[News] Understanding Steve Biko: Race, Class and Struggle in South Africa - Anniversary of His Murder

[Anti-Imperialist News]

http://roape.net/2018/09/12/understanding-steve-biko-race-class-and-struggle-in-south-africa/ 



  Understanding Steve Biko: Race, Class and Struggle in South Africa

by ROAPEadmin
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*On the anniversary of Steve Biko’s murder, ROAPE’s Remi Adekoya speaks 
to South African scholar and activist Mosa Phadi. Phadi reflects on the 
legacy of Biko’s radical and important thought, but also discusses how 
he did not consider cohesive alternatives that could now serve as a 
counter to neoliberal ideas. In a wide-ranging interview Phadi also 
looks at the political and economic crisis in South Africa, the Economic 
Freedom Fighters, the failures of the ANC and the possibilities of a 
solution in the militancy and consciousness of working-class struggle.*

*Remi Adekoya: Today is the anniversary of Stephen Biko’s murder by 
apartheid state security operatives. He has since become a hugely 
symbolic rallying figure for many black people, especially in Africa, 
but not only. What is your take on Biko’s legacy today and how he is 
being historically positioned? *

*Mosa Phadi:* I have a problem with how Stephen Biko is positioned by 
the likes of Donald Woods, his friend and biographer, who ascribes the 
whole philosophy of Black Consciousness to Biko as if he emerged in a 
vacuum. His argument is basically that at the time Biko emerged, the 
Pan-African Congress (PAC) and the African National Congress (ANC) were 
both banned organizations, and so Biko’s arrival filled a void in the 
struggle for black freedom.

However, if you think about the historical context of that time, this 
was not the case. Biko along with other students started the South 
African Students’ Organization (SASO) movement in 1968. If you think 
about 1968, this was a year of global protests; you had the anti-Vietnam 
war protests, huge civil rights demonstrations, student protests. Also 
going back, there was the background of Ghana becoming the first African 
country to gain independence from colonial rule in 1957, an event which 
bolstered other pro-independence movements across the African continent. 
There was Julius Nyerere in Tanzania talking about an ‘African socialism’.

Prior to the 1960s even, there was the 1954 Women’s Charter in South 
Africa demanding equality between men and women, there was the Women’s 
March of 1956, the Sharpeville massacre in 1960, civil disobedience 
during that period and many other instances of struggle against 
oppression. So, portraying the South African struggle as essentially 
being fought by the PAC and the ANC, and thus once these organizations 
were banned, there was some sort of a lull in the fight against 
oppression and apartheid is a false analysis.

Another underreported issue about Biko and the era he came of age in is 
how caught up it was in the unravelling contradictions of Stalinism and 
the Soviet Union in general. Clearly, this was no longer an alternative 
as many had imagined after WWII and most black activists, including the 
Black Panthers were thinking about stretching Marxism, using its 
insights when it came to party organization, but viewing the 
lumpen-proletariat in primarily racial terms as Fanon did.

There are similarities between Biko and Stokely Carmichael in terms of 
organizing students initially using non-violent tactics but later 
becoming militant and asserting blackness or ‘reclaiming blackness’ as 
Stokely would call it. At the same time Malcolm X was also in the 
picture, claiming blackness as the oppressed but also as the 
revolutionary agent. Workers were also organizing.

Acting as if nothing existed before, during or after Biko is a failure 
in analysis. It is important to emphasize that he emerged in a period 
when a splintering of ideas and ideological eruptions were occurring 
elsewhere and these in turn informed his ideas.

Biko’s idea of Black Consciousness even though original in the context 
for South Africa, was very similar to Carmichael’s ideas. My point is 
that I am critical of those who try to sanitize that history by 
decontextualizing the progression of his political ideas.

Having said all that, Biko was a very important thinker whose ideas have 
been adopted by many movements. His ideas of black consciousness were 
important in focussing on what apartheid did to the psyche of black 
people. He talked about reclaiming blackness, but also put thought into 
how we as black people in South Africa should relate to coloureds and 
Indians as the oppressed. He emphasized that while there was a hierarchy 
of racial oppression, we all needed to approach the system as an 
oppressed collective.

Black consciousness is an idea that works best in a racist 
white-supremacy capitalist setting. However, its interpretation today is 
very neo-liberal. You hear talk of ‘black excellence’ for instance, 
there’s nothing wrong with that per se, but it is a concept tied to a 
neo-liberal framing that focuses on the individual. Such an approach 
will not help break with the system, but rather perpetuates 
inequalities, as capital by nature produces these inequalities. If you 
view yourself as an individual focused on achieving ‘black excellence’ 
forgetting about structures which produce inequalities, then you are not 
helping solve the problem. If such views prevail, then a few successful 
individual blacks will be put on a pedestal by black people as symbols 
of black excellence and black power while a system perpetuating 
inequalities continues to produce mass poverty.

