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The Black American Reaction to Apartheid

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 May 2017

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Extract

This article concerns the problems connected with the Black American reaction to apartheid in South Africa reaction which appears to have been largely ignored by social scientists, opinion poll samplers, opinion leaders, and even the distributors of foundation grants. A discussion such as this one is, perforce, impressionistic. Hopefully, however, it will contribute to the construction of sound hypotheses about the character of the Black American reaction to apartheid.

The reader should perhaps be warned that I do not subscribe to the doctrine of intellectual neutrality. The perspectives from which I write are informed by clearly articulated value postulates or preferences.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1974 

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References

1 Myrdal, Gunnar, “Further Thoughts About an American Dilemma,“ Worldview, vol. 15, no. 12 (December 1972), pp. 3031.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Ibid., p. 3 1 .

3 Reisman, W.M., “Responses to Crimes of Discrimination and Genocide: An Appraisal of the Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and Genocide,” The Denver Journal of International Law and Policy, vol. 1, no. 1 (Fall 1971). For a short synoptic historical perspective on the concept of human dignity see especially pp. 3639.Google Scholar

4 See generally, McDougal, and Associates, Studies in World Public Order, Yale University Press, New Haven (1960)Google Scholar. See especially p. 987 ff., “Perspectives for an International Law of Human Dignity.“

5 Ibid. These value sectors include power, wealth, affection, respect, enlightenment, well-being, rectitude, health, etc.

6 See Reisman, p. 29 ff.

7 U.N. Doc. A/9094, annex 1. Adopted unanimously on 2 November 1973.

8 Ibid., Annex para. 8 of resolution.

9 Statement of Mrs. M. Young, Department of State Bulletin, 17 December 1973, p. 741.

10 Campbell, A., Converse, P., Miller, W., Stokes, D., “Membership in Social Groupings” in H.A. Bailey and E. Katz, eds.. Ethnic Group Politics (1969), p. 62. 11 Lane, Political Life, pp. 233-34, cited in F. Lundberg, The Rich and the Superrich (1968), p. 921.

12 Brink and Harris, A Study of U.S. Racial Attitudes Today: Black and White (1967).

13 Latham, E., “The Group Basis of Politics, Notes for a Theory,“ American Political Science Review, vol. XLVI (June 1952), p. 376, p. 384 (note 17)Google Scholar.

14 Campbell et al., p. 68.

15 Gordon, Milton, “Assimilation in America: Theory and Reality,“ Daedalus, vol. XL (Spring 1961), pp. 263283.Google Scholar

16 Nevins and Commager, America: The Story of a Free People (1942), p. 58.

17 Chubberly,C/ianff/nsr Conceptions of Education (1909), pp. 15-16.

18 Zangwell, The Melting Pot (1909), p. 37.

19 Dahl, R.A., Pluralist Democracy in the United States: Conflict and Consent (1967).

20 Dahl, R.A., Who Governs? (1961).

21 Lowi, T., The End of Liberalism (1969), p. 45.

22 Ibid., see p. 46 for development of this “ideal.“

23 Ibid., footnotes omitted.

24 Cf. Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 (1856). This case represents the most complete juridical basis for the institution of slavery in American legal culture. It is a sad commentary upon American academic lawyers that with one or two important exceptions this case has been largely ignored for analytical commentary. The opinion itself is a model of judicial craftsmanship. Its premises are articulated in a lucid and precise manner and the results are stunning. Chief Justice Taney framed the premise in these terms: First, within the meaning of the Constitution, Black Americans were not “people” because they were “beings of an inferior order.” Second, they were, as a race of “subordinate and inferior” beings, subjugated by a “dominant race.” The logic that flowed from these assumptions was that Black Americans were not entitled to any rights that the white man was bound to respect. Indeed, because the Black American was an inferior being he could justly and lawfully be regarded as property. The badge of inferiority was, according to Taney, an “axiom in morals and politics,“ governing the American social processes.

