to all who live in it". In some respects, BC therefore constituted a revival of the PAC's anti-Charterist ideas. In 1976, BC rhetoric converged with student opposition against Afrikaans school instructions for blacks that culminated in the "Soweto uprising". The murder of Biko in 1977 and the banning of the BC were a decisive turning point in black political history. Many students of the Black Consciousness movement fled into neighbouring countries where they were recruited by the guerrilla armies of the ANC.46 Again, black politics swung in a non-racial direction because the ANC and its allies could incorporate the largest numbers of BC-orientated youth (Halisi, 1999:10). This is also undermined by the fact that since 1969, whites had been allowed to join the ANC and since 1985, all racial groups could be elected for its executive committees. However strategically, the Black Consciousness movement had also influenced the ANC in growing measures. Evidence is that the organisation was now increasingly readdressing mass-based, locally organised resistance. In 1979, Prime Minister Pieter Willem Botha introduced a tricameral parliament, giving limited representation to Asians and coloureds. However, a large majority of the Asian and coloured population did not participate in the national elections because they sought to overcome the entire system of racial legislation. In the 1980s, the exiled parties began to develop their own legal internal wings. The United Democratic Front (UDF) formed in 1983 as the national unification of opposition against apartheid. Its success lay open the state's failed efforts to incorporate previously discriminated groups. Consisting of members of the ANC, BC, coloured, Indian but also white organisations, the UDF practised a "new interracialism" (Frederickson, 1995:311). Welcoming all racial groups, the organisation identified itself with the Freedom Charter and worked towards a racially inclusive democratic South Africa. 46

After being banned, the ANC, South African Communist Party (SACP) and fraternal organisations announced their armed struggle on 16 December 1961 by a series of bomb blasts against apartheid structures in Johannesburg, Port Elizabeth and Durban. A "revolutionary army" was formed, referred to as Umkhonto We Sizwe (Spear of the nation) or MK. It consisted of guerrilla units, underground urban combat groups and self-defence units. Between 1967 and 1968, the "Luthuli Detachment" engaged in battles in Zimbabwe. Umkhonto We Sizwe also participated in the liberation struggles of Mozambique and Angola, ending with the independence of these countries in 1975. After the Soweto uprising, many students (referred to as the "June 16 Detachment") left South Africa to join the MK. In newly established

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Even former members of the BC stated that racially exclusive nationalism had had its historical role but was now outlived. However, the UDF was careful not to distance itself too much from the mobilising potential of racial assertiveness. Much like the ANC, it also benefited from a vague inclusiveness to attract a wide alliance (Marx, 1996:203). The mainstream liberation movement also absorbed part of the BC's philosophy and an "unacknowledged accommodation between the two protest traditions" emerged (Frederickson, 1995:312). The ANC's multi-racialism of the 1950s, characterised by exclusive membership policy and emphasis on special attention to minority rights, had given way to consistent non-racialism. On the surface, this inclusive South African nationalism formed the antithesis to the PAC's African nationalism. As Mandela asserted in his 1990 address to the United States Congress: […] that this complex South African society, which has known nothing but racism for three centuries, should be transformed into an oasis of good race relations, where the black shall to the white be sister and brother, a fellow South African, an equal human being – both citizens of the world (quoted in Fredrickson, 1995:312).

According to Frederickson, the new non-racialist stance however resembled Sobukwe's African nationalism more than it seemed. As Africans constituted the majority, in a democracy based on majority rule they would predominate. The decisive difference to African nationalism was however that all racial groups were welcomed to participate in the struggle against apartheid. Because of these ambivalent appeals, it was possible "for those whose true sentiments partook of Pan Africanism or orthodox African nationalism to coexist in the ANC with those whose nonracialism came from ideological convictions – Christian, Marxist or liberal democratic" (Frederickson, 1995:312f). Consequently, the ANC's victory would not have been due to a special ideology but to the fact that its commitment to democracy could accommodate a greater range of ideological styles than its rivals.

3.2 Transition of ANC Nationalism in Post-Apartheid: Continuities and Change The extensive evaluation of nationalism in the history of the ANC was aimed at illustrating how both, non-racial and racial concepts have played a continuing role within

camps in Angola, they took part in military training programmes. By 1977, the MK began to infiltrate hundreds of its combatants back into the country.

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the organisation. Rather than deciding for one approach once and for all, the Congress remained ambivalent and open for change. The end of apartheid brought new challenges to nation-building objectives.47 Obviously, ruling elites would abandon apartheid while hoping to preserve the polity, restore growth and retain long entrenched white advantage. But also the negotiation partner ANC was eager to contain the threat of rising popular protest against the apartheid state. The imperative that allied former antagonistic parties, most prominently the National Party and the ANC, was the need for nation-consolidation in order to prevent a full-scale civil war. Earlier, this imperative of nation-consolidation was applied exclusively to whites (as to reconcile English and Afrikaners), now it worked across the racial divide (Marx, 1996:213). The glue for consolidating national unity was seen in the common interest in economic growth, education and concrete improvements of the living conditions of the majority. These pragmatic approaches also reflected the interests of a growing black middle class within the leadership ranks of the ANC. According to Marx, "the very existence of such an African bourgeoisie sharing an interest in economic stability and growth itself reassured whites" (Marx, 1996:210). There were several efforts towards a new inclusive national unity. On an institutional level, the interim Government of National Unity, that included an array of parties, served to unify the nation-state by reaffirming its autonomy and ensuring popular loyalty towards it.48 Besides institutionalised inclusion, ideological concepts elaborated on a new national identity. In the following, four of the ANC's major concepts concerned with the question of a national identity in post-apartheid South Africa will be introduced shortly: Mandela's "rainbow nation", the "I am an African" and "two nation" speech of Mbeki as well as his concept of an "African Renaissance". Chapter 4 will examine the contents of these efforts more closely, asking for the exact character of national identity that these concepts propose and evaluating their implications for a newly developing democracy.

47

48

For the various accounts of the nation-building discourse see: Boyce, B 1999: Nation-building discourse in a democracy. In: Palmberg, M (Ed.): National Identity and Democracy in Africa. Pretoria: Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa, the Mayibuye Centre at the University of Western Cape and the Nordic Africa Institute, 231-243; Maré, G 1999: The notion of 'nation' and the practice of 'nation-building' in post-apartheid South Africa. In: ibid., 244-260; Mattes, R 1999: Do diverse social identities inhabit nationhood and democracy? Initial considerations from South Africa. In: ibid., 261-286. However in 1996, the NNP left the Government of Unity to form an opposition.

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3.2.1 The Rainbow Nation In May 1994, South Africa celebrated the inauguration of Mandela as president. Since his release from prison in 1990, Mandela had performed "imaginative gestures of reconciliation and empathy" with the white South Africa (Lodge, 2002:14). He praised Afrikaans as a "truly African language" of "liberation and hope" (Johnson, 1991), paid a visit to the (white-dominated) Rugby World Cup and met with old adversaries. Most prominently, Mandela became an advocate of the idea of South Africa as a "rainbow nation". Archbishop Desmond Tutu first introduced this term in a speech given at the City Hall in Cape Town on 13th September 1989. Addressing then-president Fredrik Willem De Klerk, Tutu claimed: This country is a rainbow country! This country is technicolour. You can come and see the new South Africa […] I want us to stand – Capetonians, South Africans, black, white, whatever, and hold hands […] They tried to make us one colour: purple. We say we are the rainbow people! We are the new people of the new South Africa! (Tutu, 1995:183f)

In his State of the Nation address on 24th May 1994, Mandela drew upon images of past heroes and heroines to constitute a national identity: "The time will come when our nation will honour the memory of all the sons […] who, by their thoughts and deeds, gave us the right to assert with pride that we are South Africans, that we are Africans and that we are citizens of the World." He referred to a "shared destiny" of the nation, though not biologically defined but as an "effect of our historical burdens". Apart from citing "our glories" of the past, Mandela painted a "glorious future" for the nation. Rather than emphasising race, he drew on the liberal tradition of individual rights and duties. According to him, it must be fought for a society that restores "human dignity" and guarantees the "freedom of the individual" as well as "the political and the human rights of all our citizens". With reference to other nations, Mandela called for the participation in the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) and the Commonwealth as an "important community of nations" (Mandela, 2003a). Two years later, Mandela situated himself clearly in the Charterist tradition of nationalism, referring to it as the glue to national unity: The community has given our nation outstanding leaders whose contribution and sacrifice for the ideal of a non-racial democracy have been immense […] Non-racialism is one of those ideals that unites us. It recognises South Africans as citizens of a single rainbow nation, acknowledging and appreciating differences and diversity.

This statement also shows Mandela's attempt to reconcile Charterism with persisting racial identities referring to them as "differences" that are valuable. However, he 76

strongly called for further efforts to eradicate racial identities: "We need, as a nation, to strenuously combat racism […] De-racialising South African society is the new moral and political challenge facing our young democracy". Again, he drew upon past achievements to generate feelings of national pride: "All the people, from whatever sector, feel the dignity and pride of a nation which freed itself" (Mandela, 1996:7f). In his State of the Nation address on 7th February 1997, Mandela linked patriotism to pride in the nation: "a new nation is being forged; a nation whose new patriotism and sense of pride derive not only from ideas in our hearts, but also from concrete progress made in improving the well-being of all" (Mandela, 2003b). Without mentioning racial categories, he again propagated that differences existed and should be handled with care. Mandela did not exemplify what constitutes these differences. However, he suggested to regard them as a product of different economic and social status: "We have to do this and more, sensitive to the feelings of the majority and the minority, the have and the have-nots, those who have the media to communicate their ideas and those deprived of such resources." Situating himself in the tradition of constitutional nationalism, Mandela stated: "We can all derive pride from the fact that we took a historic step in this direction last year through the adoption of the new Constitution." Regarding the opposition, Mandela formulated a position favourable of a competitive democracy: Co-operative governance and the new patriotism also mean a loyal opposition: an opposition that opposes, but remains loyal to the Constitution; an opposition that takes part in the major national programmes to […] improve South Africa's standing in the world […] We are encouraged that all the parties in this chamber have committed themselves to this national consensus […] We need to act together to implement its provisions.

