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Author: search.filters.author.Stadler, Alfred William

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    The rise and decline of party activism in South Africa
    (1997-10-06) Stadler, Alfred William
    This paper is concerned to identify the decline in party activism in South Africa since before the general election of 1994. The paper falls into three parts: a brief overview of the general literature on the problem, including references to developments in post-colonial Africa; a schematic account of political activism in black politics in South Africa since the end of the second world war; and thirdly a series of cases in local politics in Mpumalanga at the time of the local elections of 1996 which suggest that there are areas where local party and social movement activism is still visible in the form of internal conflicts, or conflicts between the ANC and its allies, notably SANCO. These cases will be used to show the sometimes complex relations in local politics, and specifically the varied consequences of institutionalising democracy at the local level. The theoretical starting point lies in the debates which followed Oscar Kirchheimer's famous prediction that the "mass integration" class-based party which had politicised the European peasantry and working class in an earlier period, had gone into decline after the second world war, and was being displaced by the "catch-all party". (1) Kirchheimer argued that the catch-all party abandoned all efforts "at the intellectual and moral encadrement of the masses,... turning more fully to the electoral scene, trying to exchange effectiveness in depth for a wider audience and more immediate electoral success. The narrower political task and the immediate electoral goal differ sharply from the former allembracing concerns..." (2)
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    A long way to walk: Bus Boycotts in Alexandra, 1940-1945
    (1979-04) Stadler, Alfred William
    Bus boycotts assumed central significance in the political struggles in urban areas during the forties and fifties. The Alexandra boycott of 1957, which evoked sympathy boycotts across the country, even in areas in which bus fares had not been increased, reached the proportions of a major confrontation between the state on the one hand and African communities and political organisations on the other.
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    Liberation, national unity, and the politics of limited reform: Part 1: Italy, 1944-1948
    (1993-08-09) Stadler, Alfred William
    Italy from the mid to late 1940s provides a classic instance of a massive uprising by the poorest elements in society in support of fundamental changes in their condition. The efforts of the Italian industrial working class and the peasantry through strike action, land seizures and military action in the Resistance, were supported by the unions and by the Socialist and Communist parties. But the political project for fundamental reform was undermined in the post-liberation settlement. The great wave of mobilisation generated during the mid-1940s subsided for a variety of reasons. With its subsidence, the hopes of fundamental change which had inspired many to risk their lives in the revolt against fascism and the German occupation declined. Italy's subsequent history was one of economic growth, but it was purchased at the expense of basic reforms on the land, in industry and the state. Of course things did not go back to where they had stood in 1944. Conservatives opposed to Fascism formed the Christian Democratic Party in 1943. They enjoyed enough credibility to assume a leading position in the anti-fascist coalition which assumed office once the enfeebled Badoglio government had given way to a more representative provisional government. The Christian Democrats (DC) used their authority to consolidate an alliance which stretched across Italian party politics from the Resistance, Communists, Socialists and Liberals, to unions and business associations. The effect of Christian Democratic hegemony was to undermine the most radical elements in the coalition. But they made sufficient concessions to pressures for change from the peasantry and the working class to contain them, and thus to ensure major continuities with the social, economic and political status quo ante. These concessions were important in maintaining their hegemony: each time Christian Democratic policy shifted markedly to the right they experienced rather rapid deflations in electoral support.
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    The conditions for democracy in a future South Africa
    (1989-10-16) Stadler, Alfred William
    It is not inconceivable that the formal institutions of democracy, with universal adult suffrage in a unitary state at the centre, will be introduced in South Africa in the foreseeable future. It is also not beyond the bounds of probability that these formal institutions will be overtaken by a coup d'etat, or a one-party dictatorship which will subordinate or suppress opposition and dissent. This paper is concerned to investigate the most propitious conditions for a stable future democracy in South Africa. Like other similar undertakings, the paper is primarily based on comparative studies rather than on South African political, economic or social material. The main conditions which will be investigated are social, or socio-economic; political; and institutional. The political conditions will be discussed in two intimately related contexts: the one focused on policy, and the other on political power. But it will also become clear that it disputes the assumption made in the earlier literature that it is possible neatly to separate political conditions from social ones, or to assume that the chains of causality can be arranged in a linear fashion. The paper hopefully contributes to political debates going on in this country. It therefore has a political purpose. It also makes the assumption that academic debate may contribute meaningfully to desirable political ends. However, the paper does not, except in a superficial and piecemeal way, consider the extent to which South African conditions provide evidence of emergent properties conducive to democratic stability, or otherwise.
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    Class in white South Africa
    (1976-07) Stadler, Alfred William
    This paper sketches the broad lines of class structure in the white community in South Africa. Aside from the efforts of a small group of scholars, this issue has not received the attention it deserves in recent years. Indeed there is an implicit assumption that because there are no class parties, class is a negligible factor in white politics. While a general discussion of the literature is beyond the scope of this paper, the major assumptions which are embedded in recent analyses by liberal and conservative historians and sociologists might be summarised briefly as follows: Whites are members of a broadly egalitarian caste divided politically along language and cultural lines within a system of racial stratification. Political power reflects cultural groupings rather than class formations. Political elites are the representatives of cultural formations rather than dominant class interests. Class and community constitute alternative and exclusive bases for political action. Racial prejudice is seen as the determinant force in the present configuration of power.
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    Birds in the cornfield: Squatter movements in Johannesburg, 1944-1947
    (1978-04) Stadler, Alfred William
    The Government is beaten, because even the Government of England could not stop the people from squatting. The Government was like a man who has a cornfield which is invaded by birds. He chases the birds from one part of the field and they alight in another part of the field We squatters are the birds'. The Government sends its policemen to chase us away and we move off and occupy another spot. We shall see whether it is the farmer or the birds who get tired first (1). Thus spoke Oriel Monongoaha, one of the leaders of the Pimville squatters. The tenor and tone of his words suggests that while the squatter movements were in the first instance a protest by blacks in Johannesburg against the serious shortage of housing which developed during a period of rapid urbanisation, they assumed the proportions of open rebellion, mounted on a scale unprecedented in any urban area in South Africa. The squatter movements were remarkable, not only for the numbers involved(a), their duration, and their successes, but above all because their structure and organisation flowed out of an instinctual understanding of the contradictions developing in the South African political economy.
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    Apartheid as ideology
    (1972-05) Stadler, Alfred William
    Writers on South African race policy frequently distinguish between the ‘administrative-repressive’ structure and the ‘utopian’ or 'declamatory' aspects of apartheid, between the ongoing processes of racial discrimination and the ideal of total territorial separation between the races. (2) Van Den Berghe argues that the contradictions between the "idealist" and "realist" strains in apartheid may be resolved, "insofar as each operate at a different level. The answer lies in the old dilemma of means versus ends that is inherent in the exercise of power." This kind of argument conceals the problematic nature of apartheid. The fact that politicians' actions frequently diverge from their expressed intentions is not in itself very interesting. It is the construction which political actors place upon the relationship between means and ends which reveals the nature of ideological assumptions. In South Africa, the consciousness of a dichotomy between the ongoing activities of the political order and the professed objectives of the regime reveals the contradictions of the South African situation.