Class Conflict and the National Party Split

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Craig Charney (1984). Class Conflict and the National Party Split. Journal of Southern African Studies, Vol. 10, No. 2. Taylor & Francis.

Type	journal article
Scope	Wider apartheid literature
Method	mixed
Period studied	1948–1983
Regions	South Africa, Transvaal, Cape Province, Free State
Themes	politics ideology elections, business and state, labour markets wages, agriculture land, bantustans removals influx, transition post apartheid
Citation key	charney1984

Argument

Charney argues that the 1982 split in the National Party, which produced the Conservative Party, is not explained by the ethnic or verligte/verkrampte frameworks. It rests on a class realignment in which the NP became a party dominated by an Afrikaner bourgeoisie. That bourgeoisie needed new strategies and allies: it wanted to restructure the training, use and living conditions of black workers and to co-opt coloureds and Indians. The old coalition of petit bourgeoisie, farmers, civil servants and white workers could not hold together. He supports this with survey data on class and racial attitudes, poll and by-election results, and a sector-by-sector account of the struggles inside Afrikaner institutions. He concludes that the Afrikaner bourgeoisie's dependence on state power and patronage limits reform to economic liberalisation plus 'authoritarian reform', not power-sharing with Africans.

Evidence and method

Rapport and Star Retail Data Library opinion surveys (1982-83), election and by-election results, press reports (Rapport, Sunday Times, Die Afrikaner, Financial Mail), personal interviews with Nationalist MPs and officials, and secondary works (O'Meara, Giliomee and Adam, Greenberg, Nolutshungu).

Place in the debates

• Ethnic (English vs Afrikaans) or ideological (verligte/verkrampte) explanations of white politics vs a class analysis (see Origins, coherence and ideology of apartheid and Afrikaner nationalism). Rejects both as descriptive rather than explanatory. Argues the split's roots lie in class realignment within Afrikanerdom.
• Liberal vs revisionist views of reform: does capital's interest drive liberalisation? (see Why apartheid ended: reform, transition and elite bargaining). Revisionist. Economic liberalisation serves capital's need for skilled, organised black labour, but the Afrikaner bourgeoisie's reliance on the state rules out political liberalisation.
• Whether the split signals a move toward liberal power-sharing (see Why apartheid ended: reform, transition and elite bargaining). Denies it. The NP offers authoritarian reform with white control of the state, not majority rule.
• Left view that the split was inconsequential (see Why apartheid ended: reform, transition and elite bargaining). Rejects it. The split freed the NP to pursue capital's restructuring agenda.

Findings

• Afrikaner economic advancement under NP rule and the shift to white-collar work changed the party's class base. (p. 3)

  Afrikaner control of private industry rose from 10% to 21 % between 1948 and 1975, while, including the parastatals, Afrikaners' control of industrial output rose to 45 %.

• Attitudes to racial integration among whites split by class more than by language group. (p. 3)

  The differences between 'A' and 'D' (lower supervisory, clerical, artisans and unskilled workers) within each ethnic group were almost always larger than the differences between English and Afrikaners of the same economic status.

• The Botha government's labour reforms aimed to close the skills gap and incorporate organised urban black workers. (p. 5)

  to close the skills gap and increase demand by incorporating an organised urban African working class into the labour aristocracy.

• The NP moved from distrusting English business to partnership with it under Botha. (p. 6)

  The ghost of Hoggenheimer, the capitalist caricature against which the NP used to rail, has been laid, along with Nationalist solicitude for the 'little man' in the fields and factories.

• Reform provoked electoral defection on the far right, culminating in the 1982 split. (p. 6)

  In the white General Election of 1981, support for the Herstigte Nasionale Party (HNP) and other far right groups increased almost six times, to over 200,000 votes.

• Afrikaner support for the NP fell sharply after the split. (p. 7)

  survey figures on Afrikaners alone, which showed NP support dropping from 82% in October 1976 to 56% in October 1982.

• Civil servants' discontent was fuelled by falling real public-sector pay. (p. 11)

  the precipitate decline in real public sector pay since the beginnings of salary equalisation, a fall averaging 23 per cent in central government and 12 per cent in the provinces between 1974 and 1979.

• Small maize farmers in the Transvaal and northern Free State swung to the right because reform threatened labour supplies and their economic position. (p. 11)

  Its relaxation of labour and racial policies is regarded as threatening black labour supplies and the whole labour-repressive system on which small farmers, particularly, depend.

• Verligtes seek economic but not political incorporation of Africans. (p. 13)

  The verligte Nationalists seek only the economic incorporation of the urban African working class, and the political incorporation of coloured and Indian allies for the battle against the African National Congress.

• Influx control and homeland citizenship are tied to the fiscal cost of reproducing African labour and to preserving white privilege in state services. (p. 14)

  influx control is needed to displace these slums to the bantustans, shifting the social costs of reproducing the reserve army of labour off the central government.

