The workers' movement in Africa

"Africa" in the media is generally synonymous with catastrophes, wars and permanent massacres, famine, incurable sicknesses, corrupt governments; in brief, endless absolute misery. The workers' movement is assumed either not to have existed at all, or to have been a mere appendage of the "anti-colonial" struggle for "national liberation". This series of articles, concentrating particularly on Senegal and South Africa, aims to set the record straight.

From Soweto 1976 to the ANC in power 1993

Submitted by International Review on

We continue our series on the class struggle in South Africa, with a study of the period between the outbreak of the mass resistance movements in Soweto in 1976, and arrival in power of Mandela's ANC in 1993. In particular, we will look here at the way the new radical trades unions were used to break the back of the resistance, and drive the black working class into the arms of the nationalist ANC.

South Africa from World War II to the mid-1970s

Submitted by International Review on

This article highlights the formidable effect of the apartheid system on the class struggle, combined with the action of the trade unions and parties of the bourgeoisie, up until the end of the 1960s when, faced with the unprecedented development of the class struggle, the bourgeoisie had to “modernise” its political apparatus and revamp its system.

A history of class struggle in South Africa

Submitted by International Review on

The main purpose of this article, the first in a series on South Africa, is to restore the historical truth about the struggles between the two fundamental classes, namely the bourgeoisie (for whom apartheid was only one means of domination) and the proletariat of South Africa that, for most of the time, was left to struggle for its own demands as an exploited class, from the epoch of the Dutch-British colonial bourgeoisie and then under the Mandela/ANC regime.In other words, a South African proletariat whose struggle fits perfectly with that of the world proletariat.

Contribution to a history of the workers' movement in Africa (part 4): Second World War to 1968

Submitted by International Review on

It is well known that French imperialism liberally drew its cannon fodder from among the youth of its African colonies, as was demanded by its high level involvement in the Second World War. Indeed, hundreds of thousands of foot soldiers, the overwhelming majority of them young workers and unemployed, were enrolled and sacrificed in the bloody imperialist slaughter. With the conflict over, a period of reconstruction opened up for the French economy whose repercussions were felt in the colony in an unbearable exploitation that the workers began to courageously struggle against.

Contribution to a history of the workers' movement in Africa (part 3): The 1920s & 30s

Submitted by International Review on

Following World War I, the echo of the Russian revolution rang around the world. Senegal was no exception to this general tendency, and Senegalese workers conducted a whole series of militant strikes and revolts in the fifteen years that followed the end of the Great War.

Contribution to a history of the workers' movement in Africa (part 2): 1914-28

Submitted by International Review on

Between 1855 and 1914, the proletariat that emerged in the colony of French West Africa (FWA) underwent its class struggle apprenticeship by trying to come together and organise with the aim of defending itself against its capitalist exploiters. Despite its extreme numerical weakness, it demonstrated its will to struggle and a consciousness of its strength as an exploited class. We can also note that, on the eve of World War One, the development of the productive forces in the colony was sufficient to give rise to a frontal collision between the bourgeoisie and working class.

Contribution to a history of the workers' movement in Africa (part 1): Pre-1914

Submitted by International Review on

For many generations Africa has been synonymous with catastrophes, wars and permanent massacres, famine, incurable sicknesses, corrupt governments; in brief, endless absolute misery. At best, when its history is talked about (outside of folklore or “exotic” aspects), it is to point out its “worthy” Senegalese or Maghrebi sharpshooters, the celebrated auxiliaries of the French colonial army during the two world wars and the time of the maintenance of order in the old colonies. But never are the words “working class” used and still less are questions raised concerning its struggle, quite simply because it has never really entered the heads of the masses at the world or African level.

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