Themes in West Africa's History (review)

Abstract

Most controversial, perhaps, is Krikler’s explanation of the pogrom-like violence that white crowds directed at Africans (including women and children) in the three days before 10 March. They did this not because they viewed Africans as ‘scabs’; indeed, they did not consider Africans, despite their centrality in the production process, to be part of the working class at all. They did it because – psychologically traumatized by their rulers’ and employers’ treatment of them, and by the enormity of their imminent declaration of war on the rest of the white community – they frenziedly deceived themselves that it was not they but rather Africans, into whose despised underclass status they feared being cast, who were imperilling the social order. The massacres of Africans were a cry for help, a collective transference despairingly signalling white racial solidarity at the very moment it was about to be rent. In developing this interpretation, Krikler draws illuminating comparisons with the urban ‘race riots’ that occurred contemporaneously in the United States. Krikler strikes a good balance in explicating the contradictory mix of white-supremacist and class-conscious motives that animated the rebels of 1922. Some readers may find this a distinctly old-fashioned study given its preoccupation with whites and with labour struggles, and may feel that the title’s reference to ‘racial killing’ is a marketing ploy rather than a reflection of the book’s main emphasis. That would be unfair. This is a scrupulously researched and annotated analysis representing a new level of maturation in South African historical scholarship.