Document 65 - Z. Sanders (Zena Susser), “Aspects of the Rural Problem in South Africa”, lecture delivered to the Johannesburg Discussion Club on 1 December 1952, Viewpoints and Perspectives, 1, 1, 21 February 1953 [....]

From: South Africa's Radical Tradition, a documentary history, Volume Two 1943 - 1964, by Allison Drew

Document 65 - Z. Sanders (Zena Susser), "Aspects of the Rural Problem in South Africa", lecture delivered to the Johannesburg Discussion Club on 1 December 1952, Viewpoints and Perspectives, 1, 1, 21 February 1953 [....]

Discussion of Policy

Our analysis has shown a growing pauperization and proletarianisation of the rural Africans, but also a growing contact with the towns and with the concepts of the industrial worker and miner. On the one hand the needs of the people for food, clothes, money, health, freedom are gradually becoming felt and conscious; on the other hand new ideas of policy and action are finding their way to the rural areas. We have shown that the most powerful factors which maintain the depressed condition are lack of mobility and lack of land. This situation arises out of the present economic system of the country - on the one hand, the system of migratory labour demands such conditions, and on the other the rapid development of capitalism is tending to dispossess the rural people still further. The contradictions of capitalist economy emphasise the disabilities of our rural people, because while they are being dispossessed they are yet prevented from selling their labour in the best market. This people begin to understand. Their need for mobility is underlined by the difficulties which face them when they are driven to migrate illegally, and the need to move is a direct outcome of their lack of land.

Because the immigrant to the city is often forced to move from town to country and back, he is able to identify himself with, or at any rate, to recognise the needs of the industrial proletariat. These are obviously closely linked with his own. The industrial worker also needs mobility; he needs in addition the abolition of the industrial colour bar, which is the technique that operates most powerfully to keep him in desperate poverty, unable to advance and unable to attain class cohesion. The contradictions between the methods of fanning and mining on the one hand and industry on the other must lead to the breakdown of the industrial colour bar by a process of slow attrition; in the meantime it serves to emphasise and sharpen the recognition of this need by the worker.

Development of Capitalism

While the economic forces of our capitalist economy are gradually driving towards the breakdown of restricted mobility and restricted skill, the most effective bulwark of this system is an uneducated European electorate on which the mining and fanning interests can rely. Thus an immediate and obvious demand both for city and rural dwellers is extension of the franchise.

Who will make these demands and how can they be made effective? It is not difficult to show that since 1910, when South Africa obtained the forms of political independence, the Union, after the stimulus of industrialisation that followed the discovery of gold and diamonds, has rapidly taken on the shape of a capitalist economy. Pervading this economy are the remnants of colonialism, namely the colour bar in all its manifestations (we do not deny that it is an integral part of the present system, but it is in direct contradiction to the direction of capitalist development), the tribal system, segrega­tion, the limited franchise and the systems of migrating labour. Similarly in some European countries before 1917 there existed a capitalist economy heavily loaded with the remnants of feudalism. Before advance could take place it was necessary to destroy and abolish the institutions of feudalism - this was described as the completion of the bourgeois democratic revolution, and the workers achieved it with the peasants, and the petit bourgeoisie and bourgeois up to a point, as their allies.

Criteria for Advance

In light of this, we can proceed to answer questions. Certainly in the Union, before advance can take place, the institutions of colonialism must be abolished. The people who make the demand are the people who suffer from them, namely the Non-Europeans, and up to a very limited point, those "liberal" Europeans who represent the needs of industry . Because we have here capitalism developing amongst people who were never highly organised enough to produce a rich and powerful class, e.g. landowners, and because the rigid colonial institutions have prevented the emergence of any economically powerful group from amongst them, even under capitalism, their liberating movement is particularly in complexity. It has no bourgeoisie worth speaking of to reckon with. Those who seek liberation are industrial workers, rural workers and migrant labourers, with a smatter-petit bourgeoisie. And here their needs are largely in accord. It is not a "national" liberating movement in the true sense of the word. The Europeans, the Indians, the Coloureds, lays and the Africans do not each form a separate nation. None of them have any of the attributes of a nation, but only some racial distinction, and to call them nations would be absurd. There is but one economy in South Africa, several cultures that are tending to late into one culture, several languages which must at some time assimilate, and one geographical and political unit. Thus the problems are these of a capitalist country with remnants of colonialism still existing, and the chief opposing forces are the capitalists and industrial workers. The first handicap of the workers is the colonial forms that hold them in chains, without destroying these they cannot advance. Their allies in this struggle are natural and to hand; the rural workers and the migrant labourers. Their contact and distribution is so intimate that of necessity the migrants will carry home with them the same objectives and the same struggle. To make the struggle effective the major protagonist, the trial proletariat, must first achieve cohesive organisation. This is difficult precisely because they are so invaded with temporary rural migrants, but once achieved, the wide spectrum of such an organisation will make it all the more powerful. The policy based on the needs of these workers and migrant labourers must be towards mobility and breakdown of the industrial colour bar (and consequently of the migratory labour system) and unqualified franchise.

