POLITICS

Beyond Violence vs Non-Violence

© www.sahistory.org.za The Many Anti-Apartheid Campaigns of

Moving beyond rigid dichotomies of violence and non-violence reveal lesser-known Human Rights and international non-violence struggles that linked US Civil Rights and the South African anti- movements in the joined battle against transnational white supremacy.

By Robert Trent Vinson

38 THE THINKER POLITICS

lbert Luthuli was the president outrage. The bloodbath brought decolonisation, Luthuli remarked that of ’s current ruling pariah status and martial law to South Pretoria was bent on “concentration Aparty, the African National Africa. camps, terrorism, and legalised Congress (ANC), from 1952 to 1967. The declaration of a state of murder.” Luthuli had compared One of the most respected African emergency gave the government “concentration camp” apartheid to leaders in the age of decolonisation, sweeping powers to detain over a fatal force bent on its own final and the first African to win the Nobel twenty-five thousand people and solution. He could not rely on support Peace Prize, Luthuli, however, is outlaw the ANC and its rival the Pan- from powerful Western countries largely forgotten today. Africanist Congress (PAC), sentencing unwilling to see through Pretoria’s My new book, Albert Luthuli, is the the PAC president Cold War propaganda demonising the first book to make use of the newly to prison. Prime Minister Hendrik ANC as godless communists. Was it available Albert Luthuli papers housed Verwoerd commended the Sharpeville useful to espouse civil disobedience, at the Schomburg Research Centre for commander, Lieutenant Colonel he may have wondered, in the face African American History and Culture Pienaar, who exonerated his officers of unceasing detentions, government in Harlem, New York, USA. Thandi, for teaching a violent lesson to “the massacres, and treason trials? When Luthulis’ daughter, smuggled the native mentality which does not the State had not only banned papers out of South Africa when she allow them to gather for a peaceful civil disobedience protest, but the went into exile in the late 1960s. They demonstration.” ANC itself? remained unavailable to researchers Justice Minister Francois Erasmus, To friends like Charles Hooper and until very recently. in his previous post as defense Goolam Suleiman, Luthuli emphasised My book makes use of these minister, had railed against Africans the appropriateness of “morally papers, as well as other archival who aimed to “bring to its knees any defensible” aggression – for instance, sources in South Africa and the United White Government in South Africa when “a madman is attacking one’s States, numerous oral interviews, and family.” Hooper described Luthuli’s personal memoirs, to argue against At the dawn “condemnation of violence as prevailing historiographical claims that conditional and qualified” in the face Luthuli was unconditionally opposed of African of “pass arrests, night raids, detentions to any form of armed struggle. Luthuli decolonisation, and the starvation of minds and bodies.” was not the hapless victim of a palace Suleiman described Luthuli as “a very coup led by an insubordinate Nelson Luthuli remarked that humble person” who “wouldn’t harm Mandela. To the contrary, in July 1961, Pretoria was bent a fly” but recalled the Chief saying, he mediated private debates among “There may come a time when we have ANC and Congress Alliance leaders on ‘concentration to use violence – when violence will be about the proposed turn to armed camps, terrorism, and forced on us.” In July 1961, the ANC struggle. He actively participated in National Executive Committee (NEC) and accepted a compromise solution legalised murder’. met near Luthuli’s Groutville home, that authorised the formation of MK expressly so the banned Luthuli could as a separate, but related entity of which stands for White supremacy.” preside over pivotal debates about the ANC, which at that time was to He wanted the South African Defense armed struggle. Early on in the NEC remain officially non-violent. Force to model itself on the French meeting, Luthuli stated his opposition Subsequently, he met privately with colonial army waging war in Algeria. He to armed struggle – for principled and MK personnel, declaring support and was confident that soldiers, reinforced practical reasons. He knew that during understanding for those who turned to by white civilian posses, would “shoot the long and just-completed Treason sabotage. down the black masses when duty Trial, he and numerous other ANC But the provocative question of called.” The regime’s intent was leaders had affirmed the organisation’s whether a Nobel Peace Prize winner clear: it would menace Africans with nonviolent principles. He also certainly could also accept counter-violence genocidal rhetoric, banish activists, and understood that his members could measures must be contextualised obliterate dissent. not win a war when they lacked both within the pervasive violence of Facing this onslaught, ANC leaders modern firearms and any experience the apartheid state. In March 1960, asked whether civil disobedience of a modern battlefield. Indeed, when police using machine guns and could effect change. In the aftermath Mandela, who was leading calls for high-caliber rifles killed 69 unarmed of Sharpeville, police and army units armed struggle, had never fired a African pass protesters and wounded acted in concert, reinforcing repression. gun. Finally, as ANC president, it another 186 people at a PAC rally Luthuli doubted “whether anything but would have been highly undemocratic in Sharpeville, and also fired into a indiscriminate bloodshed and violence leadership to unilaterally adopt crowd of 10,000 pass protesters in the will make any impression…If the whites armed struggle as official ANC Cape Town townships of Langa and continue as at present, nobody will give policy; a shift that would betray Nyanga, killing 2 and wounding over the signal for mass violence. Nobody the rank and file, which adhered to 50, headlines captured worldwide will need to.” At the dawn of African foundational rules requiring a national

