|
Showing 1 - 5 of
5 matches in All Departments
On a spectrum of hostility towards migrants, South Africa ranks at
the top, Germany in the middle and Canada at the bottom. South
African xenophobic violence by impoverished slum dwellers is
directed against fellow Africans. "Foreign" Africans are blamed for
a high crime rate and most other maladies of an imagined
liberation. Why would a society that liberated itself in the name
of human rights turn against people who escaped human rights
violations or unlivable conditions at home? What happened to the
expected African solidarity? Why do former victims become
victimizers? With porous borders, South Africa is incapable of
upholding the blurred distinction between endangered refugees and
economic migrants. Imagined Liberation asks what xenophobic
societies can learn from other immigrant societies, such as Canada,
that avoided the backlash against multiculturalism in Europe.
Heribert Adam and Kogila Moodley stress an innovative teaching of
political literacy that makes citizens aware as to why they hate.
This study questions conventional wisdom about the nature and
outcome of the South African conflict. Avoiding both wishful
thinkiong and mere moralizing, Heribert Adam and Hermann Giliomee
critically examine the applicability of such concepts as
colonialism, fascism, and class exploitation cherished by the Left,
and the notion of pluralism and identity on the political Right. In
contrast to the liberal focus, they find the roots of the South
African predicament not in ideological racism or prejudiced
Calvinism but in the entrenchment of Afrikaner power and privilege.
The potent force was historically mobilized against both black
competitors and imperial foreign capital. Adam and Giliomee analyze
the political economy of ethnic patronage in the bureaucratic
expansion of apartheid administration and state capitalism. They
trace both the socio-historical background and the ideologies
behind changing in-group perceptions. The mechanisms by which
Afrikanerdom maintains its crucial unity are evaluated against the
cleavages within a ruling oligarchy in crisis. Coercion proves
increasingly insufficient against politicized victims of
traditional domination.Therefore, the search for a new legitimacy
through inter-ethnic alliances characterizes the internal debate on
political alternatives. The authros explore the limits of such
co-optation strategies and assess the preconditions for federalism
in an all-out confrontation.
Refusing to be governed by what is fashionable or inoffensive,
Heribert Adam and Kogila Moodley frankly address the passions and
rationalities that drive politics in post-apartheid South Africa.
They argue that the country's quest for democracy is widely
misunderstood and that public opinion abroad relies on stereotypes
of violent tribalism and false colonial analogies.
Adam and Moodley criticize the personality cult surrounding Nelson
Mandela and the accolades accorded F. W. de Klerk. They reject the
black-versus-white conflict and substitute sober analysis and
strategic pragmatism for the moral outrage that typifies so much
writing about South Africa. Believing that the best expression of
solidarity emanates from sympathetic but candid criticism, they
pose challenging questions for the African National Congress and
Nelson Mandela. They give in-depth coverage to political violence,
the ANC-South African Communist Party alliance, Inkatha, and other
controversial topics as well.
The authors do not propose a solution that will guarantee a
genuinely democratic South Africa. What they offer is an
understanding of the country's social conditions and political
constraints, and they sketch options for both a new South Africa
and a new post-Cold War foreign policy for the whole of southern
Africa. The importance of this book is as immediate as today's
headlines.
On a spectrum of hostility towards migrants, South Africa ranks at
the top, Germany in the middle and Canada at the bottom. South
African xenophobic violence by impoverished slum dwellers is
directed against fellow Africans. "Foreign" Africans are blamed for
a high crime rate and most other maladies of an imagined
liberation. Why would a society that liberated itself in the name
of human rights turn against people who escaped human rights
violations or unlivable conditions at home? What happened to the
expected African solidarity? Why do former victims become
victimizers? With porous borders, South Africa is incapable of
upholding the blurred distinction between endangered refugees and
economic migrants. Imagined Liberation asks what xenophobic
societies can learn from other immigrant societies, such as Canada,
that avoided the backlash against multiculturalism in Europe.
Heribert Adam and Kogila Moodley stress an innovative teaching of
political literacy that makes citizens aware as to why they hate.
|
You may like...
Loot
Nadine Gordimer
Paperback
(2)
R398
R330
Discovery Miles 3 300
Not available
|