THE FIGHT FOR A FREE SOUTH AFRICA
The Need for Revolutionary Leadership
by Tom Barrett

Bulletin in Defense of Marxism No. 24, November 1985.
Scanned and posted by Walter Lippmann, September 2007.

History will remember 1985 as the year of South Africa. The oppressed Blacks, Asians, and Coloureds of that racist prison house have already permanently altered the political landscape of the continent. Black workers and Black youth have embarked on a course of struggle, and they will not be turned away from it without winning complete political equality. They have inspired active international support of the kind which helped the Vietnamese win independence; in the United States this support has focused on the demand that U.S. corporations stop doing business in South Africa and that the government impose sanctions against the apartheid regime. Students have organized mass protests demanding that their universities divest themselves of the securities of companies which do business in South Africa. Important mass demonstrations involving labor have already occurred; more are planned.

In all likelihood the institutionalized racial oppression known as apartheid will not survive the present crisis. On September 29 leading figures of the South African bourgeoisie called on President Botha and his government to abolish apartheid. In full-page South African newspaper advertisements headlined "There is a better way," they called for the abolition of apartheid and negotiations with "acknowledged black leaders" on sharing power. Executives of some of the most significant South African and multinational corporations signed the advertisements, including Harry Oppenheimer, the head of DeBeers Consolidated Mines, J.G. Douglas, chairman of South African General Electric, and the heads of South African subsidiaries of Toyota, Kodak, Hewlett-Packard, BMW, Coca-Cola Export, Colgate-Palmolive, Mobil, General Motors, Citibank; and Volkswagen. The signers were from both the English- and Afrikaans-speaking white communities and represented those who have been profiting the most from apartheid over the years.

The U.S. ruling class and the Reagan administration have been embarrassed into taking their distance from the Botha regime. Reagan himself has been forced to call the apartheid system "repugnant" and to call on Botha to change it. With the exception of ultra-right personalities on the ideological fringe of the Republican Party, such as fund-raiser Richard Viguerie and preacher Jerry Falwell, the U.S. bourgeoisie and its political representatives have concluded that apartheid has outlived its usefulness and has become a danger to continued capitalist rule -- and profits -- in South Africa. While they would obviously prefer to deal with moderate leaders such as Rt. Rev. Desmond Tutu or Zulu Chief Gatsha Buthelezi, many have called for negotiations with the African National Congress (ANC) and for the release of ANC leader Nelson Mandela.

Furthermore, many corporations are not waiting for mass protests to sell off their investments in South Africa. Clearly, those holdings are threatened by the developing revolution, which ultimately cannot be defeated in a head-on clash. The restoration of political stability in South Africa is the primary concern of Reagan and the U.S. ruling class, and many in that class are not optimistic.

It may be concluded, then, that a tremendous victory is on the horizon for the workers and oppressed people of the entire world. Apartheid will be abolished; the fact that apartheid may be abolished without wresting state power from the bourgeoisie does not diminish the fact that it is a victory. Revolutionary Marxists support the struggle to end apartheid unconditionally. We support the struggle no matter who is leading it, no matter what programmatic limitations it may have, no matter what class forces are involved in it. The September 29 newspaper advertisements do not cause us to throw up our hands and complain that "the bourgeoisie has co-opted the struggle''; rather, we see it as a retreat forced on the bourgeoisie by the Black struggle. The continued mobilization of Black South Africans, especially the workers on whom the economy depends, such as the miners, is a real threat to continued class rule, even though that question is as yet not consciously posed. The fight for democratic rights in South Africa can grow into socialist revolution, and for this reason the capitalist class is ready to sacrifice apartheid before the struggle gets out of hand.

DEMOCRACY AND REVOLUTION

The relationship between democratic struggle and socialist revolution is not simple and linear. One does not automatically grow out of the other. Tie fall of apartheid will be a tremendous victory for South African Blacks, but it will not totally end their oppression. That goal remains ahead. It is undeniable that the abolition of apartheid is a giant step toward total liberation of the South African people; it is also true that in the case of South Africa there can be no struggle for socialism without the struggle against apartheid. However, the struggle against apartheid is not in and of itself a struggle for socialism.

If socialist revolution is to grow out of a national liberation movement it must be led. The intervention of a conscious socialist leadership is absolutely necessary. History has given us examples of leaders who came to socialist conclusions in the course of the struggle and led the national liberation movement to its next level. Fidel Castro is the prime example. However, revolutionary socialists cannot depend on a nationalist leader of Castro's caliber coming to the fore. The best answer to the question of revolutionary leadership is the building of a Leninist party on the foundation of a Marxist program. This is the answer offered by the Fourth International. A revolutionary party would participate in the national liberation struggle and seek to gain influence and leadership in order to bring about its victory. It would be able to continue the fight beyond the achievement of national democratic goals toward class liberation.

Such a party does not exist in South Africa today; it is of no use to pretend that it does. The African National Congress, the most influential group in the Black struggle at the present time, is not a substitute for that party. It does not have a program which goes beyond national liberation or democratic demands. Neither is it programmatically equipped to lead the African masses forward in the post-apartheid period ahead. Its dedication to African freedom is unquestionable. But that in and of itself may prove to be insufficient.

Furthermore, a debate is currently going on among Black South Africans on the direction in which the national liberation movement should go. The ANC is an important organization, but by no means the only organization vying for leadership of South Africa's oppressed national majority. Peter Blumer, in the September 30, 1985, issue of International Viewpoint, writes: "Within South A r~ ica, the ANC, which presents itself as the national liberation movement, has an extensive network of activists and active sympathizers, who work in the community organizations and in the trade-union movement.... But it has not yet succeeded in winning the leadership of the process of organization that is going on in the industrial working class." Other organizations, such as the National Forum, are also contributing their ideas to the debate in the liberation movement and are contending for leadership.

