State strategy and transition in South Africa: Historical and contemporary perspectives
Date
1988-08-08
Authors
Sarakinsky, Ivor
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Abstract
Much of the contemporary debate on the transition from an apartheid to
an apartheid free South Africa has primarily focussed on the question of
class alliances and the possibility of socialism. This literature has
not, in any detail, discussed the nature of the apartheid state and the
prior question of how a transition is to be brought about. The
important debates concerning the role of the working class in alliance
with other classes do not put any suggestions forward as to how the
apartheid state is to be transformed. Recently, two positions on this question have emerged. First, John Saul (1986: 3-22) makes some interesting arguments concerning the relationship between the popular democratic and proletarian themes in the liberation struggle and the way they are reflected in the liberation movements. However, on the question of transition, Saul merely makes vague references to the 'overthrow of the apartheid state', the
resistance movements 'forcing a transition to a democratic resolution of
South Africa's crisis' and 'the smashing of the apartheid state1. All
this is said in the context of his correct assertion that the 'brute
capacity of the state to bottle up the challenge (to it)...has not been
deeply threatened'. Second, and more recently, Roger Southall (1987: 345-374) discusses the possibility of socialism as well as other scenarios in a post-apartheid South Africa. His argument is premised on the unclear assumption that a transition has occurred 'not (by) the revolutionary overthrow of the
state but (by) its erosion from below'. Later on, he asserts that much
of the argument about the ongoing struggle concerns 'the strength of the
white state, and the supposition that it cannot be overthrown, only
eroded.
The problem with both these positions, excluding their vagueness, is
that they do not seriously consider the institutional structure of the
South African state, its power and its tactical responses to the recent
wave of popular militancy in South Africa. In other words, the
mechanics of transition are not rigorously examined as these authors
have focussed their discussions on other themes, and it is to this
question, the question of transition and the state, that this paper is
directed. However, before examining the contemporary line up of forces
in the South African milieu, the way the liberation movements have
historically viewed the state and the tactics that they have adopted to
effect a transition will be discussed.
Description
African Studies Seminar series. Paper presented 8 August 1988
Keywords
South Africa. Politics and government. 1989-1994