United Democratic Front: Leadership and ideology
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Date
1987-08
Authors
Lodge, Tom
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Abstract
The UDF is essentially a federation linking a large and
heterodox collection of organisations varying in function, size, and
popular impact. It is strongest in the Eastern Cape, traditionally the
stronghold of the ANC, with which many local UDF leaders are
historically associated. Class and communal cleavages as well as the
presence of rivals with a popular following, make the UDF comparatively
weaker in Cape Town and Durban. In the industrial heartland of the
Transvaal, the UDF is undoubtedly paramount, but the sheer size of the
urban centres, their social complexity, and the uncertainties of the
UDF' s relationship with a well-established trade union movement, make
its own capacity for marshalling disciplined support questionable. In
the Transvaal, to a greater extent than in its other four main regions,
the UDF has come to depend upon a tacit alliance with an increasingly
politicised yet politically independent trade union movement. Any
analysis of the UDF, though, should not be limited to the bureaucratic
boundaries of its often patchy organisation, for the UDF functions more
in the fashion of a social movement than a deliberately contrived
political machine. With this consideration in mind, two questions need
examining. Which social constituencies does the UDF represent? Is it
possible to perceive in the UDF's ideological discourse the interests or
concerns of particular social classes?
Description
African Studies Seminar series. Paper presented August 1987
Keywords
United Democratic Front (South Africa), South Africa. Politics and government. 1978-1989