This quote shows that patriotism is not only measured in terms of loyalty to the Constitution, but also in terms of supporting "what is good for the nation". However, it is not defined who determines "what is good for the nation". This leaves the possibility to denounce opposition to government policy as "unpatriotic". 3.2.2 Thabo Mbeki: I am an African What exactly "being African" means is one of the main questions in the striving for a new South African national identity. According to Barber, Mbeki now set out to develop a rallying cry for the benighted continent and, in the tradition of Mandela and Biko, foster a sense of pride and confidence in being African (Barber, 2004:124). On 77

the occasion of adopting the new South African constitution on 8th May 1996, thendeputy president Mbeki gave an address to parliament "I am an African". Drawing upon a common territory as well as a shared history, Mbeki explicitly rejected a cultural definition of African identity. Lodge therefore calls it "one of the most visionary and poetic public statements to have been delivered by an ANC leader in recent history, especially in its inclusive definition of Africanism" (Lodge, 2002:240). In his territorial definition, Mbeki alludes to South Africa's nature, calling it his "native land": "The dramatic shapes of the Drakensberg, the soil-coloured waters of the Lekoa, iGqili noThukela, and the sands of the Kgalagadi have all been panels of the set on the natural stage on which we act." (Mbeki, 1998a:31) Situating himself in the tradition of non-racial nationalism, Mbeki characterised everyone as "African" who considers the continent his or her home: I owe my being to the Khoi and the San whose desolate souls haunt the great expanses of the beautiful Cape […] I am formed of the migrants who left Europe to find a new home on our native land […] In my veins courses the blood of the Malay slaves who came from the East […] I am a grandchild of the warrior men and women that Hintsa and Sekhukhune led, the patriots that Cetshawayo and Mphephu took to battle, the soldiers Moshoeshoe and Ngungunyane taught […] My mind and my knowledge of myself is formed by the victories that are the jewels in our African crown, the victories we earned from Isandhlwana to Khartoum, as Ethiopians and as the Ashanti of Ghana, as the Berbers of the desert. […] I am the grandchild who lays fresh flowers on the Boer graves at St Helena and the Bahamas […] I am a child of Nongqause […] I come of those who were transported from India and China […] Being part of all these people, and in the knowledge that none dare contest that assertion, I shall claim that I am an African! (Mbeki, 1998a:34)

Mbeki underlined that the people of South Africa "refused to accept that our Africanness shall be defined by our race, colour, gender or historical origins". Repeating the commitment made by the Charterists in 1955, he claimed: "South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white." Mbeki also represented the anti-primordialist approach to nationalism, stressing the contingent character of a nation: "It rejoices in the diversity of our people and creates the space for all of us voluntarily to define ourselves as one people." Furthermore, Mbeki drew upon religious imagery to assert the equal status of all Africans: "God created all men and women in His image." He also warned against feelings of national superiority and promoted the valuation of other nations by demanding to "draw on the accumulated experience and wisdom of all humankind". Especially the last statement shows that Mbeki tried to align South African national identity with a broader, African identity. Accordingly, the first tendencies towards Mbeki's African Renaissance one year later can be noted: "Africa reaffirms, that she is continuing her rise from the ashes. Whatever the setbacks of the

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moment, nothing can stop us now! Whatever the difficulties, Africa shall be at peace! However improbable it may sound to the sceptics, Africa will prosper!" 3.2.3 The African Renaissance With his parliamentary address on 10th June 1997, Mbeki introduced the term of the "African Renaissance".49 He posed the question if South Africa really was a nation, as "we daily proclaim ourselves" or if it merely constituted "a collection of communities that happen to inhabit one geopolitical space". To answer this question, Mbeki proposed to identify whether there exists a national consensus or interest based on a shared national agenda. In his view, a shared national agenda should be the constitution, i.e. the aim to develop "a society characterised by equality, non-racialism, nonsexism and human dignity". Without this consensus on the constitution, the country would be condemned "to a destructive civil war". This statement underlines Marx' argument that the common interest in the stability of the country was glue to national unity. In Mbeki's view, the discussions around various issues (like affirmative action, welfare system, corruption, Truth an Reconciliation Commission) however demonstrate that a national consensus is not yet manifest, therefore the nation still has to be built. The inequalities of the past have to be eradicated because "the new nation cannot be born on the basis of the perpetuation of the injustices of the past". However, Mbeki did not characterise these inequalities as merely a result of "race and colour", even though he asserted that this classification is responsible for fundamental imbalances. Furthermore, Mbeki reminded his audience that the success of South Africa depends on the existence of an international community. Therefore, South Africans had "the 49

The idea was however neither original nor new. In 1937 for example, Nnamdi Azikiwe, later president of Nigeria had published his intellectual manifesto Renascent Africa (Azikiwe, N 1969: Renascent Africa. New York: Negro University Press). Also Leonard Barnes, a former British civil servant, had written an African Renaissance in 1969 (Barnes, L 1969: African Renaissance. London: Victor Gollancz). In South Africa, a "Black Renaissance Convention" had been formed to "re-examine our cultural heritage" (Thoahlane, T 1974: Black Renaissance. Papers from the Black Renaissance Convention. Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 7f). The new ANC leadership also emphasised Mandela's record as an "Africanist" traditionalist and as such a guiding genius of the South African led "African Renaissance" (Lodge, T 1983: Black politics in South Africa since 1945. Johannesburg: Raven Press, 18). According to Barber, Mandela had first spoken of an African Renaissance at an OAU meeting in June 1994 (Barber, J 2004: Mandela's World. The international dimension of South Africa's Political Revolution, 1990-99. Oxford [et al] : James Currey, 124.

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obligation to contribute to the common African continental effort, at last to achieve an African Renaissance, including the establishment of stable democracies, respect for human rights, an end to violent conflicts and a better life for all the peoples of Africa" (Mbeki, 1997:7f). He champions for the "recovery of our continent from […] slave trade, colonial domination and exploitation, apartheid, bad African governance and the identification of what is bad with the colour black". By the end of the year, the African Renaissance had become a strategic objective, incorporated in the programme statements endorsed at the ANC's 50th national conference (Mandela, 1997). Mbeki used the concept of the African Renaissance broadly and flexibly, which enabled him to stress different aspects to different audiences. In a 1998 radio broadcast, he spoke primarily of the violence and instability of the African continent. Blaming greedy African leaders for "corrupt[ing] our societies", Mbeki called for the "rediscovery of our soul" that had flourished in ancient Egypt, Axum, Carthage, Zimbabwe and Benin (Barber, 2004:125). In his 2001 address at the University of Havana, Mbeki stressed the importance of the African Renaissance as a "self-definition of Africans by Africans". This was a means to fight "prejudices and stereotypes" as well as "racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, sexism and other intolerances". He cited past tragedies: "the Khoi and the San had their cultures, traditions and languages destroyed, and whole communities were virtually wiped out, such that only pockets of these proud Africans remain today" (Mbeki, 2002:74). Also, he alluded to past glories: "We both had numerous heroic struggles against colonialism and later its offshoot neo-colonialism." Aligning South Africa with the rest of the continent, he stated that "the total decolonisation of the continent" would remain "in the collective memory of all African patriots". Although celebrating a "new internationalism" and emphasising that "although our habitat is Africa, we are part of humanity", Mbeki stressed the importance of fighting "cultural imperialism". This is especially interesting as Mbeki had refrained from defining "African" before, but now asserted that "we have to cultivate our value system through the production and sharing of literature, films, the products of creative art and the outcomes of sport that portray us correctly and differently from the dominant cultures conveyed by today's mass media". Mbeki therefore suggested that there is a "true" African culture or African "value-system" that is penetrated by other "cultures". This is already part of a cultural definition of nationalism that represents a decisive break with his "I am an African" speech.

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3.2.4 South Africa: a Country of two Nations In a statement entitled "South Africa: Two nations", delivered at the opening of the debate on reconciliation and nation-building on 29th May 1998, Mbeki defined nation-building as "the construction of the reality and the sense of common nationhood which would result from the abolition of disparities in the quality of life among South Africans based on the racial, gender and geographic inequalities we all inherited from the past" (Mbeki, 1998b:71). According to these ideals, the objective of nationbuilding had not been achieved. As a result of material inequalities, South Africa is a country of two nations. One of these nations is white, relatively prosperous, regardless of gender or geographical dispersal […] The second and larger nation of South Africa is black and poor, with the worst affected being women in rural areas, the black rural population in general and the disabled.

