The South African economy, 1652-1997¶

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John Iliffe (1999). The South African economy, 1652-1997. Economic History Review, LII, 1 (Essays in Bibliography and Criticism). Economic History Society / Blackwell Publishers.


Type	journal article
Scope	Economics and economic history of apartheid
Method	synthesis review
Period studied	1652–1997
Regions	South Africa, Cape Colony, Natal, Transvaal/Witwatersrand, Eastern Cape, Bantustans/reserves
Themes	methods data sources, comparative theory, origins segregation, mining migrant labour, agriculture land, manufacturing industrial policy, business and state, bantustans removals influx, inequality poverty unemployment, macro fiscal finance debt, sanctions divestment, transition post apartheid
Citation key	`iliffe1999`

Argument¶

Iliffe surveys the historiography of South African economic history from Dutch settlement to the 1990s. He identifies four approaches (liberal-institutional, radical-marxian, Natal, and Cape Town slavery-oriented) and argues that detailed archival work has recently replaced theoretical dispute. The essay reviews the Cape slave economy, nineteenth-century British capitalism, mining, manufacturing, agriculture and rural households, and corporate concentration. It treats South African industrialization as gradual, complex, incomplete and costly. Its comparative interest lies in an industrial revolution occurring alongside a rural society unusually resilient to proletarianization. It closes with three competing interpretations of the 1970s-90s economic crisis: racial Fordism, the minerals-energy complex, and no structural crisis.

Evidence and method¶

A review of secondary literature: monographs, journal articles in the South African Journal of Economic History and the Journal of Southern African Studies, and many unpublished theses. It mentions underlying sources such as Cape and Hague records, opgaaf rolls, Standard Bank reports, Bank of England records, oral history and the Defence Resources Board records. It does not itself analyse primary data.

Place in the debates¶

Liberal vs radical (revisionist) interpretations of South African capitalism and racial order (see Liberal vs revisionist: was apartheid functional or dysfunctional for capitalist growth?). Describes both schools and their weaknesses: liberals neglect Africans and equate economic history with growth, while radicals neglect institutional history. Welcomes the shift to empirical, disaggregated research that supersedes both.
Whether South African industrialization was a rapid success or a gradual, flawed process (see Industrialisation, protection and industrial structure). Notes that the liberal-radical consensus on rapid success is now disputed. He sees industrialization as gradual, complex, incomplete and traumatic in cost, and rejects take-off points and single-factor explanations.
Role of 1920s protection and parastatals (Pact government, Escom, Iscor) in the breakthrough to manufacturing (see Industrialisation, protection and industrial structure). Reports that research has qualified the radical view: tariffs were generally low and the parastatals collaborated with private capital rather than challenging it.
Causes and nature of the 1970s-90s economic crisis (racial Fordism vs minerals-energy complex vs no structural crisis) (see Did the apartheid economy fail? Growth, productivity, investment and the post-1970s crisis). Sets out the three views without choosing one. He observes that post-1994 ANC policy conformed largely to the third position, and says the crisis will be a central problem for future historians.
Proletarianization of Africans and resilience of the rural economy; role of legislation (see Agrarian transition to capitalism and the fate of the African peasantry). Holds that proletarianization seeped rather than swept, owed little to legislation and more to local struggles between farmers and tenants, and that a minority of African smallholders survived even apartheid.

Findings¶

Liberal historians explain South Africa's racial order as a pre-capitalist legacy obstructing industrial capitalism. (p. 87)

pre-capitalist legacies which have obstructed the growth of a colour-blind industrial capitalism
Radical historians argue that industrialization rested on cheap, disenfranchised black labour. (p. 87)

the particular path of industrialization in South Africa is attributable in large measure to an abundant supply of disenfranchised, low-wage, unskilled black labour
The old liberal-radical consensus on successful industrialization is now questioned on comparative growth grounds. (p. 88)

The one point on which liberals and radicals agreed—that South Africa had achieved a rapid and successful industrialization—is in dispute as growth rates compare ever less favourably with those of other middle-income developing countries
Agricultural modernization followed industrialization rather than causing it. (p. 95)

All viewpoints agree that, with the exception of the wool industry, the modernization of South African agriculture was a consequence rather than a cause of industrialization.
1920s tariffs were weaker than the radical account suggests. (p. 93)

tariffs were generally low, they protected agriculture at the expense of processing industries
Parastatals Escom and Iscor worked with private capital. (p. 93)

Archival research has shown that both Escom and Iscor collaborated with private capital rather than challenging it.
Apartheid-era industrial policy located a low-wage textile sector near Bantustans. (p. 94)

Political considerations gave the textile industry—largely a post-1945 innovation—a low-wage, labour-intensive sector located partly in or near Bantustans
Rapid tractorization after 1946 shifted farm labour from scarcity to glut. (p. 96)

