In the volcanic movement of the\nblack working class in the townships of Uitenhage and Port Elizabeth can be\nseen the outlines of South Africa\u2019s coming revolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
General strike action; mass\nmarches and demonstrations; unbridled massacre by the police; in response, a\nflaming fury of revolt spearheaded by the youth and fanning-out to wider areas;\nferocious popular revenge against black collaborators, business sharks and\npolicemen; continual police retaliation, provocations and brutalities; a\nvirtual insurrectionary situation in the townships; troop mobilisations to\nreinforce the police; \u201csealing-off\u201d, occupation and searches of townships by huge\nforces of police and troops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So the battle lines are drawn,\nand so the fundamental problem defines itself again and again in action for the\ngreat proletarian mass of the black people: how to overthrow this murderous, monstrous apartheid regime.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Eastern Cape is not unique.\nThe revolt there has merely raised to sharp relief the features revealed in the\nheroic resistance in the Transvaal, the Orange Free State, the Western Cape,\nthe Border region and now also in parts of Natal. And this is only the\nbeginning. What happens in Uitenhage can happen… anywhere, everywhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As each convulsive wave of the\nmovement passes and temporarily subsides, the militant workers and youth who\nhave confronted the state in action are forced to do battle again in the arena\nof ideas, grappling with the most intractable problems of theory, strategy and\ntactics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There is no doubt about it: the\nSouth African regime is the most formidably difficult regime on the planet to\noverthrow. More so than in any other country, the SA revolution can succeed\nonly if the revolutionary forces take a scientific and professional approach to\ntheir tasks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The violence that has broken out\nrepeatedly in the recent period between supporters of the UDF on the one hand\nand of Azapo on the other; the threats, allegedly by some UDF elements, to burn\nhomes of Fosatu members in the Eastern Cape; the divisions among the youth\norganisations; the splitting of the trade union movement of the black workers\naccording to \u2018ideological\u2019 divisions among the leaders \u2013 all this signals\ndeadly danger for the working class and all oppressed people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It will be impossible to overcome\nthese divisions and mobilise a united mass force against the regime and the\nruling class unless a unified revolutionary cadre \u2013 within the unions, the\nyouth organisations and the community bodies \u2013 is fused together on the basis\nof clear and correct ideas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The great strength of the mass\nmovement which has arisen over the past ten or twelve years derives from an\nelemental awakening of the giant black working class. The organising\ninitiatives of tens-of-thousands of activists, young and old, in every part of\nthe country, have together infused ever deeper layers of the masses with a growing\nsense of their own power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While this has given rise to the\nmightiest organisations of the working class ever known in South Africa (most\nnotably, though by no means only, the trade unions), this first stage<\/strong> in the awakening of the mass movement is nonetheless\nmainly characterised by spontaneity and improvisation. Improvisation of ideas\nand improvisation of organisations and strategies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is inevitable and healthy in\nthe development of every genuine “people\u2019s” movement which boils-up\nfrom the depths of unbearable oppression. But the reliance on spontaneity and\nimprovisation has definite limits which the activists in the movement are\nconstantly battling to overcome. In this they come up against the obstacles\nresulting from the long isolation of the South African proletariat, the\npredominance of middle class leadership and the weakness of the forces of\nMarxism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Marxism \u2013 the revolutionary\nexperience of the international proletariat over its whole history, consciously\ncollected together and summed-up \u2013 has for several generations been thrown back\nto a repository of very small forces worldwide, as a result of a whole series\nof defeats of the working class, the rise of Stalinism, and strengthening of\nreformism during the long post-war upswing of world capitalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the popular understanding, \u2018Marxism\u2019,\nwhere it has not become discredited and defiled, is today encrusted with\nconfusion and muddled-up with resurrected petty bourgeois delusions which the\ngreat teachers of Marxism had long ago decisively laid to rest. Only by long\nand persistent work, patiently explaining the fundamental ideas in the course\nof many struggles in which the working class passes again and again through the\nharsh school of experience, will it be possible for Marxists to establish their\nideas once again as a mass force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This process is to a greater or\nlesser extent under way in a growing number of countries. But if time and tide\nwait for no man, neither do the convulsions of the class struggle wait for\nMarxism. Time is of the essence everywhere. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Clear Perspectives Needed<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In South Africa the very\nspontaneity and improvisation which has been the strength of the movement in\nthe past period will more and more hamstring its further progress if clear\nperspectives, and clear revolutionary strategy and tactics, are not brought\nrapidly to the fore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The more mightily arises the\nmovement, the more vicious and cunning will be the enemy it confronts, and the\nmore difficult the obstacles which will be strewn in its path.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Intense and vital as the clash of\nideas now is among the leading tendencies of the UDF, the National Forum, the\nyouth organisations and the trade unions, it bears still an air of sterility.\nIt does not yet come solidly to grips with the real questions to be clarified. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2018Ideologies\u2019 are bandied about;\nrival \u2018principles\u2019 and precepts contend. People are \u2018Charterists\u2019 or \u2018anti-Charterists\u2019;\nfor \u2018non-racialism\u2019 or \u2018anti-racism\u2019; so-called \u2018workerists\u2019 or \u2018populists\u2019,\netc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Increasingly however \u2013 and this\nis a real step forward of historic importance \u2013 the most advanced and active\nlayers of the workers and youth in all the rival camps of the movement are\ndrawing the conclusion that \u201ccapitalism is our enemy\u201d, that the fight is to end\napartheid and capitalism together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But to identify the enemy is only\nthe first step of a conscious policy. It is necessary to identify by what means\nthe enemy can and will be overthrown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yet where is there, on the part\nof any tendency or element of the\nleadership of the movement today<\/strong> a clear conception of the general path of\nthe struggle ahead; a mapping-out of the way the revolution will unfold; a\ngrasp of the objective processes at work in their totality, and not just the\nproblems of this or that partial sphere of action; in short, a scientific\nperspective to guide the movement? <\/p>\n\n\n\n Yet, without such a perspective\nthere can be no clarity as to the revolutionary tasks and programme, no real\nunification of the working class movement, no effective workers\u2019 leadership of\nthe mass struggle, no scientific strategy, no comprehensive action programme,\nand no consistent tactics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Having a correct perspective\nmeans being prepared, so as not to be taken by surprise by sudden changes and\nturns in events; it means understanding the general processes and not being\ndiverted by a superficial reaction to this or that event.\n\nIt is to the mastery of perspectives as a guide\nto action that the most determined revolutionary activists must urgently turn\ntheir attention.\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u00a9 Transcribed from the original by the Marxist Workers Party (2020).<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\nContinue to Chapter One<\/a><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"