These findings were the results of a growing dissatisfaction with the "grumbling from some sectors of our society" to make their contribution towards reconciliation. Especially, Mbeki referred to reluctance in tax paying, racial representation/ affirmative action policies, reporting to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and continuing racist behaviour of some elements of the security forces. He asked: "Are the relatively rich, who as a result of an apartheid definition are white, prepared to help underwrite the upliftment of the poor, who as a result of an apartheid definition are black?" This statement shows that Mbeki restrained from equating the colour of skin with cultural or biological characteristics but stressed the historical origins of the racial division. Also, he honours contributions "including people among the white and Afrikaner community, who by word and deed have demonstrated a real commitment to the translation of the vision of national unity and reconciliation into reality" (Mbeki, 1998b:76). Yet for the first time since a long period, the "two nation" speech explicitly made references to a racial connotation of nation.

3.3 Conclusion Even though it implied Pan-Africanist rhetoric and an all-African membership, the ANC's early concept of nationalism was not exclusive. With the civil rights movement in America, independent struggles on the African continent and the beginnings of apartheid as a background, nationalism adopted new forms of exclusivity in the case of Africanism and incorporativity in the case of Charterism. Though the ANC heavily criticised African nationalism, throughout its history the organisation con81

tinually played with appeals towards racial sentiments and kept them available as a mobilisation force. With the help of constructivist analysis it could be shown that African nationalism articulated the feeling that Africans were a nation without state. Moreover, Congress members imagined themselves as a racial community, supported by invented traditions and notions of common history and descent. In new South African parliamentary terms, explicit African nationalism constitutes only a small force (in the general elections of 2004, the PAC achieved 0.73 per cent of the votes). But race-conscious discourses have been a far too integral part of black political thought to be summarily dismissed. The historical dichotomy of Africanist and Charterist nationalism also persists within the ANC. The concept of a rainbow nation and Mbeki's "I am an African" speech paid tribute to an inclusive, "constitutional" nationalism in the tradition of Charterism. However, Mbeki's African Renaissance reveals similarities to Pan-Africanism and leaves open "cultural" definitions of nationalism. In his "two nation" address, Mbeki explicitly linked nation to colour of skin, though still emphasising the historical, social and economic dimension of this division. Some authors therefore suggest that "race conscious populism pulsates strongly within the ANC" (Halisi, 1999:14). The next chapter will evaluate, if the new concepts of nationalism can be placed in an Africanist tradition and what implications the various discourses could have on the young democracy.

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Chapter 4: Analysis and Assessment of the Transition of African Nationalism In the previous chapters, I have introduced theories to conceptualise and categorise nationalism and illustrated the history of African nationalism within the ANC. This chapter will evaluate what kind of nationalism the ANC's concepts of nation-building in post-apartheid South Africa propose. I will therefore regard the two latest examples: the "African Renaissance" and Mbeki's "two nation" address. Having discussed the racial or non-racial character of these nation-building concepts, I will give an outlook on the possible implications of a reoccurring nationalism for South African society.

4.1 Analysis of Nation Concepts in Post-Apartheid South Africa

4.1.1 The African Renaissance According to Maseko and Vale, there are two ways of interpreting Mbeki's African Renaissance, one emphasising its "globalist" the other its "Africanist" content (Maseko& Vale, 2002:126). Lodge makes a similar distinction, calling the former content the "idea of modernity" and the latter the "idea of heritage and legacy" (Lodge, 2002:228). In this study, the latter idea as a basic mechanism of constructing national identity is especially important. I will therefore shortly evaluate the "globalist" interpretation of the African Renaissance before examining its "Africanist" content more closely. The African Renaissance in its instrumentalist understanding promotes the view that information technology, liberal democracy and market economy will provide the basis for new prosperity and progress in South Africa as well as on the continent. This interpretation has assumed its strategic dimension during 2001 with the formation of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD). Essential to NEPAD is the belief that the behaviour of the African ruling class will determine whether the continent will benefit from global capital flow. It therefore promotes the adoption of liberal constitutions, the introduction of democratic governments and cultures and the fortification of civil society. Even more emphasis lays on economic necessities of upgrading infrastructure (especially taking into account information technology), in83

vesting in "human capital" and promoting exports as well as economic diversification. In order to transform the "idea of modernity" into reality, South Africa should play a leading role in the Southern African Development Community (SADC). The African Renaissance in its "Africanist" interpretation contains elements of Anderson's "imagined community" as well as Hobsbawm's "invention of tradition". With reference to Marcus Garvey, it promotes a common African identity, calling for a reinterpretation of African history and culture. The belief is put about that modern phenomena like bureaucracies, international markets and electronic technology can be humanised and adapted to African needs. Therefore, African communities should reconstruct themselves around their tradition, legacy and heritage. Values and relationships that characterised pre-colonial institutions and norms should be restored. One important model that is always referred to in this context is the concept of "ubuntu".50 The "Africanist" interpretation also stresses South Africa's identity as African. Compared to the history of African nationalist discourse in the ANC, what kind of nationalism does the African Renaissance suggest? As the African Renaissance aligns South Africa with the rest of the continent, references to Pan-Africanism seem most obvious. However, even though there are "striking continuities" to Pan-Africanism, there are also decisive differences (Bullen, 1999:20). Continuities are that the Garvey slogan "Africa for the Africans" remains a strong theme, now emphasising economic rather than political independence. Furthermore, the Pan-Africanist demand for a "United States of Africa" is present in the valuation of economic and political cooperation. This dimension assumed political institutionalisation in form of the African Union (AU) in 2002. Lastly, Mbeki supports the Pan-Africanist "solidarity of black people everywhere", however acknowledging the vast differences between Africans 50

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"Ubuntu" was given first systematic written exposition by Jordan Ngubane, also a founding member of the ANC Youth League (Ngubane, J 1975: Ushaba: a Zulu Urlando. Washington: Three Continents Press). Since his description of ubuntu as a common foundation of all African cultures and as a "consciousness of belonging together", this concept has been adopted and developed further. The Human Science Research Council for example recommended ubuntu as a sub-system which could supply the foundations for democratic institutions (Sindane, J [no date]: Democracy in African Societies and Ubuntu. Pretoria: Human Science Research Council, 8). Also, the Constitutional Court judge Yvonne Mokgoro promoted the view that ubuntu could shape the jurisprudence with its values of collectiveness, unity and group solidarity. Group interests should therefore prevail over individual rights (Mokgoro, Y 1998: Ubuntu and the law in Africa. In: Occasional Papers: The African Renaissance. Johannesburg: Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, 52).

and Afro-Americans. Another continuity from my point of view is the refusal to accept the thesis of a South African "exceptionalism". Differing from Pan-Africanist interpretations, African "morale and culture" do not form a central theme of the African Renaissance discourse. Furthermore, "African nationalism" is no longer regarded as a key concept. In many aspects, the African Renaissance resembles nationalist discourses discussed in chapter 2. First of all, the African Renaissance by its name embodies the assumption that there is communality between African countries. The different interpretations of the Renaissance relate to the different approaches in which this communality is imagined. Mbeki's anti-culturalist interpretation of African identity and his engagement in neo-liberal51 projects suggest, that he supports the "globalist" rather than the "Africanist" interpretation of the Renaissance. Therefore, the community that he is eager to establish is not addressed in terms of ethnic nationalism (with reference to race, culture or tradition) but rather by stressing common problems, relating to a history of common oppression and colonial rule. Following the "globalist" interpretation, the Renaissance calls for African unity on grounds of a "common sense of purpose".

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"Neo-liberalism", according to the definition of Arnoldo García and Elizabeth Martinez, "is a set of economic policies that have become widespread during the last 25 years […] 'Liberalism' can refer to political, economic, or even religious ideas […] 'Neo' means we are talking about a new kind of liberalism […] The liberal school of economics became famous in Europe when Adam Smith, an English economist, published a book in 1776 called The Wealth of Nations. He and others advocated the abolition of government intervention in economic matters. No restrictions on manufacturing, no barriers to commerce, no tariffs, he said; free trade was the best way for a nation's economy to develop. Such ideas were 'liberal' in the sense of no controls. This application of individualism encouraged 'free' enterprise and 'free' competition […] Economic liberalism prevailed in the United States through the 1800s and early 1900s. Then the Great Depression of the 1930s led an economist named John Maynard Keynes to a theory that challenged liberalism as the best policy for capitalists. He said, in essence, that full employment is necessary for capitalism to grow and it can be achieved only if governments and central banks intervene to increase employment. These ideas had much influence on President Roosevelt's New Deal […] But the capitalist crisis over the last 25 years, with its shrinking profit rates, inspired the corporate elite to revive economic liberalism. That's what makes it 'neo' or new. Now, with the rapid globalisation of the capitalist economy, we are seeing neo-liberalism on a global scale." The main points of neo-liberalism include: the rule of the market, cutting public expenditure for social services, reducing the safety-net for the poor, deregulation, privatisation, eliminating the concept of "the public good" or the "community". In: http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/econ101/neoliberalDefined.html

