Africans in White Dominated South Africa

- beginning in the 19th C but becoming more differentiated in the 20th, Africans were incorporated into the economic and social system of South Africa in 3 distinct settings.

• Africans went to white occupiers/owners and made some sort of arrangement to live and work there (we’ll discuss the kinds of arrangements shortly).
  
  - this happened especially in the Cape where the wars had resulted in white forces driving out Africans who later came filtering back.
  
  
• Whites came and claimed the land where Africans lived; Africans might try to resist, at times with some success in the short term.
  
  - this happened especially in the Boer republics (only whites could own or register land); in the early days after the Great Trek, many Boers were not able to enforce their claims. However, as time went on and white control became more consolidated, Africans usually had to make some sort of deal with the whites who claimed ownership. Then, the white man or one of his children would go to live on the ‘farm’.
  

• Colin Bundy, The Rise and Fall of a South African Peasantry, 1979
  
  
• ________ . “The Response of African Peasants in the Cape to Economic Changes, 1870-1910: A Study in Growth and Decay,” The Societies of Southern Africa in the 19th and 20th Centuries, III, (1971-72), 24-37.
  
  
• ______ and William Beinart, Hidden Struggles in Rural South Africa, 1987.
  
  
• Jack Lewis, “The Rise and Fall of the South African Peasantry: A Critique and Reassessment,” Journal of Southern African Studies, XI, 1(1984), 1-24.
  

1. Natural disasters
   
   1. Cattle sickness—rinderpest. This epidemic swept down from east and central Africa arriving in S. Africa in 1895 and reaching the Cape in 1896. Up to 90% of cattle died. Eventually, a process for immunization was discovered, but by then losses were enormous; as cattle were the major source and aspect of African wealth, this was a tremendous disaster and Africans were never able to recoup fully.
      
   2. Drought—the worst drought since the 1820s began just after the S. African War and lasted for the rest of the decade (i.e., c1903-1911); distress and hardship in the Cape were great and widespread.
      
      
2. Political Changes
   
   - the growth of racism had its impact in South Africa, especially in the Cape because it was the only area that had somewhat more ‘liberal’ policies. We noted this before in talking about Cape ‘liberalism’. The effect was to reduce jobs for which Africans would be hired, especially in government service; this affected white collar jobs but even in letter and telegram deliveries.
   
   - there was less willingness to increase government support for African education (and thus restrained growth in teaching jobs for Africans). This was happening just as education had become a big priority for Africans and much larger numbers of graduates were emerging from the mission schools.
   
   
3. The South African War
   
   - in the short term, the effects of the war were ambiguous; prices for produce soared as did wages for greatly increased jobs in the ports and in transportation to facilitate the flow of men and supplies from abroad for the war effort (i.e., income increased). However, the prices of goods soared even more so that the effects of inflation nullified for most the rise in incomes.
   
   - the depression after the war caused prices for agricultural products and wages to drop drastically, but the prices of overseas goods dropped much less; thus, Africans were being squeezed.
   

4. Changing economic and political factors
   
   - gold mining in the Transvaal greatly accelerated the processes already begun in diamond fields, that is, transforming South Africa into an urban, industrial society; at first, ‘industry’ was mining rather than manufacturing, but it was a drastic change from agricultural society that for large numbers, whites as well as blacks, had been primarily subsistence (Boers had produced only small amounts of surplus for the markets earlier). The growth of cities provided markets for agricultural products but required more production. This meant more commercialization and more investment. Thus, agriculture now had to be more capitalist and market oriented.
   
   - Africans had much less opportunity to take advantage of these developments; however, just as important as ‘natural’ disadvantages were the deliberate blockages which white competitors, using political power as voters, were able to interpose. Bundy, following Legassick and Trapido, argues that white farmers had long felt in competition with Africans and had wanted to have greater access to African labour at the very low wage rates they wanted to pay.
   
   - complaints about inadequate labour were endemic and we’ll come back to discuss this soon. Here, we should note that the reserves were often a source of complaint in this regards; white farmers argued that Africans could meet most of their limited needs by grazing cattle and cultivating a bit of ground; therefore, an adequate labour supply (and farmers looked at the reserves as Cassius was described by Shakespeare, “with a lean and hungry look”) required that, short of abolishing the reserves entirely, Africans should be forced to leave the reserves to work for whites.
   
   - with the growth of the mining industry and urbanisation, white farmers were even more eager to take advantage of opportunities by expanding production, but needed and wanted large additional sources of cheap labour; mining too needed large amounts of cheap labour. At the same time, farmers wanted to reduce the competition from African producers who were formidable competitors according to Bundy et al.
   

• the act replaced communal tenure of land with individual tenure; however, the plots were only 4 acres and no more than one plot per man was allowed.
  
  
• the act also provided a special tax for any male who had not gone outside the reserve to work in the previous year; i.e., work outside the reserve was in effect made compulsory with the special tax penalty.
  