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conference to transform ANC policy. This statement acknowledged the apartheid politics with American There was also a desire to protect not double bind in which circumstances Civil Rights and global Human Rights only ANC members but also still-legal had placed the ANC. Only a majority movements. Congress Alliance partners from likely of the organisation’s delegates polled at As a deeply religious man, Luthuli state retribution. Other participants a national conference could formalise fought apartheid on both political in these debates like future MK armed struggle, but since the movement and theological grounds. He regarded commander Curnick Ndlovu thought was banned, this conference was all Christianity as a stirring social gospel of that Luthuli “believed unquestionably but impossible. justice, freedom, and equality and Jesus in non-violent struggle” but “he was not There is no extant evidence of as the champion of the dispossessed a leader who believed in dictating… Luthuli ever repudiating the formation who had died on the cross for all of The ANC had stood the test of time of MK. On the contrary, his avowal humanity. Thus, he criticised the many because of collective leadership.” ANC not to “countenance…loss of life” was pro-apartheid whites who claimed that member Joe Matthews, too, noted how affirmed by Mandela’s explanation they alone were God’s chosen people. Luthuli’s insistence on non-violence of what could be carried out: “forays Luthuli argued that all Christians should gave way to compromise. According against military installations, power fight for social justice, his ANC politics to Mandela, Luthuli himself suggested plants… and transportation links.” reflecting his own understanding of “two separate streams of the struggle”: After being kept abreast of MK Christianity. In 1952, shortly before the ANC, which would remain developments by Kotane and Ndlovu, being elected as ANC president, Luthuli nonviolent; and a “military movement Luthuli remarked: “Look, I am not a declared, “I am in Congress precisely that should be a separate and communist… but that doesn’t mean because I am a Christian. My Christian independent organ, linked to the ANC that when I am attacked, I will just be belief about human society must find and under the overall control of the like Christ and turn the other cheek. I expression here and now… My own ANC but fundamentally autonomous.” will fight back. MK is a way of fighting urge, because I am a Christian, is to get This compromise would permit the back. [but what] I would like you not into the thick of the struggle with other creation of a distinct sabotage unit that to do is to say that MK is officially an Christians, taking my Christianity with hit hard targets. me and praying that it may be used to The next night, Luthuli chaired an influence for good the character of the ANC-led gathering of its Congress This compromise resistance.” Alliance, featuring representatives from would permit the Thus he criticised the many whites, the South African Indian Congress, South creation of a distinct especially within the Afrikaner Dutch African Congress of Trade Unions, the Reformed Church (DRC), who used Federation of South African Women, sabotage unit that hit Christianity to justify white supremacy, the Coloured Peoples Congress and hard targets. relying on the Calvinist doctrine of an the Congress of Democrats. Luthuli “elect” in claiming divine sanction to opened the assembly by recognising rule South Africa as a supreme and MK, but demonstrating his democratic, ANC body.” separate population over blacks. DRC inclusive style, he stipulated that MK But Luthuli’s insistence that the religious leaders championed apartheid discussion begin anew with Congress ANC remain officially non-violent, as a divinely ordained, comprehensive allies present. while also accepting MK, invites us social engineering programme that Mandela recalled Luthuli’s feeling to move beyond conceptually rigid would create societal harmony through that armed self-defense was “a binaries of violence vs non-violence to rigorous political, socioeconomic, matter of such gravity, I would like more fully appreciate other aspects of and physical separation. For Luthuli, my colleagues here to consider the his significant legacy. apartheid was a violation of God’s law, issue afresh.” recalled Luthuli was an activist-intellectual “contrary to the plan and purpose of that Luthuli “was a great admirer of who theorised and practiced an God our Creator, who created all men Shaka and… not opposed to violence inclusive, multiracial South African equal.” in principle” but was proffering an nationalism that forged close ties Before and after the “turn to “argument… that all forms of struggle with Indians, Coloureds and some armed struggle,” Luthuli practiced were not exhausted.” Ultimately, whites. Luthuli held many identities: international non-violence, calling for Luthuli, Moses Kotane and GM Naicker Zulu, African, Pan-African, Christian, global economic boycotts, sanctions, were instrumental in devising the dual educator, elected Chief, singer, arms embargoes and the diplomatic resolution to upheld nonviolence while sportsman and committed family isolation of the apartheid regime. sanctioning the establishment of an man. The remainder of this essay will Luthuli framed apartheid as a crime affiliated sabotage wing: “You go and emphasise that Luthuli fought against against humanity, thus linking global start that organisation. We will not apartheid through Christian theology, anti-apartheid and human rights discipline you because we understand with what I call “international non- activities, supported by his fellow the conditions under which you have violence” campaigns and, with Nobel laureate Martin Luther King, Jr. taken this line. But… we [the ANC] are his admirer Martin Luther King, Jr, The UN Declaration of Human going to continue with non-violence.” by connecting South African anti- Rights, enacted in 1948, the same