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Though the Africanness Mbeki refers to is "regional rather than racial" in character (Ryklief, 2002:114), he nevertheless mystifies the notion of being African in order to build alliances. His Renaissance builds upon an idealised view of both what had been and what was to come (Barber, 2004:127). In doing so, he does not challenge colonial legacy and existing power structures. Furthermore, this leaves the African Renaissance concept open to cultural or even racial interpretations. Accordingly, the Africanist interpretation of the Renaissance imagines a community in the tradition of ethnic nationalism. Following Mamdani's argument, there can be no African Renaissance without a rewriting of history that gives Africa a sense of agency (Mamdani, 1996:130). Though this need applies for both interpretations of the Renaissance, especially the "idea of heritage and legacy" is based on rewriting the past. Resembling "invented traditions", the identity-inducing moment of the African Renaissance must therefore not be analysed according to its underlying truth or originality but in terms of the conditions of its re-occurrence in post-apartheid South Africa. Having established that Mbeki's mystified notion of Africanness at least leaves openings for various interpretations, it is questionable if the clear-cut distinction into a "globalist" and an "Africanist" interpretation of the African Renaissance can be held upright. Rather, I would suggest that these two understandings influence and depend on each other. This would resemble the mutual dependence of Africanist and Charterist nationalism within the ANC's history. 4.1.2 "Two Nation" In his "two nation" address, Mbeki explicitly linked nation to colour of skin, suggesting that South Africa is in fact not unified. Although still emphasising the historical, social and economic dimension of this division, it is questionable, whether this nation-concept is still in line with the ANC's official non-racialist stance. According to Lodge, Mbeki's "two nation" speech is not a cynical appeal to social resentments that exist within the ANC but signifies frustration with the absence of an "Africanism" among white political and business leaders (Lodge, 2002:249). He stresses that Mbeki embraces even former Afrikaner nationalists when their commitment to a new patriotism and against economic selfishness is evident.52 Furthermore, Mbeki states that those who oppose transformation are not necessarily white. In a speech in June 1998 he called for "a halt to the abuse of freedom in the name of entitlement […] es52

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This was the case with Pik Botha, who was Foreign Minister of the NP during apartheid.

pecially by elements of the black elite" that "hijack sacrifices […] to satisfy a seemingly insatiable and morally unbound greed" (Rantao, 1998). Rather than being an evidence of exclusive nationalism, Mbeki's "two nation" speech represents his eagerness to bridge the gap between economic challenges and redistributive social reform (Lodge, 2002:250). Examining the validity of Mbeki's argument, MacDonald makes the point that it is "no longer true that all of the rich are white and that almost all Africans are poor" (MacDonald, 2003:36).53 However, he states that the correlation between class and race remains strong, and that therefore both, government and business have reasons to worry about the overlap of economic cleavages with racial cleavages. As long as capital remains overwhelmingly white, the political economy has the tendency to polarise between white "haves" and black "have-nots" and is susceptible to mobilise racial resentments on behalf of economic grievances. This is why MacDonald points to look at the political and ideological importance of both, the discourse and the economic policies of the ANC, especially its affirmative action programme Black Economic Empowerment (BEE). Also Filatova assumes that a renascent African nationalism might articulate itself in an "Africanist" interpretation of affirmative action policy. Because the ANC's definition of what constitutes the South African nation lacks clarity and is therefore open to change, "only the practical steps of the government can – and will – show the real meaning of the new nationality policy of the ruling party" (Filatova, 1997:55). To examine the economic policies of the ANC will go beyond the scope of this study. However, it is valuable to outline some tendencies to examine whether Mbeki's "two nation" address heralds a return of African nationalism. Historically, the ANC had been characterised by an ambiguous view towards race and class relations. In his court statement at the Rivonia Trial54 in 1964, Mandela in-

53

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Sparks refers to the new economic strata of South African society as a "double-decker bus": "Those on the top deck are a multiracial group […] It is a rainbow deck. But those below are nearly all black" (Sparks, A 2003a: Beyond the miracle. Inside the new South Africa. Johannesburg: Jonathan Ball). The Rivonia Trial, named after the suburb of Johannesburg where sixteen leaders of the ANC had been arrested, began on 26th November 1963. Mandela and his fellow defendants were charged with 221 acts of sabotage designed to "ferment violent revolution". The ANC had been operating underground since being outlawed in April 1960, one month after the Sharpeville Massacre. The police had collected hundreds of documents from the ANC hideout at Rivonia about Operation Mayibuye (Operation Comeback). On 11th June 1964, Mandela and

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terpreted the Freedom Charter as providing for the nationalisation of "mines, banks and monopoly industry" (Mandela, 1990:173). This was clearly not a free-market statement; nevertheless it was not necessarily anti-capitalist either. The call for nationalisation was predominantly raised for reasons of racial not economic equality. Consequently, nationalisation could also be avoided if the institutions concerned shifted towards a policy of racial equality. In MacDonald's line of argument, Mandela therefore opened the way for a capitalist response to the problem of racial capitalism (MacDonald, 2003:7). As Schmidt outlines, the nationalisation of key industries was renounced by the ANC during the transitional negotiations with the apartheid government. The guarantee of private property and the (implicit) abandonment of massive income redistribution formed part of the negotiation deal (Schmidt, 2003:2). As Ryklief summarises, the ANC's victory in the first democratic elections "brought about capitalist rule – with the economic and social power of the capitalist class remaining intact – based on overwhelming popular electoral consent" (Ryklief, 2002:106). Because the correlation between class and race was very strong in the dawn of the new South Africa, the ANC campaigned for the Redistribution and Development Programme (RDP) during the 1994 elections. This programme linked economic development to social democratisation and campaigned for "economic growth through redistribution". The idea was that an improvement in infrastructure and service delivery would stimulate the economy. However, the RDP was characterised by dual aspirations: for the political left, its focus lay on redistribution whereas the government considered economic reconstruction as equally or even more important. In fact, the RDP strongly advocated the re-integration of South African economy into world markets. Its export-led growth strategy was very much in line with the recommendation of World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) (Schmidt, 2003:5). In 1996, the RDP was suspended in favour of the "Growth, Employment and Redistribution Programme" (GEAR). In opposition to the bottom-up approach of the RDP, GEAR was developed "behind closed doors by a small team of the South African Reserve Bank" (Schmidt, 2003:6). It reflected the recommendations of the IMF much more explicitly than the RDP. The reasons why the ANC willingly adopted a neothe seven other defendants – Walter Sisulu, Govan Mbeki (father of current South African President Mbeki), Raymond Mhlaba, Elias Motsoaledi, Ahmed Kathrada and Denis Goldberg

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liberal structural adjustment programme, which is usually imposed upon unwilling governments, are of economic and political nature. Economically, the ANC shifted towards accepting the neo-liberal principle that investment of capital provided for growth and that growth eradicated poverty. Furthermore, the ANC wanted to install itself as a serious partner of business. Lastly, it was eager to keep international institutions available as scapegoats for disappointed expectations (MacDonald, 2003:31). Politically, Mbeki and other exiles had compelling reasons for an alternative to the RDP: The programme was set to empower trade unions, religious groups and civic associations that the ANC had eclipsed in establishing control over the government and the state (MacDonald, 2003:34). Furthermore, there were unclear positions between the RDP office and different ministries. Lastly, its implementation was dependent on active support by local governments. This proved to be difficult because there were no democratic communal elections before 1995 (Schmidt, 2003:6). Coming back to the question of what kind of nationalism is expressed in the ANC's policy of affirmative action, it is valuable to analyse some of the party's documents in the year preceding Mbeki's "two nation" speech. In preparation of the 50th annual National Conference, the ANC issued a discussion document stating that in present day South Africa "the poor are by definition mostly black, whilst the majority of the rich are by definition white". Furthermore, the document called for "the building of a black bourgeoisie" and "the fast growth of a black middle strata" so that "the place that individuals occupy in society is not defined by race" (ANC, 1997a:2). This illustrates that Mbeki's "two nation" concept had its precedents within the ANC and also resonated with at least some of its members. In another discussion document, Pallo Jordan stated that the ANC must create a code of conduct for the "black" bourgeoisie including "job creation, the fostering of skills development, the empowerment of women, the strengthening of the popular organs of civil society, an active involvement in the fight to end poverty" (Jordan, 1997:12). According to MacDonald, this demonstrates the ANC's conviction that a black bourgeoisie behaves differently and better than a white bourgeoisie (MacDonald, 2003:39). In another document, the ANC mobilised racial nationalism by stating that the interests of the black bourgeoisie are congruent with the (African) majority: "the rising black bourgeoisie and mid-

– were convicted. Mandela was found guilty on four charges of sabotage. All eight were sent to life imprisonment.

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dle strata are objectively important motive forces of transformation whose interests coincide with at least the immediate interests of the majority" (ANC, 1997b:9). In the logic of racial nationalism, class interests are subordinate to (racial) national interests. The African poor sublimate their particular interests as poor people to the general interests of the African people, as it is embodied in the African bourgeoisie. Accordingly, the interests of Africans prosper, because some of them are empowered. African elites affirm their people by affirming themselves, which counts as a decisive victory over racism (MacDonald, 2003:40). Mbeki underscored this attitude in a speech addressing the Black Management Forum: "As part of the realisation of the aim to eradicate racism in our country, we must strive to create and strengthen a black capitalist class." Because poverty and wealth were distributed among racial lines, redistribution was not only a class question, but also a national question. Mbeki concludes that "the struggle against racism […] must include the objective of creating a black bourgeoisie" (Mbeki, 1999:2). The ANC benefits directly and indirectly from the development of a black bourgeoisie. The ANC knows that what strengthens Africans, strengthens the party. This becomes transparent in Jordan's statement: "Since 1994 the multi-class character of the ANC has of course changed. Whereas in the past there were no captains of industry in the leading organs of the ANC today an NEC [National Executive Committee] member heads one of the largest conglomerates trading on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. This corporation, moreover, employs thousands of other ANC members as well as ANC supporters!" (Jordan, 1997:12) It is important to stress that though African nationalism is evoked to legitimate the economic policies of the ANC, affirmative action also benefits business. BEE reorganises the relationship between race and class, making economic elites multi-racial by inclosing black South Africans. Africanising economic elites dissociates business from the legacy of white supremacy. The different racial backgrounds in the various strata of capital give Africans nationalistic reasons for favouring the capitalistic order. Thus, property rights are not threatened and the capitalist logic is not challenged (MacDonald, 2003:36).