Consequently, the endorsement by revolutionary socialists of any particular national democratic leadership is of little service to the South African people. However, the August 30, 1985, issue of the Militant gives uncritical endorsement to the African National Congress. This is out of place. The democratic demands of the ANC's Freedom Charter are good ones for agitation, for building a mass movement. But demands are not a substitute for a political program which addresses the reality of class rule and offers a strategy for replacing it. The Freedom Charter should be put forward; its demands should be the basis for mass action. But the editors of the Militant should know better than to hold out the false hope that they are enough. The ANC is a nationalist organization, committed to building a national liberation movement. It is doing that. However, the Socialist Workers Party is committed to building a revolutionary socialist movement. By endorsing the leadership of the ideologically nationalist ANC the SWP contributes nothing to the building of a revolutionary Leninist party in South Africa.

At one time the Socialist Workers Party understood the difference between unconditional support to people in struggle and support to its leadership. The SWP correctly argued in the 1960s against endorsing the leadership of the Vietnamese Stalinists; in 1970 against those who called on it to endorse the Democratic Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine; and in 1976 against those who called for support to the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA). The party did not spend a great deal of time and energy criticizing those organizations, nor should it have. The important thing was to build support for the ongoing revolutionary movements and, when appropriate, to express constructive ideas on how best to build those movements and speed their victory.

POST-APARTHEID SOUTH AFRICA — A QUESTION TO BE FACED NOW

There is little use in speculating on what kind of compromise might be reached on ending apartheid, or even on whether or not one will be reached. What is undeniable is that the inner circles of the ruling class in all the advanced industrial countries are desperately trying to come up with a plan which can save their rule in South Africa. U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz, on October 2, said as much. He said that apartheid was "doomed" and called on Blacks not to turn to an alternative "worse than apartheid," by which, of course, Shultz meant socialist revolution. Some of the leaders of the antiapartheid struggle will have to play a role in a compromise if it is to succeed, and some of them have already expressed willingness to do so. The national liberation movement will have to face several issues as the struggle moves into a post-apartheid period.

First of all, imperialism's stake in South Africa should never be underestimated. It commands the oil-shipping routes from its position at the intersection of the Indian and South Atlantic oceans. Its natural resources and industrial base are vitally important. The amount of money invested by Western banks and multinational corporations is far too much to be written off.

Secondly, Black leaders in South Africa are not united. Gatsha Buthelezi, the leader of South Africa's largest tribe, the Zulus, is strongly anticommunist and has organized physical attacks against ANC activists. The ANC since its founding in 1912 has devoted itself to ending tribal antagonisms; nevertheless, they remain, and the capitalist class will continue its efforts to exacerbate them. Until power is taken away from the capitalists, ending tribal hostilities may not be possible. And one may depend on Buthelezi to continue to defend capitalist power. Bishop Tutu and Allan Boesak (a Coloured minister of the Dutch Reformed church and leader of the United Democratic Front) also have a great deal of influence and are stronglycommitted to compromise rather than
revolution.

Thirdly, the ANC itself is strongly influenced by Stalinism. It is committed to a stagist concept of the South African revolution -- a national democratic revolution now, whose class content is explicitly not proletarian. It has said very litt1 about socialist revolution except to argue against it. A polemic against the National Forum in the July and August, 1985, issues of its journal Sechaba quotes Nelson Mandela: "[The Freedom Charter] is by no means a blueprint for a socialist state but a programme for the unification of various classes and groupings amongst the people on a democratic basis. Under socialism the workers hold state power. They and the peasants own the means of production, the land, the factories, and the mills. All production is for use and not for profit. The Charter does not contemplate such profound economic and political changes." Further, the same article states, "...the political situation in South Africa does not by any means make the question of the socialist revolution the immediate task of the struggle.... Our immediate aim is to win the objectives of the national revolution expressed in the Freedom Charter...." (Reprinted in International Viewpoint, September 30, 1985, p. 16ff.) One can only speculate what the ANC will do to prevent "profound economic and political changes." It can hardly be relied on to advance proletarian interests -- which require "profound economic and political changes" -- after apartheid has ceased to exist.

SOUTH AFRICA AND THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL

What is needed in South Africa is a revolutionary party, built on the foundation of a Marxist program, the program of the Fourth International. What Fourth Internationalists do throughout the world, not only within South Africa, will have a big effect on that process.

By building mass action in opposition to apartheid the Fourth International can earn respect for its contribution to the defeat of that racist regime. Mass action can best be organized through nonexclusionary united fronts whose purpose is to bring the power of the working class and its allies to bear against those who would stand in the way of Black freedom.

By informing working-class militants throughout the world of the issues in debate in South Africa and by constructively contributing its own ideas the Fourth International can influence the discussion in a positive way. It can win South African fighters to a revolutionary Marxist perspective and begin the process of building a party which can lead the South African workers and their allies to socialist revolution.

Precisely the opposite course is being followed by the Socialist Workers Party in the United States. Rather than contributing positive ideas to the general debate on perspectives in South Africa it has given its uncritical endorsement to the ANC. Such a policy hinders the process of building a revolutionary party, both in South Africa and the United States. What is needed in both countries is a party which will fight alongside the oppressed masses at whatever their level of consciousness and carry out concrete work designed to raise people's understanding and convince them of the necessity of socialist revolution, growing into the mass party which can lead the working class in making that revolution.