Biko’s solutions to black problems were twofold: black consciousness and 
black economic empowerment. The second part is much emphasized recently, 
we see this even in the now popular ‘township economy’ in South Africa 
which is fundamentally neo-liberal in its philosophy.  The Provincial 
government in the economic hub of South Africa seeks to encourage 
entrepreneurial culture in various townships. Hence, wants to support 
Black businesses. This idea of growing Black businesses was part of 
Biko’s emancipatory approach. Biko wanted to create Black markets and 
expand Black business ownership. Once a radical idea it is currently 
used to justify elite formation especially among politically connected 
individuals.

Biko’s ideas, while radical at that time don’t get me wrong, 
nevertheless played into this bourgeoise democracy we find ourselves in, 
his ideas were radical and important at that time, but he did not think 
much about cohesive alternatives that could now serve as counters to 
neoliberal ideas.

*Which of Biko’s ideas are popular today among South African intellectuals?*

His death in 1977 sparked militancy amongst people, for example when you 
think of the 1980s insurgence, I think part of the courage emerged from 
Black Consciousness ideas of reclaiming Blackness. His thoughts about 
what black freedom should look like, what type of mentality we need to 
achieve it and via which methods, still permeate today through various 
social movements. For instance, the Fees Must Fall student movement 
sparked in 2016 about statues which still perpetuate symbols of black 
inferiority quoted Biko extensively and his views were manifest in their 
demands. They demanded that first and foremost statues of people like 
Cecil Rhodes must go, the curriculum must change and there should be a 
higher representation of intellectuals who look like us teaching us, for 
example.

People still gravitate towards Biko today because when you read his work 
you can relate to it as a black person. Even though he wasn’t a 
traditionalist who believed in fixed cultures, he was very aware of the 
role cultural norms and values play for everyday Africans in their 
everyday lives. For instance, he knew religion was important to people 
and his spiritual outlook moved beyond Christianity and incorporated 
ideas of ancestors. He talked about how music can enlighten the wounded 
soul, he tapped into daily experiences realizing the potential of 
everyday culture to radicalize and galvanize people into action.  When 
you read him, he sparks the radical spirit in you to say: ‘yes, we can 
fight the system, yes we have the right to fight the system.’ But then 
apart from this, you need to think what kind of world you want to 
replace the current system with. This is where his limitations were. But 
as a light to spark action, he was very important.

*What are some of the most popular ideas among South African 
intellectuals today regarding the way forward for the country? *

In academia, especially after the Fees Must Fall movement, the most 
popular issue is that of decolonization. Seminar after seminar, 
conference after conference and article after article have been written 
on this. The main inspiration comes from Latin American scholarship 
emphasizing the need to decolonize, for example, the knowledge system 
amongst other broader structural issues in South Africa which are 
inherently Western-oriented and steeped in racism. This is the most 
popular school of thought today.

Marxist ideas have been rejected, as indeed Biko rejected them in his 
day. The link between class and race has not been integral in our 
analysis, Marxism failed to incorporate race into the equation. 
Meanwhile, issues centred around our history and oppression are very 
important to people. People use terms like ‘triggers’ to refer to pain 
that has been inflicted upon us in the past and emphasize that we need 
to remedy that. However, Marxism in South Africa is unable to offer an 
analysis of how a history of racial oppression and being black frames 
how people relate to various struggles beyond the workerist approach.

Julius Malema’s Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) are quite popular today 
both among the Working Classes and some black intellectuals.  This is 
due to the failure of ANC to radically change peoples lives in the 
townships where there is huge unemployment. I come from a town called 
Kagiso. When I go home, on a weekday, it seems like a weekend there, 
young men and women on the streets with no jobs. There are protests 
virtually non-stop, people demanding services. In the 1990s, people 
waited patiently for change, but by the 2000s, they started realizing it 
was not happening. This has sparked some xenophobic attacks like recent 
ones on Pakistani shop-owners which were looted by people complaining 
they were selling stale food. Taxes have increased, VAT was increased 
this April leading to steep hikes in food prices. There is tension 
everywhere.

This is the crisis we’ve been in since Ramaphosa became the president, 
squeezing not just the poor but the middle-class as well. This has 
created space for EFF, especially with Malema forcing the conversation 
about race into the public forum. Up till then, the left had been 
fixated with class while the conversation about race had been muted. The 
left focussed on economic structures, neglecting the everyday 
manifestation of being black. They missed the feelings young people had 
about being not just poor, but poor and black as well. Malema exploited 
this very well. He too uses Black Panther methodology, utilizing a 
Marxist-Leninist model of party structures combined with Fanonian 
elements incorporating race and treating the racially-oppressed 
individual as a revolutionary subject. Again, this goes back to 1960s 
ideas before and during Biko’s activist period. Although embroiled in 
some corruption scandals themselves, EFF has attracted young unemployed 
people, mainly men, but also some middle-class people who have 
experienced racism in the corporations they work in, which are still 
largely owned by white people. Some black intellectuals have also been 
drawn to EFF.