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4.2 Non-Racialism or Racialism? The question of this study is, whether ANC party political discourse, officially devoted to building a non-racial democracy, is entrenched in a nationalism that uses racialist sentiments as point of reference. Generally, the interpretations found in literature can be divided into three categories. The first interpretation accuses high-ranking ANC officials – most prominently Mbeki – of harbouring Africanist sentiments. It links Mbeki's rising influence in the party to a return of Africanism and points to the danger of a revived racial nationalism for the new South African democracy (Filatova, 1997; Van Vuuren, 2002). The second, contrasting standpoint also acknowledges the danger of using racial sentiments. However, these analysts argue that the ANC is not engaging in a new racial discourse. Rather, it would pay tribute to the continuing salience of racial identity, simultaneously proposing the inclusion of whites in a new patriotism (Lodge, 2002; Sparks, 2003a; Alexander, 2004). As a synthesis of the previous positions, a third argument proves that the ANC uses both, racialism and non-racialism, to consolidate its power (Halisi, 1999; Ryklief 2002; MacDonald, 2003). 1. Filatova argues that especially the debate on the discussion documents of 1997 proves the intensity of Africanist feelings and the strengthening of Africanist tendencies within the ANC (Filatova, 1997:48). Regarding the history of African nationalism, Filatova finds that the present conception of nationalism can be compared to that of the early Communist Party (see footnote 44). The ANC's call for "a continuing battle to assert African hegemony" (ANC, 1997a:3) seems to pay tribute to the CP's striving for a "native South African republic". The ANC's annex that this battle should be fought in the "context of multi-cultural and non-racial society" resembles the CP's emphasis on "equal rights". This framing is also similar to the Charterists' conception of a South African nation. However, in Filatova's eyes the new conception of nationalism lacks the idea of a nation as a political unit based on equality and diversity. Another proof in her point of view is the fact that the discussion document refers to the rainbow nation concept as "problematic". Apart from the discussion documents, the author enumerates various reflections of an Africanist renaissance in party political discourse: the "Africanist" interpretation of affirmative action policies, the African Renaissance, the fact that the vote is racially 91

divided and that the ANC is an overwhelmingly African party. According to Filatova, one reason for the shift towards an Africanist interpretation of nationalism is the numerous "rediscoveries" of African cultures. Though the author states that this is a "normal" process in restoring dignity after the humiliations of apartheid, she finds it surprising that it is the ANC leadership who expresses Africanism much more vigorously than the PAC or BC groupings. In her point of view, the new definition of nationhood is aimed at consolidating support and mobilizing the electorate of the ANC. African nationalism offers better political potential to the party than the non-racialist "rainbowism". Though always eager to emphasise its non-racialist stance, the ANC leaves the definition of what constitutes a nation open for change. This lack of clarity, that the ANC was criticised for throughout its history, is a very successful tactic for mobilisation. Endorsing completely Filatova's line of argument, Van Vuuren proposes that the ANC documents of 1997 and 1998 show a resurrection of ideological African nationalism. The call for an "African hegemony" implies a "black monochrome instead of a rainbow nation vision". The ANC understands "transformation" as the systematic Africanisation of all strategic institutions. Affirmative action represents a "reintroduction of race-classification, job-reservation, and racial quotas that discriminate against non-Africans, white males in particular" (Van Vuuren, 2002:15). Furthermore, Mbeki's support for Robert Mugabe shows a "weird and dangerous understanding of democracy" implicating that "African democracy is subordinate to the ideological demands of African nationalism" (Van Vuuren, 2002:23). Van Vuuren argues that Mbekian discourse has seen a shift in the use of key concepts such as "diversity", "non-racialism" and "democracy". More concretely, these concepts appear to be stripped of their Charterist, multi-racial meaning and are now compatible with the strategic interests of Africanists. The concept of "diversity" for example seems to have abandoned its inclusive/ multi-racial connotations of horizontal equality and been converted to a concept that indicates vertical hierarchy. "Diversity" is employed quantitatively to indicate the numerical "representativity" of diverse groups. Opposing the concept of multi-racialism, South African society appears to be without ethnic divisions (except for the decisive difference of affirmative action), but just a "democratic" society of majority rule. Van Vuuren forecasts a gloomy future: "the ideological dream of nation-building-through-African-hegemony, coupled with an Africanist conception of democracy, is likely to become a nation-destroying reality executed under undemocratic conditions" (Van Vuuren, 2002:23). 92

2. According to Lodge, successful leaders engage in the construction of an "imagined community" that followers can take part in. They also present utopias that are drawn from an imagined past or project an ideal future. With the African Renaissance, Mbeki helped to create a sense of shared-purpose community among the new managerial elite who assemble at "self-consciously Afrocentric gatherings" (Lodge, 2002:265). However, Lodge insists that Mbeki's African Renaissance is intended as an inclusive concept of nationalism as it is easy for "white South African patriots" to embrace. Since 1999, Mbeki's speeches have emphasised national divisions rather than the broader inclusiveness represented in his "I am an African" address. However from Lodge's point of view, Mbeki's "two nation" concept does not draw on racial sentiments. The president's stance on affirmative action only shows his willingness to reconcile economic challenges with redistributive social reform. The author asserts Mbeki's acknowledgement of the continuing importance of racial identity as well as his commitment to an inclusive nationalism (Lodge, 2002:249). Nevertheless, Lodge admits that not all discourses of the African Renaissance are inclusive. In fact, the concept might also resonate in perceptions of national superiority as well as xenophobia directed at immigrants from other parts of the continent. Lodge admits that there are also indicators of a nascent authoritarian political habit of the ANC administration: the demonising of political opponents, the intervention in provincial party politics, imperial presidential behaviour, the reluctance to organise a discussion on Mbeki's succession and the erosion of boundaries between party and state. Especially important for this study is the tendency to respond to criticism with accusations of racial malice and the interference by Mbeki's office with the government to promote particular black empowerment interests. Having said that, Lodge stresses that Mbeki's exercise of executive authority is a local instance of an international trend in government and not related to totalitarian practice. As an example, he cites Tony Blair's centralisation of decision-making processes within the government and the Labour party. He suggests that "liberal" critics fail to recognise the positive elements of a deliberative democracy, in which politics and discussions are structured to achieve consensus. Lodge concludes that "in such polities government and politics are inclusive rather than adversarial" (Lodge, 2002:255). In Sparks point of view, Mbeki's concern about business' defensive reaction to strategies aimed at achieving greater economic equity are justified. He supports Mbeki's

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call for the "deracialisation" of the economy in order to create a non-racial South Africa (Sparks, 2003a). This would be a political as well as economic necessity and also serve security interests of the white population. Sparks is confident that the new South Africa will fulfil Mandela's directive and attain the rainbow nation. With reference to the “I am an African” speech, Alexander argues that Mbeki belongs to the non-racial category of Africanists. Accordingly, Africans were all people who live in Africa, regardless of their race, religion or colour. Mbeki is characterised as an engaged and passionate fighter, aiming at liberating the African peoples from all forms of racism and traces of colonialism. However, Alexander asserts that Mbeki's actions carry through the interests of (especially South African) elites. Nevertheless, he sees the "African Renaissance" as an attempt to make good for the apartheid regime's damages on the continent (Alexander, 2004:23). 3. Evaluating whether Mbeki casts his (capitalist) solutions for South Africa in a racial framework, Ryklief concludes: "Mbekism is a neo-liberal orthodoxy spiced with a 'liberal' dash of African nationalist impulses." (Ryklief, 2002:119) Halisi argues that non-racial and race-conscious populist discourse bisects every other ideological confrontation in black South African political experience. Following Mamdani, he terms this the "historic bifurcation of black political thought". The question for him is if the ANC is able to find a new overarching identity or if the two discourses on nationalism will continue to be the dividing line in post-apartheid South Africa. Nonracialism is now and will be the official stance of the government. One attempt in transforming non-racial citizenship into popular identity was the concept of a rainbow nation. Yet for the black majority, an inclusive national identity will derive its force and character from the legacies of a racial past. For the immediate future, governments will have to cope with racial and class-conscious political sensibilities that persist with other issues of popular concerns such as affirmative action, black empowerment, economic equity and land distribution. Although black race-conscious organisations are currently in disarray, race-conscious populism pulsates strongly within the ANC (Halisi, 1999:141). The author also notes a growing intensity of interactions between non-racial and race-conscious political attitudes within the organisation. MacDonald states that South Africa's government is democratic and non-racial. It protects civil liberties, guarantees free elections and recognises individual rights. The 94