40 THE THINKER LITERATURE year as the beginning of apartheid, was Nobel winner after the committee had is much in Mississippi and Alabama largely a reaction to fascism and Nazi explicitly added human rights as one to remind South Africans of their own atrocities during World War Two. It criterion for winning the Prize. The country.” He identified “with those was tragically ironic that it was former Nobel Committee’s award exemplified in the far more deadly struggle” who South African Prime Minister Jan international recognition and support “strove for half a century to win… by Smuts who introduced the language for the anti-apartheid struggle as a non-violent methods” before “the of human rights into the UN Preamble fundamental human rights issue. In his shootings of Sharpeville and all that even though he refused to accept that acceptance speech, Luthuli emphasised has happened since.” Human Rights such rights were universal claims that that apartheid was the antithesis of scholar Samuel Moyn claims King only extended to “natives.” South Africa “humanity’s highest aspirations of placed “civil rights in a global frame in was one of eight countries to abstain which the United Nations Declaration the last year of his life… he occasionally when UN member countries voted of Human Rights is a culmination. This invoked human rights as well.” But overwhelmingly to adopt the Charter. is what we stand for. This is what we accepting his 1964 Nobel Peace As president of the ANC, Luthuli fight for.” Prize, King praised Luthuli, “pilot in continually framed apartheid as a As MK engaged in its sabotage the struggle for human rights… [who] crime against humanity and aligned the campaigns, Luthuli coordinated anti- met with the most brutal expression anti-apartheid struggle with emerging apartheid protests with the American of man’s inhumanity to man.” Years international Human Rights norms. anti-colonial and anti-apartheid earlier, in a July 1957 joint statement, He celebrated the significant domestic organisation, the American Committee “Declaration of Conscience” King and international support for the 1952 on Africa (ACOA) and the UN Special declared his support for South Africans ’s fight for the Committee Against Apartheid, calling “to achieve basic human rights for democracy and “fundamental human for weapon embargoes and trade all as proclaimed in their ‘Freedom rights of freedom of speech, association boycotts particularly by Britain, South Charter.’” and movement” that would modernise Africa’s largest trading partner. King and other US civil rights South Africa. He declared the Freedom With the death penalty looming activists also raised money for the Charter, a landmark 1955 document legal defense for Luthuli and the other that demanded freedom, justice, and 154 defendants during the five-year material equity for all South Africans, Luthuli argued Treason Trial. By July 1962, King “a South African Declaration of Human that all Christians and Luthuli issued the “Appeal For Rights” and a “Magna Carta – a Bill of should fight for social Action Against Apartheid,” calling Human Rights.” for the world to support economic Luthuli’s international non-violence justice, his ANC sanctions, trade boycotts and “an included his 1958 call for a global politics reflecting his effective international quarantine of boycott of all South African goods that apartheid” until South Africa aligned helped develop early anti-apartheid own understanding of its policies to the UN Declaration of movements in several countries – Christianity. Human Rights. including Ireland, Great Britain, On December 10, 1965, Scandinavia, the Netherlands, India, International Human Rights Day, the US, and Ghana. Inspired by this for those MK activists charged with flanked by South African exiles the appeal, global anti-apartheid activists sabotage at the 1964 , singer Miriam Makeba and ANC leader later coordinated closely with the Luthuli implored British diplomats Robert Resha, King made his most South African domestic struggle and and the UN Secretary-General to comprehensive speech against South with the exiled ANC, broadening the “save the lives of the nine…. [ANC] Africa, entitled “Let My People Go,” a terrain for sanctions beyond economics leaders.” Luthuli praised their “spirit nod to the African American spiritual to other sectors like sport, culture, of militancy” which embodied “the and the title of Luthuli’s autobiography. and higher education. Against views highest in morality and ethics.” It He declared, “the issue of human rights that economic sanctions would be was not easy to pursue “justice by is the central question confronting counterproductive because they would the use of violent methods,” but the all nations,” but in reviving “the mostly hurt economically vulnerable “uncompromising white refusal to” nightmarish ideology and practices black South Africans, Luthuli argued ensure “freedom” for “the African and of Nazism,” South Africa was “this soberly that if the economic boycott other oppressed” pushed them in this formidable adversary of human rights.” was the “method which shortens the direction. Moving beyond rigid dichotomies day of blood, the suffering to us will be King supported Luthuli’s of violence and non-violence reveal a price we are willing to pay.” international non-violence work. En lesser-known Human Rights and Luthuli became the first route to his 1964 Oslo ceremony, King international non-violence struggles African-born recipient of the Nobel stopped in London to give an “Address that linked US Civil Rights and the South Peace Prize in recognition of his non- on South African Independence.” King African anti-apartheid movements in violent anti-apartheid and human connected the global colour line from the joined battle against transnational rights activism. In fact, he was the first America to apartheid: “Clearly there white supremacy. ■

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