However, many of the protests on the streets demanding basic services 
like water and electricity are not organized by any political party or 
movement, they have no specific policies, they simply want services. The 
new student movements, meanwhile, are not only using Biko as a symbol, 
but also challenging gender dynamics, ideas of feminism have become key 
debate in struggles with power and patriarchy. Women are protesting 
against domestic violence and patriarchy, again taking us back to the 
ideas of the 1960s which are coming back in different ways. In general, 
revolutionary ideas about race and gender dating back to the 1950s and 
60s are returning, the only difference is that they are emerging today 
in modern form and style, especially with the proliferation of social 
media which can be used to spread a message very rapidly.

*Is there any party who, in your opinion, if they came to power, would 
best deploy that power towards the betterment of the people? You’ve 
mentioned EFF in a rather positive light but said yourself they have 
been implicated in corruption scandals too. On what basis do you do 
associate them with any hopes of true positive change for downtrodden 
South Africans? As you know, history is replete with examples, plenty in 
Africa unfortunately, of people riding to power on the back of all sorts 
of equalitarian slogans only to gorge themselves on the state’s 
resources once they get there.*

Well, what are the options? There is the Democratic Alliance which is a 
very liberal party, so you are assured of a set of liberal economic 
policies if they get into power. Additionally, they seem to place no 
emphasis on our history and don’t recognize the psychological scars 
apartheid has left on black people. Ideologically, this is thus not a 
viable option for me. Then you have the ANC and the EFF. EFF wants state 
capitalism. They should be understood as a party that is left of the 
ANC, not /that/ leftist you understand, but simply left of the ANC. I 
will vote for them. Not because I believe they, or any other party, can 
emancipate the working-class. No, the working-class have to find the 
agency in themselves to fight for themselves.

No politician or political party will save the working class or the 
poor, let’s not be delusional. For me, the hope is that the 
working-class will organize and fight for themselves. EFF wants state 
capitalism and this can go two ways as history shows. It can become very 
authoritarian or focus on building new forms of elites. EFF is important 
for debates linking race to class, but I don’t naively believe they will 
be our saviours. As always, the working-class will continue trying new 
parties, hoping for something better. But only their militancy can force 
change. EFF is a child of the ANC and they cannot break away from the 
corrupt links of the ANC.

*What then would be the value added of the EFF for regular South 
Africans were they to one day win power?*

If they come to power, of course there will be reforms, they wouldn’t be 
able to just rule in a business-as-usual fashion. They would have to 
make concessions to the poor. The land question would be addressed, land 
would become state-owned. With regards to key financial sectors like 
mining, they are currently trying to propagate a 3-way ownership system 
in which the state would own say, 50% of a mine, the community 10% and 
the rest would be privatized. They want to show capital they are ready 
to negotiate with it while at the same time trying to sustain their 
radical image.

But they have opened a space in the debate, emboldened people to believe 
they have a right to push. I know the militancy they came with can’t be 
sustained if they win power. If they win, there will be some big 
reforms, but there would be contradictions too, no doubt. And yes, there 
is the danger of dictatorial tendencies in them. That is the risk 
involved with them. Yet, I still think the working-class should vote for 
EFF demanding some specific reforms.

*So, basically you accept they are a risk, but think they are a risk 
worth taking?*

Yes, I do. Also, one major issue they deserve credit for pushing onto 
the agenda as well is that of land reform, the idea of the expropriation 
of land without compensation. Even though there were various landless 
people’s movements in the 2000s, EFF emboldened that demand and now 
parliament has passed a resolution to amend the constitution allowing 
for land expropriation without compensation. However, right now, public 
consultations are being held, expected to end with a report by end of 
September.

*If President Ramaphosa eventually signs that amendment into law, is 
there any plan in place for how exactly this process would look?*

No, right now there has not been any debate on who would get what and on 
what grounds. The politicians are simply caught up in the militancy of 
the people who are demanding reforms. This whole land issue also 
reflects ideas popularized by Biko years ago. Apart from the physical 
desire people have to get their lands back, it is also part of a 
psychological recognition that /this is your land/. The planning of our 
cities today is still the same as it was under apartheid with developers 
able to keep certain areas exclusively rich and white. Or even in the 
rural areas, you have a situation where all the best farmland is owned 
by whites, so they are the farmers while the blacks are simple village 
residents with a few black people who managed to carve their space in 
the agricultural sector. People are now imagining a different kind of 
space; a different kind of South Africa and politicians are rushing to 
respond because they want votes. But the discussion about who will get 
what and whether this process will really empower the poorest South 
Africans has yet to be started.

*Mosa Phadi completed her PhD at the University of Johannesburg in 2017. 
She has worked for years on questions race and class, including two 
ground-breaking reports on the local municipalities of Mogalakwena and 
Lephalale. She has worked as a researcher for over six years, published 
peer-reviewed articles and producing a research documentary film 
focusing on the idea of a middle class in Soweto. *

*
*

-- 
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863.9977 https://freedomarchives.org/
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