non-racial state sees both, black and white, as South Africans only. Except for matters of affirmative action, race is therefore located in the private sphere. In MacDonald's view, making race a private matter is however preserving it and keeping it available for political mobilisation (MacDonald, 2003:5). Despite official nonracialism, it is in fact racial nationalism that legitimates democracy in South Africa. Africans value democracy for historical reasons, because it empowers them and for instrumental reasons, because they are the majority of the electorate. However, this works only if empowering "Africans as Africans" (MacDonald, 2003:6) is taken as an essential political good. Furthermore, Africans comprise the majority only, if they conceive of themselves as a racial group, only on the condition that their peoplehood as African is supreme over other identities. Moreover, racial nationalism consolidates the power of the ANC. The mobilisation of voters and the de-mobilisation of opponents on the basis of race enable the ANC to win elections. MacDonald therefore summarises: "Under apartheid, racial nationalism mobilised opposition; under democracy, racial nationalism implies consent" (Mac Donald, 2003:47). In the introduction, I have formulated the question whether the majority position of the ANC has moved from an inclusive, non-racial position on nationalism to an exclusive, racially or culturally defined nationalism. As I have argued above, I think that it would be most accurate to describe the ANC's current position as a synthesis of both concepts: While it could be shown that officially, the ANC embraces a nonracial, inclusive concept of nationalism, the party still plays to racial sentiments. This could be demonstrated on the basis of Mbeki's vague definition of Africanness in the African Renaissance, his "two nation" address and various other ANC documents. Rather than regarding this development as a decisive break with the past, I would argue that the current nation-concepts are part of a continuing battle between positions of non-racial and racial nationalism that have characterised black political thought throughout history. Analysing the course of nationalism in the ANC, it is not the explicit exclusive definition of the nation, but the vagueness and openness of its various discourses that make way for cultural or racial interpretations. It is important to stress that the ANC does not simply impose nationalism. There are also beneficiaries outside the party that adopt and promote African nationalism in order to serve their own interests. This is especially true for the new African bourgeoisie that mediates the gap between rich and poor as well as black and white in order to facilitate the legitimation of economic inequalities. 95

4.3 Political Implications In the introduction, another question was raised: What implications would a resurrection of nationalism, racial as well as non-racial, have for a newly democratic society? I have formulated two anticipated threats. On the one hand nationalism legitimates mechanisms of exclusion, resulting in discrimination and political incapacitation. Here, three categories of "victims" can be singled out. With regard to foreign affairs, feelings of national superiority can be directed against other countries of the African continent. With regard to domestic policy, they can turn against refugees or immigrants. As a third possibility, a racial version of nationalism can be directed against South African citizens who are perceived as non-African. On the other hand, nationalism's capacity to function as an instrument of inclusion, directed against opposition and critics via the "unpatriotic claim" or racial ascriptions, is used to organise consent and legitimate non-emancipatory politics. In the following, I will give an overview of the potential political implications of nationalism in post-apartheid South Africa. With regard to foreign affairs, Melber states that the South African government uses Pan-Africanist claims to position the country as the leading political and economic power of the African continent. Through direct expansion into other African countries, the South African economy benefits from the expertise that was developed and tested during apartheid. A new (supposedly colour-blind) pact of elites guarantees that the new (supposedly non-racial) South Africa can use this expertise for profitmaximising interests (Melber, 2004:25ff). Also Alexander confirms that there is a strong connection between the motives and modalities of South African foreign policy on the one hand and private and state businesses on the other. If the whole continent is supplied with an energy network distributed by the South African Eskom Enterprises, he remarks ironically, the result could be a "truly Pan-African project" (Alexander, 2004:22). Lodge argues that the Africanist interpretation of the African Renaissance, with its emphasis on tradition, intends to reconstruct a political order based on collective solidarity rather than on civil liberties. He warns that the new African "patriotic bourgeoisie" might find it more appealing to support Afro-centrist historical nostalgia than democracy and human rights. If the founding myth of a new imagined community becomes the recollection of ancient African civilisations, racial sentiment rather than political principle would be the animating idea behind the African Renaissance

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(Lodge, 2002:240). According to the models discussed in chapter 2, this imagined community would resemble a Kulturnation rather than a Staatsnation. Emphasising its primordial character, this nation produces bifurcated patterns. On the one hand it promotes superiority over "outsiders", on the other hand it promises equality among "insiders". Evaluating the promotion of superiority over "outsiders", the inclusion of South Africa in the identity politics of an African Renaissance is not as benevolent as it seems: The country benefits from its alignment with the continent (inter alia by offering its citizens a common African identity) but uses "African sameness" to suit the needs of South Africa only. Evaluating the promise of equality among "insiders", it must be noted that the longing for a community without ambivalences can only be realised by undemocratic methods. Invented traditions for example do not necessarily mean egalitarian or benign practices. Often, they are accompanied by a racial emphasis and are used in an authoritarian manner to legitimate democratic shortcomings and to justify oppression and cruelty, for example against homosexuals and women. Mbeki's African Renaissance is therefore problematic in at least two aspects. Firstly, the mystified nature of African identity leaves openings for culturalist or racial interpretations that resemble African nationalism. Secondly, it allows South Africa to align itself with Africa – taking all its advantages without giving much in return. With regard to domestic policy, the reinforced national identity has fatal consequences for people without South African citizenship. The result is a deepening xenophobia against immigrants from other parts of the continent (Goebel, 1999:323; Vale, 2003:12). In October 1996, the South African survey found that South Africans generally "look upon undocumented migration with suspicion, if not open hostility". 65 per cent of those questioned regarded illegal immigration as "bad" or "very bad" and 80 per cent favoured stronger border controls. The majority of South Africans accuse "illegals" of competing for jobs, undercutting wages, swamping social and health services, spreading disease and promoting crime (Barber, 2004:134). Even though a strong latent chauvinistic trend can be analysed across the party political spectrum, my assumption is that especially the ANC party political discourse on national identity has had an influence on the public perception and interpretation of immigration. During the first decade of government, large parts of the ANC had obviously been relieved that the controversial topic of immigration, which also fractioned the party into many camps, lay in the responsibility of Mangosuthu Buthelezi, leader of the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) and Minister of Home Affairs until 2004. 97

Buthelezi declared in 1995: "If we South Africans are going to compete for scarce resources with millions of aliens who are pouring in then we can bid goodbye to our Reconstruction and Development Programme" (quoted in Barber, 2004:133). Policy implementations like immigration control were left to the political hardliners of the coalition. This enabled prominent ANC politicians to profit from the work of the Home Affairs Department without getting their hands dirty (Goebel, 1999:267). But it is obvious that also within the ANC, there were hardliners that identified with Buthelezi's position. For example Penuel Maduna, the deputy Minister of Home Affairs during the first period of government who likes to call himself a nationalist, was as a supporter of a restrictive immigration policy. Also his successor, Lindiwe Sisulu, demanded more support for Buthelezi from the cabinet (Goebel, 1999: 272, 274). Furthermore, ANC spokespeople such as Desmond Lockey stressed that there was nothing exceptional about denying non-citizens their rights including detaining them without trial for 80 days (Neocosmos, 1999:308). Not only the Department of Home Affairs, but also the Labour Department enters into the discourse. In the definition of the ANC, "Southafricanization" of workers is equated with national interest. While a "free" labour market is defined as democratisation, this "freedom" is limited by the geo-political boundaries of the state. Free movement of people is seen as a threat to national sovereignty. Numerous legislative initiatives regarding immigration were initiated since the first democratic elections in 1994. In 1996, the Labour Market Commission made a proposal that a more liberal approach should be adopted towards skilled immigrants, while the sanctions against employers of illegal immigrants should be increased. On the recommendations of this commission, the ANC government also refused to sign a SADC Protocol that called for the free movement of people. Overall, the Home Affairs Department used legislation that emphasised state security rather than individual rights. Concerning the use of police and military patrols as well as border fences, measures already taken by the apartheid regime were maintained. In 1998, the ANC government again refused to sign a SADC protocol that favoured fewer restrictions on movement and instead tried to reach bilateral agreements with its neighbours. In 1999 a white paper on "International Migration" proposed to facilitate immigration for skilled workers (letting the market determine the skills needed) and harden it for others. The established Immigration Review Board draw a ranking, which privileged the South African region.

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In summary even though the ANC's self-portrait – and certainly that of Mbeki – is that of an anti-racist, inclusive and internationalist party, its policies are restricted to the concept of a nation-state, which implies a definition of "insiders" and "outsiders". Apart from these immanent necessities – due to a growing deficit of government legitimation because of the widening gap between the political elite and the majority of the population – the ANC reinforces identification according to the mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion. The nation-consolidation of the new South Africa works inclusively to the inside, now compassing the black – but South African – population. However, this consolidation can only be achieved via the exclusion of others, i.e. the "foreigners". Therefore, nation-building is not only about building a common political project but also about drawing a demarcation line of those excluded. Accordingly, the "imagined" community of the new South Africa is not only based on "identity" but on legal, political, social benefits and disadvantages respectively. Therefore, it is not only "imagined" but also materially experienced. It is not only an ideology, but also a socio-material object embedded and experienced in social relations. On the other hand, nationalism functions as an instrument of inclusion organising cohesion and consent in order to legitimise non-emancipatory politics. Already the era of Mandela saw a rather repressive discourse concerning the opposition with the tendency to accuse critics of being inspired by reactionary forces. For example, the former president blamed critical black journalists for being "co-opted by conservative elements to attack the democratic movement". He advised prominent individuals like Archbishop Tutu not to criticise the ANC publicly, as this "created the impression of division within the movement" (quoted in Lodge, 2002:16). This demand was also directed at members of the own party: At the ANC's 1994 conference, Mbeki submitted a document stating that opposition would "create contradictions" within the ANC and split the movement (McKinley, 2001:187). Since the Mbeki governance, an "increasingly discernible 'nationalist' position within the ANC hierarchy" (Lodge, 2002:164) intertwines with resentments against "strangers to the struggle". Sometimes, opponents are even discredited with subliminal reference to racial ascriptions. In the following, the consequences for four groups of critics shall be singled out: members of the ANC, allies of the ANC (the Congress of South African Trade Unions, COSATU, and the South African Communist Party, SACP), journalists and important persons of public life.