25 Ibid., p. 32. “The Negro problem was then, and remains today, mainly a white problem. The whites live in moral confusion. They proclaim the ideals they bluntly disobey in daily life. This is the dilemma.“

26 Cited in August Meier, Negro Thought in America 1880-1915 (1968), p. 4.

27 Ibid., p. 190.

28 DuBois, W.E.B., The World and Africa (1946), p. 35.

29 See William K. Tabb's excellent study. The Political Economy of the Black Ghetto (1970). For the colonial implications of ghetto existence see especially pp. 21-34, and for the insightful economic features of the system of domestic colonialism see especially pp. 24-27. In the context of “internal colonialism,” Blacks, says Tabb, remain in their historic position somewhere between Marx's reserve army and Cairns’ non-competing group. That is, they are an available source of labor when needed by the economy and at the same time a group set apart which can be confined to certain types of work (low paying, hard, and unpleasant jobs)… .When economic conditions decline, whites move into take the jobs previously set aside as “Negro work” (pp. 26-27).

30 Reprinted in African Agenda, vol. 2 (February 1973), p. 3.

31 Jackson's image has suffered recently. In March 1974 he visited Yale University as a Chubb Fellow (as did Sam Ervin in 1974). Jackson's visit, for all the preliminary work, was an uneventful one. As Bob Greenlee, a black reporter with the New Haven Register put it, the country preacher had become “old hat” (10 March 1974). Rev. Jackson's brand of social development for the Black American was, admittedly, oratorically “superb,” but as Greenlee remarked, it “usually lack[ed] substance… .The rap is good and makes people forget their daily troubles for the moment…the problems remain unchanged.” And Greenlee summed up the feelings of many New Haven Blacks when he declared that Jackson's presentation accentuated the confirmation of a perspective—in phrases that he thought Jackson himself might have used: “It's not the rap, but the map; it's not the man, but the plan.“

32 Tabb, p. 58.

33 Gregory, Dick, “Black Capitalism or Black Cooperativism,“ Connecticut Daily Campus, 5 February 1969.

34 Johnson, John H., “Not Enough Black Capitalists,” New York Times, 21 April 1974, Sec. F, p. 14.Google Scholar

35 Ibid., col. 3.

36 Ibid., cols. 7-8.

37 Ibid., col. 6.

38 Carl Holman sounded an ominous and insightful warning when he recently said, “Seems like economic justice for blacks is a luxury that Americans are willing to pay for if there's a little money left over. Otherwise nobody's willing to make a sacrifice.” Cited by Roger, Wilkins in “The Sound of One Hand Clapping,” The New York Times Magazine, 11 March 1974, p. 54.Google Scholar

39 Diggs Hearings, infra, note 59.

40 Quoted in Gwendolen M. Carter, Black Initiatives for Change in Southern Africa (1973), p. 1. See also Press Release Issued by the Congressional Black Caucus dated 25 September 1973, Concerning the Killing of African Gold-Miners in South Africa.

41 “Position Paper for the 1972 Campaign,” issued by the American Committee on Africa (164 Madison Ave., New York, N.Y.), June 1972.

42 The Gary Declaration: Black Politics at the Crossroads, National Black Agenda presented to the National Black Convention, Gary, Indiana, 11 March 1972, p. 8.

43 See Strategy Workshop Report, African-American National Conference on Africa, sponsored by the Congressional Black Caucus, 26-27 May 1972, Howard University, Washington, D.C., p. 37.

44 Key points were mobilization of black workers in the United States, whose firms were engaged in South African business dealings, almost unconditional support for liberation movements, financial aid for liberation movements to be channeled through the OAU, legislation to end racism in United States installations in South Africa, rigid regulation of visas to South Africans on a quid pro quo basis, and cultural, artistic, and sports isolation and boycott. Professor G. Carter in “Black Initiatives for Change in Southern Africa” urges that this last point is “contrary to what most black South Africans desire.” No evidence is given to support this assertion. Indeed, this writer's sources of information inside South Africa assert quite the contrary, that the majority of black South Africans do not wish outsiders to come to South Africa under apartheid conditions.

