Dube and Sol Plaatje led campaigns against legislation that formalized racial segregation and limited the citizenship rights of black South Africans, such as the Natives Land Act. Early ANC leaders came from a variety of ethnic backgrounds but shared certain characteristics, one of which was missionary education and English proficiency.39 Many early ANC members were Xhosa, reflecting their relatively early exposure to missionary education and British colonial rule. However, as Dale McKinley (1997) emphasizes, early ANC leaders were not necessarily focused upon a radical reorganization of South African society. Rather, they represented an emerging black South African professional class whose political and economic interests were undermined by unified white rule. Despite class differences between the ANC leadership and the majority of black South Africans, the party rose to prominence in the 1920s, campaigning against racial segregation and the continued expropriation of black South African land and resources.40
The onset of unified rule was accompanied by an expanded use of state institutions to secure the political and economic interests of white South Africans, including legislation to address the growing population of “poor whites.”41 Increasing numbers of white South Africans living in poverty undercut the logic of segregation, which was predicated on the supposed racial supremacy of Europeans. The union government set out to reestablish the link between race and class as the foundation for a bifurcated wage-labor system across South Africa. Transnational interests influenced the unity government’s policies, as the Carnegie Corporation funded a commission that addressed the “poor whites” question in South Africa (Willoughby-Herard 2015). The commission’s findings were used to rationalize institutional mechanisms to support the social welfare of white South Africans, despite growing social inequality and disease prevalence among black South Africans.42
The development of state-owned enterprises that disproportionately employed poor and working-class whites accompanied a welfare state that defined South African citizenship in racial terms. State-owned enterprises such as the Electricity Supply Commission (Eskom), and the Iron and Steel Corporation (Iscor) expanded white employment and contributed to industrial growth in South Africa. The developmental state created during the interwar period was buttressed by the expansion of a state-led industrialization of the South African economy (Freund 2013). The Afrikaner population was the primary beneficiary of the white welfare state, which transformed their class position and reinforced the link between race and class. The rise of an Afrikaner working class was accompanied by the establishment of institutions created by an Afrikaner elite that espoused Afrikaner cultural particularity and white nationalism (O’Meara 1983). The broederbond, an elite network of wealthy Afrikaner men, backed the development of Afrikaner nationalist ideology, which focused on black South African urbanization and the social instability that was believed to accompany this process. Inspired by racialist conceptions of social Darwinism, united by Calvinist beliefs, and informed by the memory of concentration camps, the National Party was formed in 1914 to secure the interests of South Africa’s Afrikaner population.
Industrialization and urban growth during the interwar period exacerbated contradictions in the white settler alliance that had held since the South African War. The development of a white industrial working class and urban economic expansion led to increased black South African participation in the workforce and growth in black urban communities.43 The rural reserves had never had sufficient arable land to support subsistence agriculture, and black South Africans increasingly depended on urban employment as soil qualities degraded and the rural population grew.44 As the pressure to garner urban wages to supplement subsistence agriculture in the rural reserves intensified, so did the size, scope, and complexity of black urban social formations.45 The growth of black urban settlements in response to employment opportunities led to new forms of social organization and decisive shifts in South African history.46
The early history of Soweto offers a useful example for understanding how black urban settlement expanded and developed in social and political terms. Squatter leader James Mpanza played a central role in Soweto’s settlement and in the development of mechanisms for self-governance,47 including the collection of fees for trading licenses that supported social policing initiatives and funeral arrangements, among other functions (Stadler 1979; Bonner 1990). However, many of those who settled in black urban areas were temporary residents, as black South African men were recruited to work in urban areas or the mines for a period of six to nine months, after which time they would return to their ethnic homelands (Mayer 1980; Sharp and Siegel 1985). While these areas of “separate development” were key sources of mining labor, women-driven agricultural production in the homelands subsidized social reproduction, since mining wages alone were inadequate to support a family. Despite the transience of some residents, urban communities such as Johannesburg’s Sophiatown blossomed with cultural expression during this time, including the publication of magazines such as Drum and the development of influential music scenes (Coplan 1985).
The question of black urbanization had long figured in debates on traditional authority. Political leaders such as Jan Smuts were ardent supporters of racial segregation due to a belief that detribalized black South Africans would destabilize the country. British experiences with the issue of precolonial social organization had deeper roots, as their attempts to unravel the caste system in India had informed their subsequent colonization of the African continent. Indirect rule, which maintained traditional laws and customs in the native reserves and reinforced the power of traditional rule, was formalized following the violent suppression of African social formations during colonization.48 Debates on detribalization had simmered during the latter half of the nineteenth century, highlighted by a series of “rape scares” in several cities across South Africa (Etherington 1988; Scully 1995). That black urbanization was primarily male was a central component of growing white fear and mistrust, encompassed by the term swart gevaar (black peril).49 While many of the reported cases of sexual assault appear to have been baseless, the image of young black South African men roaming urban areas stoked fears of the tsotsi (youth gangster).
As the black urban South African population grew, the political divide between the liberal-leaning British South Africans and nationalist-leaning Afrikaner South Africans expanded. Following urban industrial growth and commensurate increases in the demand for black urban labor during the Second World War, the South African public was faced with a clear choice on how to address racial segregation. A vote for the liberal United Party in 1948 would unravel the two-tiered racial structure of the labor market and move South African society toward desegregation. Conversely, a vote for the National Party would reverse black urbanization and deepen existing policies of racial segregation and “separate development.” Here again, South African history was marked by continuity rather than a break with the political, economic, and institutional dynamics of the past.
Apartheid, Traditional Authority, and Urban Revolt
The dynamics of racial segregation, social inequality, and expropriation continued and expanded during the apartheid era in South Africa. The National Party’s rise to political power intensified racial segregation, exacerbated racial inequality, increased state violence toward black South Africans, and led to South Africa’s immersion into Cold War proxy conflicts. Support for African traditional elites was central to the apartheid state’s project of maintaining ethnically distinct reserves. The apartheid state supported and expanded the power of traditional leaders, designating customary areas as the basis for “separate development.” The process of reconstructing urban space along racial lines was contingent upon forced removals and the development of periurban townships, fundamentally changing urban sociospatial relations across South Africa. However, the “ordering” ethos of the apartheid system was never fully realized, and political opposition to the apartheid state grew in the black urban social formations that the National Party aimed to control.
After coming to power via national elections in 1948, the National Party initiated the apartheid project of racial separateness. The apartheid system built on and expanded institutions developed during the colonial period to control the movement and residence patterns of black South Africans. The
