Author Sylvia Neame's study of the development of the national liberation movement in South Africa is in stark contrast to the frequent depictions of the history of the ANC by leading academics as fragmented, fractured and discontinuous. Not only does her analyses disprove the belief that the ANC's development has been episodic, several of the conclusions drawn point to its essential inner coherence.
Crucial to the development of the congress movement was the search for an alliance strategy that would ensure the ANC its central role. Particularly striking, and essentially new, is the depiction of the various alliance partners including the Industrial and Commercial Workers' Union (ICU), the Communist Party and the South African Congress of Trade Unions and their complicated interaction.
The research, based on extensive primary and secondary sources including some eighty interviews dating back to the early 1960s, uniquely combines narrative and analysis. The Congress Movement invites the reader to engage in the fascinating development of the national liberation movement in South Africa in its formative period and uncovers its outstanding continuities as well as the considerable range of its methods.
Volume 1 traces the unfolding of the congress movement from 1917 and looks at socialist and other forces that played an integral part in its formation. The 191820 upsurge, which included an African mineworkers' strike, played a key role in this development and laid the basis in the 1920s for a partnership between the Industrial and Commercial Workers' Union and the African National Congress.
VOLUME 1: 1917April 1926
- TOWARDS A TYPOLOGY OF THE ANC & THE ICU:
A critical assessment of a wide range of views
Introduction
The CI's Black Republic resolution
(a) The nature of the ANC
(b) The nature of the ICU
The ICU as a rural movement: Helen Bradford
Erosion of the historical method, 1970s-80s: Neo-Marxists & "social historians"
ANC in terms of its relationship to state power: Susan Booysen & Paul Rich
The ANC, popular struggle & marginal groupings: Philip Bonner
The discontinuous nature of ANC history: Tom Lodge
A national-political history of the ANC: Peter Walshe
ANC & labour. Continuity in Congress history: Peter Limb
The origins of the ANC: Andr Odendaal
- THE WORKERS' UPSURGE, 1917-20:
Birth of the Congress mass movement
Introduction
ISL & establishment of the IWA
Development of the IWA prior to the upsurge
Tensions within the IWA
Wages movement of 1918
The Moffat report
Pass campaign of 1919
1920 strike
National Congress & formation of a national workers' organization, 1920
Response of the ruling class
(a) Low Grade Mines Commission
(b) Establishment of the JJC
(c) Founding of the TNMCA
(d) Umteteli
(e) Committee on the Native Pass Laws
Mahabane comes to the fore - KADALIE & SELBY MSIMANG, 1919-21:
Congress, the ICWU & the ICU
Introduction
Kadalie's background
Early days of the ICU
Cape Town strike, 1919
Selby Msimang's background
SANNC conference, May 1920. African worker organization & Meshach Pelem
Establishment of the ICWU at Bloemfontein, July 1920
Problems of structure, arising from the conference
ICU claims the role of a nationwide movement
The Port Elizabeth events of 1920 Masabalala & Msimang
Kadalie & Masabalala break with Msimang at the time of the July 1921 ICWU conference
Msimang drifts into the camp of the Joint Councils - 1922 STRIKE & UPRISING:
Was it anti-black?
Introduction
State of the parliamentary parties preceding the strike
1922 strike
Different streams in the strike
Role of the Afrikaner nationalist politicians
Role of the blacks in the strike
The Cape, the ICU, and the 1922 strike - BLACK ORGANIZATIONS IN TRANSITION, 1921-early 1924:
Relations with the parliamentary parties
Introduction
ICU's October 1921 conference
ICU's 1923 conference
The contradictions continue. ICU & ICWU
A new phase: Growing disillusionment with Smuts amongst black leaders
Annual conference of Congress, May 1923
ICU in the new phase
CP's attitude towards the ICU & black nationalism into early 1924
ICU's January 1924 conference - 1924 GENERAL ELECTION:
White-Black Front against Smuts?
Introduction
Pact policies for the general election
The Pact & the mining industry
The communists & the 1924 election
Cape black leaders attempt to establish a united front for the general election
The All-African Convention, May 1924
Mahabane & segregation run-up to the election
ANC annual conference, May 1924, & the general election
Cape blacks in the election campaign
Election results how did the blacks vote?
Contradictory nature of Hertzog's segregation policy in its early phase - ICU & ANC; MID-1924 TO APRIL 1926:
Non-cooperation & efforts to establish a united front
Introduction
The ICU comes to the Rand
ICU-ANC relations in the setting of the ANC's 1925 conference
Selope Thema's difficulties with Congress, mid-1923 to 1925
ICU's 1925 conference
ICU-ANC & the pass issue in 1925
ICU-ANC organizational-structural aspects
ICU-ANC the social aspect
Receding of Garveyite influence in the ICU. Role of Thaele
Kadalie's internationalist outlook
CPSA-ICU, 1924-early 1926
Growing disillusionment with Hertzog
Mahabane calls for a national convention
ANC in Special Convention, January 1926
The Special Convention and the question of mass struggle
Problem of the united front between the ICU and the ANC
Postscript: Kadalie maintains the role of the ICU as a potential wing of the ANC - STRUCTURAL ASPECTS OF THE ICU, 1925-April 1926:
Trade union, African-Coloured alliance or African nationalist movement?
Introduction
ICU, the stevedores & the rest of the dockworkers
Growth of a town-based branch structure
ICU offices, manned by provincial secretaries, tend to undermine the branch structure
Opposition to Tyamzashe's bureaucratic methods
The communists & the ICU's realignment on a trade union basis
ICU's 1925 constitution
A Coloured or African organization?
Problems of the ICU's leading organs
The La Guma inspection report
National Council meeting & conference, April 1926, in relation to structural issues
Reference list
Index
