For those with an interest in identity politics, the white Afrikaners in South Africa pose a very interesting research challenge. Since 1994 they have lost political power, their economic security has been called into question, and a language struggle has ensued, at the same time as more novels and books of poetry in Afrikaans have been published than ever before. Many of them feel profoundly uncomfortable under a black majority government, while others have embraced the new freedom of democracy and created hybrid identities that emphasise their Africanness. The main question still being asked is: ‘Who is an Afrikaner?’
Rebecca Davies' book makes a fundamental contribution to grappling with this question in all its complexities. It has been a long time since I have read such a densely written, comprehensive integration and analysis of the literature dealing with political economy, transformation and cultural identity. Relying on a Gramscian framework of hegemony, she shows how structural and social forces operating at local, national, regional and global levels simultaneously contribute to different forms of domination and subordination, and a new hegemony created by the ANC. These different forces shape new Afrikaner identities, continuing the historical trajectory of schisms among the community. Davies' approach is novel in the sense that she applies Gramscian theory to both cultural development and identity politics.
Chapter 1 sets out the Gramscian framework used for this analysis. Chapter 2 revisits what used to be called the ‘race/class’ debate – the application of a Marxist framework to capitalist development and the reliance on cheap black labour. She shows how the development of an Afrikaner nationalist project was necessary to create the unity needed for nation building, while keeping racial capitalism in place. Davies also shows why it became necessary for the Afrikaans captains of industry to move to a national and global stage. In Chapter 3 she explains the creation of a new hegemony by the ANC to replace the old Afrikaner hegemony. By accepting the neo-liberal orthodoxy, the ANC created a type of schizophrenic relationship with trade unions and labour on the domestic front, promising societal transformation while underwriting economic growth through neo-liberal strategies at the global level. For Afrikaners at the local level, the greatest displacement was caused by affirmative action and black economic empowerment, which led some to withdraw from politics and others to enter into vehement opposition.
Chapter 4 is the pivotal chapter that explains Afrikaner identity from a cultural perspective. It analyses the considerable complexity of Afrikaner identity politics – dealing with the spectrum of alliances varying from the far right to a new generation of young Afrikaners who feel that they are paying the price for the ‘sins of the fathers’ but who also create new vibrant cultural formations. It looks at the vibrant publication industry, cultural festivals, and the ‘taalstryders’ wanting to maintain an Afrikaans university, and the utilisation of the global economy by Afrikaans business. Chapter 5 continues this analysis by looking at the influence of local (provincial) politics with specific reference to the uniqueness of the Western Cape. I found this chapter a bit disjointed as it jumps between culture and provincial politics, but the most important point is that Afrikaners have not found a new cultural project to unite them since 1994.
One argument that could have been made in stronger terms relates to the Afrikaners' understanding of multiculturalism (p. 76) and how they view their minority status. The debate on this issue is complex and most of it takes place in Afrikaans, so that it is difficult for non-Afrikaans speakers to follow. It is also not clear why there is no reference to Hermann Giliomee's seminal work The Afrikaners: biography of a people (2003). The Afrikaners offers an interpretation of the community by one of its members who is the foremost ‘taalstryder’; Afrikaners in the New South Africa would have gained much from a deeper engagement with Giliomee's ideas and insights. Another neglected area is the gender dimension: since 1994 there have been Afrikaner women who have challenged Afrikaner patriarchal culture, and who have linked their struggles both to post-modernism and to global struggles for the emancipation of women. But these caveats notwithstanding, this book makes an important contribution to our understanding of the continuities and contradictions in Afrikaner identity; it should be read by anybody who has an interest in identity politics in general, and Afrikaners in South Africa in particular.