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Already the structure of the party provides mechanisms that makes it more difficult for internal critics: The ANC's principle of "democratic centralism" for example binds lower structures to follow the decisions made by higher structures. Together with its constitutionally prescribed prohibition of "disruption and factionalism" consent rather than competition is facilitated. As mentioned above, these structures do not differ much from other electorally orientated parties in liberal democracies. However, Lodge finds that the commitment to consultative decision-making within the ANC during Mbeki's leadership has declined, though under certain circumstances, the rank and file can challenge leadership successfully (Lodge, 2004: 198). But not only institutional, also ideological structures hamper opposition within the ANC. Racial ascriptions are aimed at making critique untrustworthy. For example Peter Mokaba, representative of the ANC's African nationalist tendency and former ANC Youth League president, released a discussion paper before the ANC's 50th conference in 1997 saying that non-Africans and communists enjoyed a disproportionate influence within the organisation (Lodge, 2002:164). In 2001, a "whispering" campaign by government officials, responding discussions about forming a workers party, promoted the view that "a stranger to the struggle", (white) American-born economist and ANC member Neva Makgetla, was behind these plans (Forrest, 2001). Besides racial resentments, the card of a doubtful commitment to the party is played. In 2002, Trevor Ngwane from the Soweto Electricity Crisis Committee (SECC) had criticised the privatisation plan for Johannesburg "Igoli 2002". Three days later he was suspended from all his positions in the ANC, including those in the Council, for "bringing the party into disrepute" (Ngwane, 2003:45). In 2003, the director of prosecution, Bulelani Ngcuka, was attacked for investigating against deputy president Jacob Zuma. An unnamed ANC "leader" explained: "One of the unwritten rules is to check with comrades before taking an action against the deputy president of the ANC" (quoted in Lodge, 2004:209). Claiming the monopoly of the heritage of the struggle against apartheid, efforts to discredit opponents are also directed against the allies of the ANC. At the 10th congress of the Communist Party in 1998, Mbeki labelled critics as "enemies of transformation". He stated that the "objective realities" were of such a nature that "the basis does not exist for partners of the Alliance fundamentally to redefine the relationship among themselves, including the way they handle their differences". Before, he had accused communists and trade unionists of "spreading falsifications and telling lies" and being "defenders of reaction" (quoted in McKinley, 2001:196f). Also in 100

2001, the ANC National Executive focussed its discussion on "enemies within". Mbeki stated that COSATU collaborates with "ultra-leftist" and has "counterrevolutionary" plans to found a new party (quoted in Lodge, 2004:200). Also ANC's presidential spokesman Smuts Ngonyama commented on the critique formulated by SACP deputy secretary general Jeremy Cronin by calling him a "frustrated individual, unfaithful and guilty of spreading deliberate lies" (quoted in Lodge, 2004:201). With regard to the relation between the party and the media, it really should make one think that black journalists were labelled as non-black or non-African in order to discard their critique. When a black journalist published a critique of Mbeki in the Mail & Guardian, ANC spokespeople suggested that instead, the (white) editor was in charge of the article (Lodge, 2002:171). In another instance, an ANC "media coordinator" criticised a report from a black newspaper covering government ministers by saying that "African values […] include among others, respect for elders in society". Therefore, she found it "strange" that African journalists did "stoop so low in being vitriolic against these ministers – unAfrican indeed" (quoted in Lodge, 2004:200). The tendency to illegitimate critique can also be analysed via the relationship to persons of public life. In his Nelson Mandela Lecture in 2004, Tutu criticised the ANC inter alia for its internal decision-making processes, the policy of BEE that seems to benefit a small elite only, and the failure of the government to provide a basic income grant. In his published answer, Mbeki discards the first point of critique simply on the basis that "the Archbishop has never been a member of the ANC, and would have very little knowledge of what happens even in an ANC branch". Regarding BEE, Mbeki implicitly makes Tutu look as though he was reluctant to the "deracialisation of our economy" and the "struggle to eradicate the legacy of colonialism and apartheid" (Mbeki, 2005a:19). Furthermore, Mbeki does not portrait politics as a field where one negotiates about divers interests and ideas, but merely as a management of "facts" that cannot be dealt with otherwise. Tutu would use "populist argument" and "empty rhetoric" that do not demonstrate "decent respect for the truth" (Mbeki, 2005a:20). Before determining the nation's agenda, South Africans must first "educate" themselves about "the reality", "internalise the facts" and "respect the truth". Lastly, the president equates the struggle against apartheid with the struggle for his politics when he concludes: "In this regard, inevitably, the struggle continues." (Mbeki, 2005a:21) At the same time where critique is discarded with reference to a national agenda, consent is organised to legitimate non-emancipatory politics. In a South African context, 101

this is especially true regarding the economic sphere. Patrick Bond from the Alternative Information and Development Centre points out that between 1994 and 2002, the official unemployment rate had doubled from 16 to 32 per cent. In September 2004, the rate was still up to 26 per cent. Of all the people that are able to work, excluding children, old and sick, 42 per cent are without job. Youth unemployment rises up to 80 per cent in some rural areas. Black women appear to be most affected by unemployment, more than seven times than white males. Also, racial injustices have increased. While black South Africans have had an income loss of 19 per cent between 1995 and 2000, the average white household became 15 per cent richer. Therefore, South Africa is one of the countries with the broadest gap between rich and poor. Even though poverty increased, prices for water and electricity were raised, so that in 2002, households that earned less than 70 US Dollar per month had to pay 30 per cent of their income for water and electricity. The failure to pay the bills eventually led to cutting approximately ten million people off these supplies. Since the initiation of the land reform, not even five per cent of the land available for agriculture has been handed over to the black majority. Also, the urban settlements have hardly been redistributed. Bond calls this a transformation from a race-based to a class-based apartheid (Bond, 2004:14). Similarly, others comment that the institutionalised racism of apartheid made way for structural racism via socio-economic inequalities in postapartheid South Africa (Melber, 2004:27). How does nationalism serve to sustain these structured relations of inequalities? The courses of national rediscovery – including the search for „international interest“ – does not only determine non-emancipatory politics in the economic but also in the international sphere. Security as well as economic questions are not re-evaluated: their continuity can be characterised by neo-realism and neo-liberalism (Vale, 2003:9). As Ngwane states, Mbeki used the phrase "The people have spoken" to "imply that if people had voted for the ANC they must support its neo-liberal policies and shouldn't now oppose them" (Ngwane, 2003:45). Iheduru argues that BEE is the crucial point of the post-Mandela nation-building strategy. The empowerment of blacks legitimises the regime as it balances the majority expectations. The new black bourgeoisie functions on the one hand as a buffer between the ANC and the masses, on the other as an ally against white economic power. Yet, the policy of BEE ignores the fact that most blacks do not have the skills or the training for being employed in BEE sectors. Especially, intra-black division and alienation is produced because of the government's 102

tendency to pick among the "patriotic" black bourgeoisie for BEE programmes. Furthermore, ethnic group identification is a vehicle for BEE. When these groups demand for their share of empowerment, racial and inter-ethnic divisions are likely to widen. Therefore, there is also the risk of re-racialisation that would contradict the "rainbow nationalism" (Iheduru, 2004:21) and threaten the non-racial nation-building project. Furthermore, BEE creates an "empowered" black middle and upper class that is tied to state patronage and party hierarchy. Not only do business organisations retain a race-based structure. The result is also corruption, secrecy, clientelism and greed (Ryklief, 2002:118; Iheduru, 2004:23). MacDonald argues that racial nationalism legitimates capitalism. Because it shares the racial identity of the poor and the class interests of the white economic elites, the new African bourgeoisie is able to mediate the gap between rich and poor, between black and white. It has the effect of detaching class from race while not threatening the interests of businesses and not preventing the ANC of using racial appeals whenever this seems beneficial. It rewards racialist political strategies of legitimation and stabilisation without allowing the African poor effective institutional support (MacDonald, 2003:44). In summary, African nationalism is aligned with economic inequality through affirmative action.