45 Tabb says that the aim of the black capitalist alternative is “ t o win the loyalty of an important group of potentially influential local leaders, and to channel protest into less threatening and, incidentally, less useful goals. He cites Robert B. McKersie, “Vitalize Black Enterprise,” Harvard Business Review, September-October 1968.

46 See John, Simon, “Yale's First Year as a ‘Socially Responsible' Stockholder,” Yale Alumni Magazine, vol. XXXVII, no. 5 (February 1974), pp. 17ffGoogle Scholar. Simon described the moral incentives in these terms (p. 23): Participation as a stockholder in the process of corporate self-regulation is an intrinsically important task for Yale and other institutions, regardless of impact, for it helps to sustain an endangered tradition —the tradition of personal responsibility for one's own actions. In a complex society… personal responsibility requires us to attend not only to our own individual conduct but also to the collective conduct of the mass organizations through which we must function.

47 A brief though analytically undistinguished summary is Erik P. Eckholm's “Polaroid's Experiment in South Africa,” U.N. Unit on Apartheid, March 1972. A superficial trend study is attempted by Beryl, Unterhalter, “The Polaroid Experiment—A Progress Report,“ Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, vol. 6, no. 1 (Fall 1972), p. 109ff.Google Scholar

48 An undated pamphlet issued under the name of the Polaroid Revolutionary Workers Movement and listing Caroline Hunter as correspondent of the group stated that Polaroid had not answered three PRWM demands, and, to lessen the pressure of public opinion, had purchased $100,000 of advertising space on 12 January 1971 making a public declaration of its intention to “experiment” with the introduction of basic standards of decency for its black workers in South Africa. The pamphlet called for a “boycott” of “all Polaroid products“! Further exhortations included appeals for community action: “Stop the sale and display of Polaroid products. Talk to dealers and ask them not to order Polaroid. Put a large white 'X’ on those who refuse—sign of quarantine.” Appeals in a similar vein were made to campus communities, churches, workers. (Pamphlet in personal possession).

49 See Gould, , “Waiting to Be Born-Soul City,” The New Republic, 3 July 1971, pp. 911.Google Scholar

50 Ibid., p. 9.

51 Ibid., p. 10.

52 In 1960, ten American banks including Chase Manhattan were involved in a consortium loan of forty million dollars to the South African government. The loans were ultimately terminated in November 1969 after tremendous public pressure and protest against involvement in the economy of apartheid. (See CIC Brief [New York: Corporate Information Center, National Council of Churches], July 1973.)

53 Much of this is ably documented in a confidential draft memorandum to a United Nations subcommittee: NATO: Towards Defense Co-Operation with the White Regimes (1974). The author declares, for example, that “(D)efense cooperation between NATO and the white regimes has always been presented as an awkward necessity. The real problem, it was said, was the vulnerability of the Cape Route… . If the Cape Route is to be protected, the Western powers must work with the white regimes,” at p. 4. See also “Draft Working Paper on the Soviet Maritime Threat,” Military Committee, North Atlantic Assembly, June 1972, rapporteur, Patrick Wall, M.P.

