In the course of our African National Congress national conference in December, Joel Netshitenzhe presented the strategy and tactics document to the media. Among other things, it affirms the ANC is ”neither neo-liberal nor ultra-left”. Which is true, but on its own it’s a bit like those old colonial maps of Africa. The coastal outline might be defined, but the hinterland is rather vague. Answering the predictable follow-up question (”Well, then, what actually is the ANC?”), Netshitenzhe suggested, more or less off the cuff, that the ANC was probably somewhat akin to a social democratic party.
Not so, argues Drew Forrest (”Misleading from the front”, January 10). If anything, Forrest contends, the classical social democratic tradition is now being upheld in South Africa by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) and the South African Communist Party — ironically those labelled by some as ”ultra-left”.
It might seem churlish to respond critically to an article that is generous, at least in its own terms, to some of us within the ANC alliance. But terms do matter, and if we are not clear about them, generosity is likely to be misplaced.
When we think about South African politics we often locate tendencies and personalities on a left-right axis that evokes European references. Marxists do it all the time; we label each other Leninists, Trotskyists, Stalinists, Gramscians. This is also Forrest’s manner of proceeding, although in his case it is the milder nuances of the British Labour Party that establish the paradigmatic reference points. The dominant trajectory within the ANC, he writes, is not classically social democratic, not in the tradition of Michael Foot and Tony Benn.
I certainly agree with the drift, if not detail, of some of what Forrest has to say. For instance: ”It is misleading to characterise the differences between Cosatu and the ANC leadership as a fight between the ultra-left and the disciplined left … It is closer to being a fight between Benn and Tony Blair’s versions of social democracy …”
However, if we are to understand South Africa then this left-right axis needs to be supplemented with another axis, North-South. For it is the persisting crisis of under-development in the South, of a South that is not so much neglected as actively linked into debilitating accumulation patterns centred on the North, that lies at the heart of the South African reality, and (whether we always realise it or not) of the ANC’s raison d’être.
Neglect of this North-South axis results in many oversights. The left legacies that come to us from the 20th century are not confined, as Forrest implies, to two competing currents — social democracy on the one hand, and a ”thoroughly discredited” Marxism on the other. There are at least two other prominent left traditions. There is the ”new left” (in fact, a very old tradition of social movement struggles); and (more salient for our purposes here) radical Third World nationalism. This latter, a major tradition, is personified by such diverse figures as Jose Marti, Mahatma Gandhi, arguably Mao Zedong and, of course, Nelson Mandela.
Radical Third World nationalism has had its own complex relationship with the other major left traditions, variously influencing, coopting or rejecting. But radical Third World nationalism deserves to be understood also as its own reality, and not merely as a failed attempt to imitate Foot or Blair’s Labour Party.
Radical Third World nationalism answers to an objective reality. Our own country, for instance, remains stubbornly enmeshed in a pre-1994, semi-colonial accumulation path. The economy we have somewhat stabilised (and I am not saying we should not have) remains an enclave, a substantial enclave but an enclave whose performance remains largely irrelevant to the lives of the great majority of South Africans. While the ”fundamentals” in the enclave are ”all in place”, November’s Statistics South Africa data confirms the persisting (and in terms of household income) deepening inequality of our society. It also confirms the ongoing racialised trajectory of this reality — between 1995 and 2000 the average black household’s income deteriorated 19%, the average white household’s income improved by 15%.
These are the symptoms of 130 years of a dependent, externally driven, enclave development path from which we have not yet been able to break. And this is where Forrest’s neglect of the North-South axis leads to another confusion, a simple contrasting between social democratic reform (”good”) and revolution (”bad”, ”extra-legal”).
I do not think we will be able to rise to the challenges of our situation if we fail to appreciate just how fundamentally we have to transform (revolutionise) the pre-1994 accumulation path within which we still remain stubbornly enmeshed. This is not a question of illegality, or of rejecting reforms, or Parliament, but it is beyond anything imagined by Foot, Benn or Blair.
The fact that Third World nationalism answers to an objective reality does not mean, of course, that radical nationalism is not often evoked in empty, demagogic and dangerous ways. Radical nationalist movements are, appropriately, multi-class and their trajectories are contested. It is not unknown for emerging parasitic strata to hijack the revolution, crushing left forces and mass formations. Radical Third World nationalist movements (like other left traditions) can degenerate in ways typical to this particular legacy, but then that’s what we have — a degenerate nationalist movement, and not ”fascism” (a term Forrest misapplies to Zanu-PF).
These are not academic points. If we fail to understand the reality (and necessity) of a radical Third World nationalism in our society, then we will not be alive to the possibilities, the actual challenges, and the likely dangers inherent in our own reality.
Structurally the challenges we face are not dissimilar to those confronting Brazil, for instance. It is not easy to transform these realities, and the question ”how?” takes us to the heart of what should be the real debates in our society.
In 2003 it is not possible as a single, Third World country to simply isolate ourselves from the dominant capitalist global reality and build, let alone sustain, socialism. Cuba and China (with all of its resources) are compelled to defend and advance their social gains by engaging with the dominant capitalist world, not without risk. I do not think there is anyone in the ANC alliance who would argue that there is a go-it-alone option here.
But nor, on its own, will simple compliance with the economic policy strictures of the dominant North (and its local beneficiaries) overcome our systemic crisis of underdevelopment, as six-and-a-half year’s of macroeconomic stabilisation have underlined. It is also a lesson underlined by the paltry results of the recently concluded two-term presidency of the ”Third World social democratic guru” Fernando Cardoso in Brazil.
What is the appropriate mix of global engagement and strategic self-determination? How do we ensure a momentum of reform that radically revolutionises our systemic under-development? How do we overcome mass social exclusion, broaden public space and shift private property out of the enclave? Those are the debates currently in Brazil. Those, I believe, are the debates that should be at the forefront here in South Africa. Sparring with an imaginary ultra-leftism leaves the hinterland uncharted, or open to vague occupation by Southern Blairism or, god bless them, the more avuncular shades of Foot and Benn.
Jeremy Cronin is the SACP deputy general secretary and an ANC national executive committee member
Related:
Misleading from the front 10 January 2003