  
• land held under this legislation did not count for the property qualification for the vote. The Registration Act of 1887 had disqualified land held under communal tenure; the Glen Grey Act established individual tenure (individual tenure was supposed to be one of the great educative effects for improving and ‘civilising’ Africans). Now, this act ensured that they did not gain any political power from the change. Moreover, you can see that this was a clear departure from non-differentiation in Cape ‘liberalism’— Africans in the Glen Grey district covered by this law were treated differently from everyone else in the Cape Colony.
  
  
• the act did set up a system of local government (a council of Africans) employing a combination of traditional leaders (chiefs) and elected representatives.
  
  • the administration was carried out still by the officials of the Cape Native Affairs Dep’t (i.e., the Resident Magistrates and their staffs) and were responsible and answerable to the Cape government, not to the ‘native council’. However, it did allow Africans to tax themselves for purposes they decided (e.g., roads, additional education facilities, etc.).
    
  • this system was later introduced into the Transkei where a territorial body, the Bunga, was established; the Bunga was usually judged to be a ‘success’. The Bunga also provided a model which the National Party government under Verwoerd could adapt in developing and imposing its Bantustan policies in the 1950s and 60s.
    

• Natal had a system of labour requirements for public projects called isibalo. It was a kind of labour tax. White magistrates or officials would go to the local chief and demand that a specific number of men be available to perform work on some project (repairing a road, building schools, etc.). The chief then assigned specific men under his jurisdiction to provide this labour.
  
  
• sufficient land was available that most Africans did not have to work for white farmers. When sugar was introduced, large supplies of disciplined labour was required. With Africans unwilling or considered unsuited, the problem was solved by importing indentured Indians. At first, these Indians were allowed to buy land and to bring their families after their initial 5 year contract was completed. Later, strong efforts were made to prevent this and to require that labourers return to India at the completion of their contracts.
  
  
• proposals and experiments to bring Irish peasants failed: social dislike, farmers were unwilling to pay enough and the labourers themselves left farming as soon as possible to go to more remunerative employment.
  
  
• late in the 19th C (as indicated above), increased taxes were used to force Africans in increasing numbers into the labour market.
  

1. Full time worker—this is probably the major type.
   
   - usually, the wages are paid in cash and in kind (the latter might includes some form of housing, some food, the right to graze some stock, some land for their own food production, sometimes clothing; in western Cape often wine and brandy rations). They and their families live on the farm in small houses.
   
   
2. Labour tenant—this system is very like feudal serfdom except Africans have never acquired the security of tenure achieved in feudal Europe.
   
   - the African family is allowed to live on and use part of the farm in return for labour from 90 days to 6 months.
   
   - this form of ‘kaffir farming’ has not been attacked by legislation as strongly as other forms; perhaps it has been tolerated more because a white farming family still remains to farm part of the land, relying on the labour tenants.
   
   
3. Cash tenant—usually called a ‘squatter’. This term is a peculiar usage in South Africa although it was also used subsequently in colonies with white settlers such as Rhodesia and Kenya.
   
   - in this arrangement, the tenant pays a specific rent for use of a portion of the farm. Usually, the entire farm would be let out in this way and was called a location. Normally, the white owner of the land does not live on the farm and only comes around to collect the rent.
   
   - the term ‘squatting’ has pejorative connotations and its not clear why it is used in this context. Renting out land to tenants is the overwhelming arrangement in agriculture in Britain (this has perhaps been changing as a result of death duties which have taken a toll on the land holdings of the traditional landed families of the aristocracy and gentry).
   
   - moreover, when whites leased or rented land to other whites, they did not call that ‘squatting’! Basically, the use of the term indicates the strong dislike which other whites have when some of their colleagues take advantage of such arrangements.
   

4. Half-shares farming—share-cropping—also referred to as ‘squatting’.
   
   - as with cash tenants, the entire farm is divided among the tenants in a location, but instead of a specific rent, the tenants pay half the crop produced to the owner. This has the advantage that the risks of having a poor crop is shared between the owner and the tenant whereas with cash rent, the risk is entirely borne by the tenants.
   
   
   - with both these last 2 relationships, the tenants supplied all or most of the working capital, having their own teams of oxen, plows, sometimes wagons and provide their own seed. As such, they were substantial men with their own capital.
   
   - also, the relationships was more or less an equal partnership—the landowner providing the fixed capital (the land) and the tenant providing the working capital and the labour.
   
   - both were also the subject of hostility and of vigorous attempts to eliminate them by making them illegal (as we shall see); there was considerable, but not complete, success.
   
   
5. Isibalo labour—mentioned this form of labour in Natal. It was only used in Natal and disappeared at the time of Union.
   
   
6. Prison labour
   
   - this had often been used in the 19th C, usually for public works. It became a very important development after World War 2 and under apartheid. We shall come back to this shortly.
   
   
7. Migrant labour
   
   - these are workers brought in, usually from a considerable distance, for specific periods (e.g., planting or harvest, or perhaps for an entire season). They are not intended to be permanent employees and are often men without families.
   