We need not speculate at this stage on what is likely to follow the achievement of these aims; they are far reaching in themselves.

Conclusion

The attentive reader will have noted that the need for land had not been dealt with. We believe that no advance in this respect is possible without the accompanying abolition of colonial institutions. It is a just demand and should be made, but its achievement will surely be a later event than the abolition of the pass laws and the industrial colour bar, perhaps even the full franchise. The immediate limiting factor is, of course, the orientation of the ruling groups in the country and its electorate base. On such a basis demand for land has substance. Land reform could only be an expansion of Native Trust policy, and obviously no South African government based on the present electoral could or would wish to undertake the purchase of four-fifths of South Africa for Africans. Equitable distribution by this means is obviously a ludicrous pipedream. The freedom to buy and sell land may appear not a very radical demand. But it would mean scrapping the reserves and thus the breakdown of the system of migratory labour, which is fundamental feature of our present economy. Again, no government based on the present electorate would consider such a change. In any case, without the abolition of other colonial restrictions, this freedom must lead quickly to complete dispossession the African, and to no fundamental change in his condition save to intensify his economic problems.

The abolition of colonial institutions would lead to a revolutionary change, i.e. the achievement of a new and more advanced political form. It might then be possible to establish freedom to buy and sell land. But the fundamental need of rural dwellers is simply for more land, which necessarily entails some form of redistribution. Precisely how this should best be done would depend on the conditions obtaining at the time, on the rate of development of the economy as contracted with the rate of political development of the people, on how and when the necessary political changes come about. So that a sound policy would not take into account the detail and minutia of a redistribution of land, but would simply note the need and make the demand for more land.

Mr. Holt. I should like to know at what rate this trend towards wage labour is developing? In trying to assess this development rate, certain factors should be taken into consideration. Firstly, the backward farmer is subsidised, therefore economic pressure doesn't necessarily force him to use wage labour. Secondly, he has convict labour on which to draw. Thirdly, the situation one finds on South African farms of wage labourers living in prison-like compounds doesn't seem to be a development towards capitalist production. These wage labourers are not always free to sell their labour as and how they wish.

Another point I should like to make is that most Africans want private ownership of the land and one must take this into account if one is trying to draw them into the Liberatory movement. The slogan "the land to those who till it" is a very good one. By implementing this slogan the African peasant would be able to own his land as it would mean the expropriation of white farms.

Lecturer. The compound system does involve a capitalist relationship between labourer and employer. The labourer has only his labour to sell. The overlay of restrictions which prevent his movement from market to market and even locally from farm to farm, does not affect qualitatively this economic relationship with his employer. The amount of wages he can command is affected but the way he works is a capitalist way. The restrictions on movement are a colonial hangover.

While subsidisation obviously encourages poor and outdated farming methods; and labour relations, the rewards of capitalist techniques are great enough to be promoting a fairly rapid development in the use of these methods.

Mr. Sisulu. The people in the Reserves are not so interested in "buying" land. They want more land more stock. It is important that something be done to prevent these people from being so easily recruited to the mines.

How does one organise forced farm labour who are working in many cases against their own will. The Liberatory movement has not made a thorough study of this group.

Mrs. Altman. There is no stable group in the Reserves to form the basis of the Liberatory movement. Assuming the conservation and culling boycott is successful, what happens after the boycott?

