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This book analyses the ANC and its attitudes and relationships with the nascent formations of the black working class, with particular attention to the most conscious and active workers. It focuses on the formative period of engagement of political and socioeconomic forces and also discusses migrant, rural, domestic, and women workers.
List of contents
Abbreviations and Acronyms
Illustrations
Sources of illustrations
Tables
Preface
1. Introduction
Part 1: Nation, Class, and Place in South African History
2. Perspectives on ANC-Labour History
3. Black Labour in South Africa to 1940
4. Early African Political Organisations and Black Labour
Part 2: The ANC and Labour, the First Decade
5. The SANNC and African Working People
6. To “Heartily … Assist the Working Movement as Best They Can”: Congress and Black Labour in the Transvaal, 1912-1919
7. “Join Our Union—You Will Find Good Result”: Congress and Labour in the Cape, Natal and Free State, 1912–1919
Part 3: The Second Decade
8. “A Strong Seed in a Stony Bed”: The 1920s
9. “The Ruling Class is Getting Lost in the Mist and Sea of Selfishness”: Natal in the 1920s
Chapter 10 “I-Kongilesi Lilizwi ezindlwini” (Congress’s Name is Household): The Transvaal, Cape and Orange Free State in the 1920s
Part 4: The Third Decade
11. From “Culpable Inertia” to Rebuilding: The ANC and Labour in the 1930s
12. Moderate Centre, Militant Province? The Cape in the 1930s
13. “A Very, Very Wide Influence, Even When … Dead”: The Transvaal, Natal, and Orange Free State in the 1930s
Conclusion
Select Bibliography
Index
Summary
This book analyses the ANC and its attitudes and relationships with the nascent formations of the black working class, with particular attention to the most conscious and active workers. It focuses on the formative period of engagement of political and socioeconomic forces and also discusses migrant, rural, domestic, and women workers.