Evidence ledger

Sources used

Source	Kind	Period	How used
Star Retail Data Library survey, April 1982 (Johannesburg-area whites, socio-economic status and attitudes to integration)	household or labour survey microdata	April 1982	Table 1 shows class position (A-D) rather than language group differentiates white attitudes to school, transport and racial integration.
Rapport Poll, April 1982 (Mark-en-meningsopnames), income of NP supporters	household or labour survey microdata	April 1982	Shows the NP's base is now mostly middle-class by income, with only 38% under R13,000.
Rapport Poll 3/82 (Nov. 1982) and Rapport 05.06.83 poll reports; Charney's 1981 election analysis	household or labour survey microdata	1977-1983	Table 2 traces partisan support among whites across the 1977 and 1981 elections and 1982-83 polls to show NP decline after the split.
Hanf et al., South Africa: the prospects of peaceful change (1974 and 1976 surveys) plus Rapport polls 1982-83	secondary literature compilation	1974-1983	Table 3 gives Afrikaner party preferences, showing NP support falling from 82% to 56% and the rise of the CP.
Rapport Poll, July 1982 (party choice by denomination and church attendance)	household or labour survey microdata	July 1982	Table 4 shows that conservative-church Afrikaners, and Transvaal NGK members, lean towards the far right.
Rapport Poll, Nov. 1982 (HNP supporters' income)	household or labour survey microdata	November 1982	Supports the claim that the HNP reverted to a poor-white protest party.
General election returns and by-election results, 1977, 1981, 1982-83	election returns	1977-1983	By-election swings to the far right are used as an indicator of the strength of the right, since polls underrate it.
Lombard and Stadler, 'Focus on key economic issues: Income distribution and cross subsidisation', Mercabank, Nov. 1982	secondary literature compilation	1974-1979	Source for the fall in real public-sector pay, which explains civil-servant discontent.
Personal interviews with Nationalists, a high official, an NP MP and Beaumont Schoeman (former editor of Die Afrikaner)	interviews oral history	c. 1982-83	Supports claims on the class character of the NP, the official view of the ANC threat, defections in the Transvaal NP, farmer politics and the limits to reform.
South African press: Sunday Times, Sunday Express, Rand Daily Mail, Sunday Tribune, Financial Mail, Rapport, Die Afrikaner, Frontline	newspapers periodicals	1982-1983	Evidence on business funding of the NP, Broederbond struggles, church conflict, wine-farmer privileges, and government statements about reform.
Wiehahn Commission, Riekert Report and de Lange Committee reports	commission or official report	late 1970s-early 1980s	Cited as exemplars of the technocratic approach and as the basis of Botha's labour and education reforms; not read directly.
Giliomee and Adam, Ethnic Power Mobilised; Greenberg, Race and State; O'Meara, Volkskapitalisme (data on Afrikaner economic advance)	secondary literature compilation	1948-1975	Supplies the figures on Afrikaner control of industry, share in white-collar jobs and professions.
Speeches and statements of P. W. Botha, Vorster and NP figures (Carlton Centre Conference 1979; Giliomee, Parting of the Ways; Lombard quoted by Posel)	other	1978-1983	Used to show NP ideology shifting to growth, technocracy, and cooperation with big business.
1983 constitution and constitutional referendum (November 1983)	legislation gazette	1983	The structure of the new constitution is analysed to show how it preserves white and NP control.

Inference

Quantification: Descriptive tables.

Interpretive political-economy argument grounded in a class-analytic framework. It draws on cross-tabulated opinion polls, election and by-election results, press reports and interviews. The author compares regions, denominations and classes, and reads institutional struggles as expressions of class alignments. There are no statistical tests or controls.

Key claims

Claim	Basis	Strength
Class position, not language group, structures white attitudes to racial integration. (p. 3)	Star Retail Data Library survey of April 1982, Table 1 cross-tabs by status category and language group.	Partial data
The NP became a party dominated by an Afrikaner bourgeoisie and middle class through state capitalism and rising Afrikaner economic power. (p. 3)	Figures from O'Meara, Giliomee and Adam, and Greenberg, a Rapport income poll, and a personal interview.	Partial data
NP support, especially among Afrikaners, fell sharply after the split, with a far-right surge that partly recovered by 1983. (p. 7)	Rapport polls, election returns and Hanf et al., Tables 2 and 3, and by-election results.	Systematic data
The split followed regional and sectoral class lines: Cape finance and export agriculture backed Botha, while Transvaal small farmers, civil servants and white workers moved right. (p. 12)	Press reports, an interview with Schoeman, and regional by-election results; little systematic data.	Illustrative or anecdotal
The church and denomination of Afrikaners correlates with their support for the far right. (p. 10)	Rapport Poll of July 1982, Table 4.	Partial data
The Afrikaner bourgeoisie's dependence on the state limits political reform; the NP will pursue economic restructuring and authoritarian rather than liberal reform. (p. 14)	Argument from class theory, analysis of the constitution's provisions, press quotations and interviews, and Nolutshungu.	Asserted
Botha's policies produced a restructuring of black labour policy that angered white workers and prompted right-wing swings. (p. 6)	Commission reports as described, by-election swings, and the 1981 election results via Charney's own article.	Partial data

The author's caveats

The author acknowledges that past surveys have consistently underrated support for the right-wing parties, because of the lack of media support, late mobilisation and the 'lie factor' among Afrikaner voters. He therefore treats by-election results as a better gauge of the right's strength. He also describes the English-speaking share of the 1983 referendum majority as a 'rough estimate'.

Gaps in the evidence

The argument that the NP split reflects class realignment needs systematic data on the class composition of NP and CP/HNP voters at constituency level, such as linked census and election data. It also needs data on Afrikaner employment and ownership by sector. Several claims on farmers, civil servants and business funding rest on interviews, press reports, and single polls with unspecified sample sizes and methods. Such data existed at the time, for example in constituency-level returns and census occupation tables, and could now be assembled.

Replicability: Data poorly documented.