   
8. Daily labour
   
   - may live on the farm, but often are trucked in daily or weekly from nearby areas. They often work for substantial portions of the year, but farmers have no long term contracts with them.
   

1. Landowner/farmer and his family—this was the ideal for Afrikaner nationalists and the object of so much solicitude by governments.
   
   
2. Farm manager—usually poor whites or at least landless whites. There were never many whites in this category and they became increasingly rare. In fact, increasingly, Africans were becoming de facto farm managers.
   
   
3. Bywoner (literally, someone who lives nearby). These were landless, poor whites who were, to some extent, like labour tenants. The bywoner provided services to the landowner, often as an overseer, in return for being allowed to live on the farm and use a portion of the farm for his own account. This has disappeared in the 20th C.
   

Africans in White Dominated South Africa

• on one extreme, some white families displayed a paternalistic approach in taking an interest in the well being of their workers (the farm wife going to the huts of workers’ families with medicines for someone sick);
  
• on the other, some very brutal and unreasonable employers (some who would go into rages and kill or seriously injure employees—this was not that uncommon).
  
• even with ‘good employers’, farm workers and families were subject to greater control and less freedom than elsewhere; restrictions on visiting were especially hard on the young people wanting to socialise with members of the opposite sex.
  

• the diamond fields required vast numbers of labourers, a large portion of whom were temporary migrant workers. Initially, non-whites had been able to acquire diggers’ claims, but after rowdy whites rioted, authorities ceased this practice and claims could only be held by whites.
  
  
• a significant problem on the diamond fields was theft and the I.D.B. (Independent Diamond Buyers); also, there were frequent complaints about lack of discipline in the labour force, especially that access to canteens led to excessive drinking and workers not able to work because of the effects of drunkenness. The solution was the implementation of closed compounds. These were barracks-like living quarters on mine property where workers spent their entire term of contract—not allowed to leave (with barbed wire and armed guards, these compounds were [are] more like prisons). Stores were available inside the compounds.
  
  
• at the goldfields, store owners mounted too strong an opposition to allow closed compounds; also, theft was not a problem. As a result, open compounds were established. Very rarely did mining companies establish facilities for miners to bring their families, although some coal mining companies in Natal did do that for a while.
  

• in Natal: “Let them understand that the towns of the Colony are the special places of abode for the white men, who are the governing race...”
  
  
• in the SAR, no African was allowed to live in or near towns without special permission (i.e., were given a pass); in 1899, Africans were prohibited from walking on sidewalks.
  
  
• in the Orange Free State: “The traditional conception of our Native locations in the Free State ... undoubtedly is that they are merely convenient reservoirs for the purpose of supplying the legitimate labour requirements of our towns and villages.” The Free State had the strictest curfew laws.
  

“The masterless native in urban areas is a source of danger and a cause of degradation of both black and white.”

1. White farmers (towns and higher town wages were attracting African labour away from the farms);
   
2. Poor whites (hardly ‘poor’ anymore by 1948, but people of restricted education who continued to see Africans, especially educated Africans, as an economic threat) often felt in competition for housing and facilities.
   
3. Afrikaner leaders in church and politics who were obsessed with the dangers of intermingling and ‘miscegenation’.
   

1. Period of ‘fragile productivity’ 1918-1954
   
   - there was a slight tendency for output per head to drop, but the proportion of subsistence requirements produced remained relatively constant. This is largely explained by emigration from the reserves as density grew only slowly from 50/sq. mile in 1918 to 60/sq. mile in 1955.
   
   
2. Period of rapid decline 1955-1969
   
   - influx control reduced the outlet of emigration. The average densities increased from 60/sq mile to 110 in 1969. Production per head plummeted; the proportion of subsistence requirements was by the late 1960s only 2/3 of the 1955 level. There was a great increase in the dependency of people in the reserves on remittances from the urban areas.
   
   - what this indicates is that while influx control did not stop let alone reverse African migration to the cities, it did slow it down during a period of rapid population growth. As a result, population densities increased (almost doubled). Production per capita declined for several reasons; unless production increased at the same rate the population was increasing, there would be a per capita decrease. However, the population remaining in the reserves was not balanced, there being a disproportion of children, old people and women with children; many working age men and young women, the most productive workers, were absent as migrant labour. It was hard or even impossible for this unbalanced labour force to maintain maximum production. As overcrowding increased, problems of soil depletion and erosion further reduced production. As a result, residents in the reserves were less and less able to meet their subsistence needs from their own production and increasingly relied on income from absent family members to survive. This downward or vicious circle was a direct effect of apartheid policy. Ironically, the policy was increasing the ‘push’ for Africans to go to the cities and thus producing the opposite of what was intended and wanted! No matter how repressive influx control was made, necessity forced Africans continually to circumvent it and infiltrate into the cities.
   
   - Simkins comments, “Indeed, it may not be fanciful to see the state’s ‘homeland development’ programme (seriously started in the late sixties) as a response to a crisis it had precipitated fifteen years earlier.” (p. 271).