Mr. Rabinowitz. Despite Mr. Holt's arguments, the trend is definitely towards rural wage labour. Irrigation farming is assuming ever-greater importance, and irrigation land is too valuable to use in lieu of wages. Squatters are becoming wage labourers. The trend is towards intensive rather than extensive farming - a trend incompatible with the old systems. The fact adduced by Mr. Holt, that South African farm labour is not free to sell in the highest market is irrelevant. Traditionally agricultural labour is less mobile than industrial labour. Furthermore, in Britain where agriculture is highly developed, the bulk of agricultural labourers are in fact tied to individual employers by reason of occupancy their occupancy of housing supplied by that employer or landlord. No one would suggest that this is incompatible with a wage-labour system.

From the tone of the discussion it would appear that it is generally accepted that, the opportunity, all Africans would want to be farmers. This misconception could lead serious errors. A growing number of Africans are (as are people in all countries) drawn to the cities by greater opportunities, better amenities, and education for their children, etc. The city-born know nothing of farming. From the point of view of the economy, it is incorrect to assume that 80% of the population will be permanently required as food producers. In America, 13% fulfill this function.

A correct assessment of the position is necessary in order to determine what are the ligimate aspirations of the African peasantry. From this would be determined his political role and also the best methods of expressing and canalising his political potential.

Dr. Roux. I should like to raise the following points for discussion:

1. The present campaign has found its support predominantly in urban areas, except or certain cases in the Eastern Province, where the most striking example was seen in Peddie.

2. The Unity Movement recommended the boycott of Government conservation measures, these reaching their highest point at Witzieshoek and in Natal where people were prevented from building fences.

This policy was based on the feeling that conservation measures are a form of oppressions. I disagree with them as I regard conservation as being in the same category as other preventative measures such as vaccination. In Port Elizabeth, for example, the rioters burnt down schools, cinemas, etc. Although the African National Congress later admitted that it was not good politics to bum down schools, I consider this similar in nature to conservation sabotage.

The Liberatory movement has never tried to use the Reserves as an economic basis struggle. I maintain that the Transkei, if properly organised on a collective basis, could be the granary of South Africa. The people in the Reserves could build up their economic strength to use as bargaining power to increase mine wages. The existing lacking organisation in the Reserves could do this if the desire and knowledge were not lacking, and they would then use the conservation methods to help to achieve this aim.

Mr. Papert. Because they are the most permanent source of labour on the mines, the peasants are the backbone of South African economy. The function of the Reserves as whole and of the rehabilitation scheme is merely to provide additional labour for the mines. If betterment schemes were to be resisted a serious blow would be dealt to the chamber of Mines who would then find its supply of cheap labour considerably curtailed. Similarly, Dr. Roux's suggestions in regard to the Transkei is wholly unfeasible as the Chamber of Mines and the Government would never permit the re-organisation of the Transkei on a collective basis - again because it would endanger their potential source of labour.

It is not so much a question of Africans overstocking the land, as of there having insufficient land. The policy of "resting" certain areas of land by having people move from one area to another merely decreases the amount of land available for production.

At the same time it adds to the congestion already present in those areas which have to carry a larger number of people. Contour farming, too, is no answer to the land problem. Again, if there is an insufficiency of land available for the farming, culling will provide no solution, especially in terms of the value set on cattle by all African peasants.

Consequently, all rehabilitation schemes, even if they are honest, still serve the function of the Chamber of Mines. The Native Affairs Department which administers these schemes will has the primary function of looking after the requirements of the Mines in regard to labour. In other words, since it is the Native Affairs Department which is responsible for the administration of rehabilitation schemes, the form of administration practised is similar to that found in the educational sphere - Africans are given some measure of educational facilities, but of a far inferior nature to those available for Europeans.

Because of the importance of land to the people, they can be rallied in terms of land.

Mr. Slovo. The major problem as the African peasant sees it, is lack of land. When he sees a government conservation official, that official is a symbol of frustration. For that reason I don't think one can compare, as Dr. Roux has done, conservation sabotage with the burning of schools. The farmer might not be in every case an expression of political consciousness but it is an expression of their desire for more land. As such one cannot condemn conservation sabotage but one must try to direct it into positive channels.

I find the formulation of policy in the paper inadequate. The perspective suggests that the proletarian is going to lead the struggle. Appealing to peasants in their capacity as migrant industrial workers is completely impractical. As peasants they demand more land one can't ignore this unless one ignores five million potential supporters. Once can compare the position here with that in China where it was originally said that the proletariat must lead the struggle. However, when it came to making an appeal to the soldiers, for example, they appealed to them not only in terms of the proletariat struggle but in terms of the problems of the land shortage. One must take into account the aspirations of the people. [....]