Rethinking the 'race-class debate' in South African historiography
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3635458 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Deborah Posel (corresponding author) |
| Year | 1983 |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 50-66 |
| Publication date | 1983-06-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Social Dynamics (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0253-3952 • E-ISSN: 1940-7874 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/02533958308458333 |
| OpenAlex | W2088653526 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 32 |
| References cited | 16 |
This article argues that revisionist historiography has constituted a debate with its liberal opponents which has an ‘either‐or’ form: either class or race has analytic primacy, and either segregation/apartheid is functional or dysfunctional to capitalist growth. This has led revisionists into reductionism and factionalism, despite frequent disclaimers to the contrary. Failure to conceptualise and address the relative independence of social factors has, as a corollary, a functionalist rendition of their relationship to capitalist interests and development. By way of illustration an article by Wolpe and a book by Saul and Gelb are criticised for analytical shortcomings. Finally revised conceptualisations of the relationships between race and class and between capitalist development and racial policies are proposed
Archaeology · Epistemology · Genealogy · Historiography · Sociology · African history and culture studies · Gender Studies · Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics · History · Philosophy · South African History and Culture
Competing paradigms - towards a critical sociology in Southern Africa∗
Privileged Precariat
The Life and Work of a South African Economist
Shareholder Schools
Deconstructing Profitability under Apartheid
Madam & Eve
Southern theory
The School of Journalism and Media Studies, Rhodes University, South Africa
Beyond the male-migrant
White Workers in the Late Apartheid Period
Controversies about capitalism and apartheid in South Africa
Reproducing “racial capitalism” through retailing in South Africa
Sociology in South Africa
Racial capitalism
Contextualising journalism education and training in Southern Africa
South African marxist state theory — a critical overview
The Reconstruction of South African History
Ruling Relations
Books reviewed
Revisiting the Origins of the Industrial Colour Bar in the Witwatersrand Gold Mining Industry, 1891-1899
The Hand on the Tiller
Racial Desegregation and Schooling in South Africa
Thinking with Capital today
Transformation
The political economy of South Africa in the interwar period∗
Does China have an apartheid pass system
Between racial madness and neoliberal reason
Dan O'Meara's Afrikaner nationalism
Ethnographic evidence versus theoretical models
Class and Race Domination and Transformation in South Africa
Tactile technologies of the self
Unit of study, context and culture
Race and state in capitalist development
The Oxford history of South Africa
South Africa in a comparative study of industrialization
The 1946 African mine workers’ strike and the political economy of South Africa
Class struggle and the periodisation of the state in South Africa
Class struggle and the state
Capital and the state in South Africa
Ethnic Power Mobilized. Can South Africa Change
Ethnic Power Mobilized
White Prosperity and White Supremacy in South Africa Today
Industrialization, Race Relations and Change in South Africa an Ideological and Academic Debate
Capital restructuring and the modification of the racial division of labour in South Africa
Capital, state and white labour in South Africa
The Crisis in South Africa
South Africa
Capitalism and cheap labour-power in South Africa
| Unique citing works | 32 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,74 |
| Citation span | 1983 - 2023 (41) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 31 |