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While much has been written on post-apartheid social movements in South Africa, most discussion centers on ideal forms of movements, disregarding the reality and agency of the activists themselves. In Living Politics, Kerry Ryan Chance radically flips the conversation by focusing on the actual language and humanity of post-apartheid activists rather than the external, idealistic commentary of old. Tracking everyday practices and interactions between poor residents and state agents in South Africa's shack settlements, Chance investigates the rise of nationwide protests since the late 1990s. Based on ethnography in Durban, Cape Town, and Johannesburg, the book analyzes the criminalization of popular forms of politics that were foundational to South Africa's celebrated democratic transition. Chance argues that we can best grasp the increasingly murky line between \"the criminal\" and \"the political\" with a \"politics of living\" that casts slum and state in opposition to one another. Living Politics shows us how legitimate domains of politics are redefined, how state sovereignty is forcibly enacted, and how the production of new citizen identities crystallize at the intersections of race, gender, and class.

This book, comprising approximately 300 letters, provides access to the voice of Robert Sobukwe via the single most poignant resource of Sobukwe’s voice that exists: his prison letters. Not only do the letters evince Sobukwe’s storytelling abilities, they convey the complexity of a man who defied easy categorization. More than this: they are testimony both to the desolate conditions of his imprisonment and to Sobukwe’s unbending commitment to the cause of African liberation. The memory of Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe, inspirational political leader and first President of the Pan-Africanist Congress, has been sadly neglected in post-apartheid South Africa. In 1960, Sobukwe led the Anti-Pass Protests, which culminated in the Sharpeville Massacre, which proved a crucial turning point in the eventual demise of apartheid. Nevertheless, Sobukwe – a man once thought to hold greater promise for the liberation of South Africa than even Nelson Mandela – has been consistently marginalised in histories of the liberation struggle. Jailed for nine years, including a six-year period of near complete solitary confinement on Robben Island, Sobukwe was silenced throughout his life, a condition that has been extended into the post-apartheid present, so much so that we can say that Sobukwe was better known during rather than after apartheid. Given Sobukwe’s antagonistic relations both to white liberalism and to the African National Congress (whom he felt had betrayed the principles of African Nationalism), it is unsurprising that he has been subjected to a ‘consensus of forgetting’. With the changing political climate of recent years, the decline of the African National Congress’s hegemonic hold on power, the re-emergence of Black Consciousness and Africanist political discourse, the growth of student protests, Sobukwe is being looked to once again. Robert Sobukwe, the founder and first leader of the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC), was silenced throughout his life, a condition which has been extended into the post-apartheid present. This book, comprising approximately 300 letters, provides access to his words via the single most poignant resource of Sobukwe’s own voice that exists: his prison letters. Not only do the letters evince Sobukwe’s storytelling abilities, they convey the complexity of a man who defied easy categorisation. More than this: they are testimony both to the desolate conditions of his imprisonment and to Sobukwe’s unbending commitment to the cause of African liberation. Although jailed for nine years, including a six-year period of near complete solitary confinement on Robben Island, Sobukwe was better known during rather than after apartheid. Given his antagonistic views to both white liberalism and the African National Congress (ANC) it is unsurprising that he has been subjected to a ‘consensus of forgetting’. With the changing political climate of recent years, the decline of the ANC’s hegemonic hold on power, the re-emergence of Black Consciousness and Africanist political discourse and the growth of student protests, Sobukwe is being looked to as a leader once again.

Govan Mbeki (1910-2001) was a core leader of the African National Congress, the Communist Party, and the armed wing of the ANC during the struggle against apartheid. Known as a hard-liner, Mbeki was a prolific writer and combined in a rare way the attributes of intellectual and activist, political theorist and practitioner. Sentenced to life in prison in 1964 along with Nelson Mandela and others, he was sent to the notorious Robben Island prison, where he continued to write even as tension grew between himself, Mandela, and other leaders over the future of the national liberation movement. As one of the greatest leaders of the antiapartheid movement, and the father of Thabo Mbeki, president of South Africa from 1999 to 2008, the elder Mbeki holds a unique position in South African politics and history. This biography by noted historian Colin Bundy goes beyond the narrative details of his long life: it analyzes his thinking, expressed in his writings over fifty years. Bundy helps establish what is distinctive about Mbeki: as African nationalist and as committed Marxist - and more than any other leader of the liberation movement - he sought to link theory and practice, ideas and action. Drawing on exclusive interviews Bundy did with Mbeki, careful analysis of his writings, and the range of scholarship about his life, this biography is personal, reflective, thoroughly researched, and eminently readable.