54 The problems of corporate giantism are well documented in the domestic product and geographic markets. For discussion regarding the overcompensation of corporate executives, see Williamson, “Managerial Discretion and Business Behavior,” 53 American Economic Review 1032, 1042-47 (1967); industrial concentration and monopoly profits, see Weiss (pp. 363-71) in M. Intriligator, ed.. Quantitative Studies in Industrial Organization in Frontiers of Quantitative Economics (1972); corporate inefficiency in internal matters, see Liebenstein, , “Allocative Efficiency vs. X-Efficiency,“ 56 American Economic Review 392 (1966)Google Scholar; employment discrimination, see Shepherd, , “Market Power and Racial Discrimination in White-Collar Employment,” 14 Antitrust Bulletin 141 (1969)Google Scholar; technological sloth, see J. Bair, Economic Concentration, 199-254 (1972). For a summary of monopolistic woes, see Mark, Green and Ralph, Nader, “Economic Regulation vs. Competition: Uncle Sam the Monopoly Man,” Yale Law Journal, vol. 82, 5, p. 871 ffGoogle Scholar. For a spirited if spurious defense of the corporate establishment see Ralph K. Winter, “Economic Regulation vs. Competition: Ralph Nader and Creeping Capitalism,” ibid., p. 890ff. And for an equally spirited reply see Mark Green and Beverly Moore, Jr., “Winter's Discontent: Market Failure and Consumer Welfare,” ibid., p. 903ff. It is obvious to all but the most intellectually myopic that when the problems of corporate giantism are translated into the reality of a broader arena than the confines of the internal product and geographic markets, these problems become even more complex and their impact more intense. Moreover, the lack of strong regulation of monopolies in the international context becomes an acute problem when it is recognized that the various domestic patterns of antitrust trade regulation are somewhat ineffective regulators of ologopolistic trends. Cf. the revealing and interesting study published by Senator Russell B. Long's Committee on Finance: Implications of Multinational Firms for World Trade and Investment and for U.S. Trade and Labor. (Washington, D.C.: Government Printers), February 1973.

55 U.S. News and World Report, 22 April 1968, p. 96.

56 See generally, U.S. Business Involvement in Southern Africa, Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Africa of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives, Ninety-Third Congress, First Session, Part 3 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office). Hereinafter cited as Diggs Hearings.

57 The best survey, so far as this writer is aware, is that of Ruth First, “Foreign Investment in South Africa,” U.N. Document No. 21/72, October 1972. See especially footnote 6, p. 2: “All statistics relating to foreign investment are notorious for undervaluation.” In 1971 the net inflow of foreign capital into South AFrica was R725 million (p. 1). In 1971 the U.S. sent 1% of its total overseas direct investment to South Africa. There are 300 American firms and 6000 agencies operating in South Africa. See First, p. 3. Most of this investment is to be found in critical areas of the South African economy.

58 Ramsey Clark and others have suggested legislation that would extend the reach of title VI and title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to transnational affairs. According to Clarck, we cannot make the world “safe for hypocrisy.” Diggs Hearings, First Session, Part 3, p. 135.

59 Ramsey Clark: We talk of world peace. We say we want it. We know that the Republic of South Africa poses as great a risk to world peace as any government on this globe. You read the United Nations Association magazine for April 1973…and you find the statement that South Africa is the most significant violater of the fundamental principles of the U.N. Charter on the globe. See Diggs Hearings, p. 133. A specific violation occurred with regard to the importation of chrome from Rhodesia in violation of authoritative decisions emanating from the Security Council of the U.N. These are well documented elsewhere; cf. also Clark, ibid., p. 134.

60 Overseas Business Reports (United States Department of Commerce), December 1970, pp. 28-29.

61 Malcolm X, “Message to the Grassroots,” Malcolm X Speaks (1966), p. 13.

62 Ibid., pp. 14-15.

63 I owe this point to a discussion with Dennis Brutus of Northwestern University. To illustrate this conclusion. Professor Carter, also of Northwestern, in the paper cited above (see also Issue [Spring 1974]), gives a summary of what she conceives to be Black American initiatives regarding actions against South African racism. The theme is developed in such a way that the apex of black demands is almost entirely absorbed in the platform planks of either the Democrats or the Republicans. Whether advertantly or otherwise, the perception of the reader is absorbed by the sequence of black demands being preempted by these platform positions—whereas we all know that they were irrelevant as issues to either Senator McGovern or former President Nixon. In a sense, Professor Carter is right. There has been a diminution of black concern since these major events of 1972. But what is glossed over is that much of this activism was only incidentally geared to legislative reform. Indeed, the central thrust appears to have been to give direct support to the forces opposed to South African racism.