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Chapter 5: Conclusion and Outlook With the help of discourse analysis and ideology critique, this study established a theoretical framework to analyse African nationalism in apartheid and post-apartheid South Africa. Constructivist school of thought proved to be the most appropriate tool for analysing the phenomenon of nationalism, establishing nations as "imagined communities" that are based on "invented traditions". The two different concepts of nationalism, "constitutional" and "ethnic" nationalism, could be retraced in South Africa where they form the central antagonism in black political thought. Furthermore, the approach accomplished to place the study of post-apartheid African nationalism in its historical perspective by focusing on the major milestones of ANC discourse before and during apartheid. It could be demonstrated that throughout its history, the African National Congress was characterised by the rivalry between "constitutional" and "ethnic" nationalism. While the former concept found its counterpart in Charterism, the latter was adopted by African nationalism. The ANC in its majority embraced multi-racial nationalism as a political agenda, but its relationship towards Africanism remained ambiguous. Though the Congress heavily criticised African nationalism, the party continually played with its appeal to keep racial sentiments available as a mobilisation force. The theoretical and historical contextualisation allowed for the investigation of the various dimensions of present ANC party political discourse on African nationalism. The study achieved to analyse different concepts of nationalism employed by the ANC and compared these models to those discussed in academic literature. It could be found that the historical dichotomy of Africanist and Charterist nationalism persists within the ANC in post-apartheid South Africa. While early concepts of nationalism like Mandela's "rainbow nation" and Mbeki's "I am an African" speech still paid tribute to the Charterist tradition, the "African Renaissance" and Mbeki's "twonation" address at least leave openings for Africanist interpretations. Furthermore, the analysis has shown that nationalism is not only a product of discourse but also one of material conditions. Marx' ideology critique and Gellner's application to the study of nationalism suggest that it is valuable to examine the material conditions of life that make the idea of nationalism "compelling rather than absurd". In fact, this study could show that it is not only the ANC that hijacks African nationalism in order to mobilise its electorate and push through unpopular policy 105

choices. Also, there are compelling material reasons for South Africans to embrace nationalism to serve their own interests. This could be demonstrated with the new "black bourgeoisie" that mediates the gap between rich and poor as well as black and white. It adopts African nationalism while neither uplifting the majority of African poor nor threatening the material privileges of white South Africans. African nationalism in this regard serves to legitimate domination and existing unequal structures within society. Lastly, the study could give an outlook on the political implications of a resurrected nationalism. The effects can be analysed according to the two promises of nationalism: superiority over "outsiders" and equality between "insiders". Superiority in postapartheid South Africa is established over other African countries, immigrants and groups within the South African society that are considered as "foreign". As the Research Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation noted, xenophobia "is a negative consequence of building a 'new' South Africa" (quoted in Harris, 2002). As a result of nationalism, foreigners have become handy scapegoats for South Africa's ills, particular crime and unemployment. Furthermore, it could be outlined that the equality promoting nationalism has the tendency of discrediting opponents and critics to government policies via the "unpatriotic" claim and references to racial ascriptions. Furthermore, nationalism legitimates non-emancipatory politics in the social, political and economic sphere. It would have gone beyond the scope of this study to evaluate the historical antagonist of African nationalism, Afrikaner nationalism. Some analysts suggest that Afrikaner nationalism in post-apartheid South Africa is in "death agony" (Sparks, 2003b). Indeed, regarding the political parties, there is nothing closer to the truth. The NNP voted itself out of existence in the course of April 2005. The Freedom Front Plus that geared itself to fight against "farm attacks, pressure on Afrikaans schools and pressure on Afrikaans universities" (Mulder, 2003) only received 0.89 per cent of the votes in the April 2004 elections. However, the existence of parties and their election results might not account for persisting Afrikaner nationalism within the population. Even though consisting of a fanatic minority only, the Boeremag bombings in 2002 are but one example of how exclusive nationalist identities continue to play a role in South African political life.55 According to ANC party spokesperson Smuts Ngon55

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Between 2000 and 2002 the Boeremag (Boer Force) had developed a plan to take over South Africa. According to their concept, a group of over 4000 people would take over military

yama, despite of its minority status the Boeremag can be seen as a threat to society because of its "indoctrination that blacks are sub-human and therefore cannot govern this country" (quoted in Tabene, 2003). What is also not considered in this study is the fact that other parties of the political spectrum are increasingly characterised by appeals to nationalist claims and "chauvinistic hysteria" (Neocosmos, 1999:308). Analysts argue that the United Democratic Movement has been stripped of its "rainbow hue" and that the DA is increasingly characterised by "racialized rhetoric" (Faull& Jacobs, 2003). Especially during the latest election campaign it became obvious, that the DA adopted a populistconfronting strategy that took up racial resentment to appeal to a white constituency (Bannach, 2004:17). Furthermore, the development to fractionalise national into ethnic claims, as seen in other post-independent countries on the African continent, has to be examined in closer detail. In South Africa, perceived ethnic differences have led to the most brutal fights between ANC followers (that consider themselves as mainly Xhosa) and Inkatha Freedom Party members (that consider themselves as being Zulu). Even though the threat seemed to have been contained first by the Government of National Unity and then by the inclusion of the IFP in the government until 2004, the danger is far from being banned. Not only does the IFP continue to play the Zulu ethnic card. Moreover, at least ten workers from both parties have died in the 2004 election campaign in what are widely assumed to be politically motivated attacks. Additionally, beatings of party supporters and disruptions of rallies have occurred on both sides (Wines, 2004).56 Also, it would be of great asset to examine what impact BEE has on (re-) enforcing ethnic identities especially along the lines "black" and "coloured" and "Indian". Following the employment equity act, many white businesses have minimised the percentage of white employees. However, they employed not blacks but mainly coloureds and Indians, so that by January 2004, these groups were represented unproportionally in leading positions. At the same time, especially Indian business

56

bases and media, destroy the state's computer network, chase all blacks out of the country or to specially demarcated areas and "take out" the Cabinet and Parliament. Before they could accomplish their coup, members were arrested. However in October 2002, a regrouped unit was responsible for explosions in several places that left one person dead. However, these figures seem comforting compared to the first democratic elections in 1994 when around 20.000 people were killed in political violence and the 1999 elections, where still around 200 people died.

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people still prefer to articulate their class political interests through separate institutions and networks developed during apartheid (Iheduru, 2004:22). This study did not analyse what impact a rising (racial) nationalism would have on the competitive multiple-party system in South Africa. In fact, the developments of April 2005 seem worrying for some: The former National Party leader and apartheid president FW de Klerk claimed that the NNP's demise left South Africa without an effective opposition to the ANC. Furthermore, mixed-race Afrikaans-speaking voters of the NNP seem to be suspicious of black majority domination and already abstained from voting (Price, 2005:23). Lodge notes that as long as most poor people remain black and most white people relatively prosperous, the ANC will more likely find its core constituency within one racial community. Also, the black middle class, as a principle beneficiary of government's affirmative action policies, is unlikely to turn against the ANC in the near future. As the ANC mobilises African nationalism, it consolidates its own electorate. However Lodge argues that the demise of the NNP does not threaten democracy, as the party had not been "a great asset to democracy" anyway (quoted in Mail& Guardian, 2005). MacDonald notes that in South Africa "power is concentrated in a party that […] manipulates race to shield itself from electoral competition" (MacDonald, 2003:13). By emphasising racial identities the ANC can "represent poor Africans symbolically, while putting them off economically", leaving all the "theatres" of a capitalist society to the control of whites (MacDonald, 2003:16). However whites, whatever their electoral prospects, have political influence (because the government is competing for their confidence) as well as economic power that can be used to defend "cultural" identities. Therefore, presenting whites as powerless because of their minority status is denying their power. Melber states that in regard to the policies, all parties of the political spectrum have committed themselves to a neo-liberal programme. Regardless of the number of political parties, he therefore finds that the voter really had no choice in the 2004 elections (Melber, 2004:27). The study could not examine in detail how the developments within the ANC fit into a general development of national liberation movements in Africa. A hypothesis would be that nationalism in South Africa will eventually take the same road as other nationalist movements on the continent. As a latecomer to independence, not from colonialism but from "apartheid", African nationalism would therefore disconnect from its liberating intentions and developed into an ideological legitimation of domination and relations of inequality. 108

Lastly, a major issue that has not been touched upon in this study but demands for further research is how the various ANC discourses on nationalism, inclusive or exclusive, effect the population. Xolela Mangcu has commented that the president's philosophy too often does "not resonate with ordinary people" (quoted in Mamaila, 2002). Surveys suggest that emphasising racial division does not resonate with public sentiment (Schlemmer, 2001). In 1999, the Quality of Life Survey found that very few respondents, regardless of their colour, ranked the African Renaissance as a source of national pride (Dickow& Møller, 2001). Also, Mbeki's castigation of black intellectuals (Mbeki, 2000) and the critique articulated by prominent "Africanist" personalities show the limitations of the president's ideological concept. It would therefore be of great insight to complete further research on the reception of nationalism in post-apartheid South African society. This must be accompanied by further investigation on the level of "direct experience", e.g. the material conditions of life that lead to the adoption of nationalist ideologies. As much as there is the apprehension of a rising nationalism in South Africa, there is also hope for resistance to these developments. Alexander predicts a "revolution of upcoming frustration" as a consequence of ANC politics. Social movements and networks of nongovernmental organisations could be seen as first signs of a radical transformation of Africa for alternative approaches of organising economy and society (Alexander, 2004:24f). The official reaction to those movements is however equally radical: radically restrictive. For example, 51 people of the Anti-privatisation Forum (APF) were arrested on 21st March 2004 because they had demonstrated during the inauguration of the Constitutional Court in Johannesburg. This led some analysts to comment that "the grant of basic civil or political rights appears to be decided on randomly" (Bond, 2004:13). On the day of the general elections, police broke up an announced and permitted demonstration of the Landless People’s Movement (LPM). More than 50 people were arrested and released on bail only the next day. Because of the missing solidarity with the arrested, Cramer subsumes: "The left is isolated" (Cramer, 2004:8). However, Ngwane argues that many of the so-called social movements build nothing on the ground. "Civil society" and NGO's were often reaching out for the private sector. For him the working class, including the unemployed, remains the key component of an alternative left strategy (Ngwane, 2003:54f). The future task of an emancipative movement will be to explore forms of society in which individuals and groups can achieve higher levels of freedom. How to define 109

and encourage such a society without reference to cultural, ethnic, racial or national exclusion remains the fundamental challenge to the new South Africa.

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