When Amin Cajee left South Africa to join the liberation struggle he believed he had volunteered to serve ,a democratic movement dedicated to bringing down an oppressive and racist regime,. Instead, he writes, in this powerful and courageous memoir, ,I found myself serving a movement that was relentless in exercising power and riddled with corruption,. Fordsburg Fighter traces an extraordinary physical journey , from home in South Africa, to training in Czechoslovakia and the ANC,s Kongwa camp in Tanzania to England. The book makes a significant contribution to the hidden history of exile, and documents Cajee,s emotional odyssey from idealism to disillusionment.

A subtle understanding of the achievements and the limitations of testimony.

Revisits the work of Rick Turner, a South African political theorist, and addresses contemporary debates Rick Turner was a South African academic and anti-apartheid activist who rebelled against the apartheid state at the height of its power. For this he was assassinated in 1978, at just 32 years of age, but his life and work are testimony to the power of philosophical thinking for humans everywhere. Turner chose to live freely in an unfree time and argued for a non-racial, socialist future in a context where this seemed unimaginable.This book takes seriously Rick Turner's challenge that political theorising requires thinking in a utopian way. Turner's seminal book The Eye of the Need: Towards a Participatory Democracy laid out some of his most potent ideas on a radically different political and economic system. His demand was that we work to escape the limiting ideas of the present, carefully design a just future based on shared human values, and act to make it a reality, both politically and in our daily lives.The contributors to this volume engage critically with Turner's work on race relations, his relationship with Steve Biko, his views on religion, education and gender oppression, his participatory model of democracy, and his critique of enduring forms of poverty and economic inequality. They show how, in his life and work, Turner modeled how we can dare to be free and how hope can return, as the future always remains open to human construction. This book makes an important contribution to contemporary thinking and activism where the need for South Africans to define their understanding of their greater common good is of crucial importance.

Nelson Mandela - in his incredible transition from one of the world's longest-detained political prisoners to iconic statesman - became an exemplary figure of integrity and moral fortitude.In this fascinating essay, Elleke Boehmer traces the Nobel line of inheritance passed from Mandela to Obama, demonstrating how 'Madiba' emerged as a skilled.

Nelson Mandela - in his incredible transition from one of the world's longest-detained political prisoners to iconic statesman - became an exemplary figure of integrity and moral fortitude. In this fascinating essay, Elleke Boehmer traces the Nobel line of inheritance passed from Mandela to Obama, demonstrating how 'Madiba' emerged as a skilled orator and master of political theatre, characteristics which Obama would later adopt to great success. Looking beyond Mandela the symbol, it reveals the sophistication of his self-awareness, rhetorical style, political astuteness and strategic willingness to perform the roles required of him to achieve his political aim: freedom and equality in South Africa. A unique insight into a man who became a giant of the international stage, and his enduring legacy.

Ruth First and Joe Slovo, husband and wife, were leaders of the war to end apartheid in South Africa. Communists, scholars, parents, and uncompromising militants, they were the perfect enemies for the white police state. Together they were swept up in the growing resistance to apartheid, and together they experienced repression and exile. Their contributions to the liberation struggle, as individuals and as a couple, are undeniable. Ruth agitated tirelessly for the overthrow of apartheid, first in South Africa and then from abroad, and Joe directed much of the armed struggle carried out by the famous Umkhonto we Sizwe. Only one of them, however, would survive to see the fall of the old regime and the founding of a new, democratic South Africa. This book, the first extended biography of Ruth First and Joe Slovo, is a remarkable account of one couple and the revolutionary moment in which they lived. Alan Wieder's deeply researched work draws on the usual primary and secondary sources but also an extensive oral history that he has collected over many years. By weaving the documentary record together with personal interviews, Wieder portrays the complexities and contradictions of this extraordinary couple and their efforts to navigate a time of great tension, upheaval, and revolutionary hope.