Between 1946 and 1960 the number of tractors in use on South African farms increased from 20,292 to 120,920.
Combine-harvesters and related technology cut farm employment sharply. (p. 96)

enlarging average farm sizes by 75 per cent, more than doubling maize yields, and reducing seasonal harvest workers by nearly 70 per cent and permanent workers by a smaller proportion.
Farm employment peaked in the late 1960s, after which the state moved surplus workers into Bantustans. (p. 96)

Farm employment probably peaked in the late 1960s. Thereafter the authorities concentrated on moving unwanted workers into Bantustans.
Corporate ownership was extremely concentrated by 1987. (p. 97)

In 1987 four conglomerates—Sanlam, Mutual, Anglo American Corporation, and Rembrandt—controlled 83 per cent of all companies listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
The 'racial Fordism' account locates the crisis in a market limited by unequal income distribution. (p. 98)

mass production of consumer goods for an internal market so limited by the unequal racial distribution of income that production and employment could expand further only by drawing in imports
Post-1994 policy followed the 'no structural crisis' view. (p. 99)

Although all three views of the past were represented within the African National Congress regime of the late 1990s, practical constraints dictated economic policies conforming largely to the third position.

Evidence ledger¶

Sources used¶

Source	Kind	Period	How used
Cape cadastral calendar (deeds' book), 1677-1731	state archives	1677-1731	Listing of real property transfers, cited as a recent publication of Cape records that supports the picture of early Cape agriculture.
Records at Cape Town and The Hague (VOC-era archives)	state archives	1652-1795	Underlies the claim that wheat, wine and pastoral production trends are evident under Dutch rule.
Slave petitions of the amelioration period, 1823-1838, and criminal records	state archives	1823-1838	Used by recent research to recover slave voices, moral economy and family claims.
Internal farm records of Klaver Valley	company records or reports	1812-1898	One of the few surviving internal farm records, used to show slaves as only part of a larger workforce.
R. J. Gordon's travel accounts (Cape travels, 1777-1786)	other	1777-1786	Vivid contemporary description of the subjugation of the Khoisan on the frontier.
Standard Bank reports on economic conditions in southern Africa, 1865-1902	company records or reports	1865-1902	Highlights the business cycles that periodically devastated Western Cape agriculture.
Transvaal (South African Republic) land records from the Great Trek	state archives	1830s-1900	Beginning to be used to show how notables accumulated land through public office and off-farm resources.
Bank of England and British government records on gold and the 1899 war	state archives	c.1886-1899	Further search found no serious evidence that gold supply concerns motivated British aggression in 1899.
Oral research on mineworkers' experience	interviews oral history	20th century	Oral work penetrates the experience of deep-level gold mining and migrant culture.
Archival records on Escom and Iscor (including Cross's D.Phil. thesis on Iscor)	company records or reports	1920s-1989	Archival research shows the parastatals collaborated with private capital rather than challenging it.
Tractor numbers on South African farms, 1946 and 1960	official statistical series	1946-1960	Quantifies post-1946 agricultural mechanization that turned labour scarcity into glut.
De Klerk's study of farm mechanization in the western Transvaal	secondary literature compilation	1950s-1970s	Source for effects of combine-harvesters on farm size, yields and seasonal and permanent labour.
Oral sources and biography of Kas Maine (van Onselen, The Seed is Mine)	interviews oral history	1894-1985	Illustrates sharecroppers' resistance to proletarianization through one man's life over 35 years on 15 farms.
Johannesburg Stock Exchange company control figures, 1987 (via Jones, ed., Financial enterprise)	stock market financial data	1987	Provides the headline concentration figure of conglomerate control of listed companies.
Pulp and paper share of manufacturing GDP, 1990	national accounts macro	1990	Illustrates the economic environment favouring very large enterprises.

Inference¶

Quantification: Illustrative figures.

Historiographical review: synthesizes secondary literature and archival studies by others, organized by period and sector, comparing liberal, radical and revisionist schools and three contemporary economic analyses of the 1970s-90s crisis. Occasional statistics are quoted without original analysis.

Key claims¶

Claim	Basis	Strength
The Cape Colony under Dutch rule is exceptionally well documented, enabling detailed study of agriculture, slavery and settlement. (p. 2-3)	Opgaaf rolls, cadastral calendar, 1729 colonist list, and Cape Town and Hague archives, as published by the Opgaaf Project.	Partial data
Tariff protection after 1924 was generally low and did not drive the breakthrough to manufacturing; parastatals Escom and Iscor collaborated with private capital. (p. 7)	Archival and tariff research by Clark, Freund and Cross, reported at second hand.	Partial data
Mechanization after 1946 converted agricultural labour scarcity into a glut, with farm employment peaking in the late 1960s. (p. 10)	Tractor counts 1946-1960 and De Klerk's western Transvaal study; peak date given as probable.	Partial data
Proletarianization of Africans on white farms was a gradual, locally contested process with little to do with legislation. (p. 9)	Case studies and oral biography (Beinart and Bundy; van Onselen; Schirmer).	Illustrative or anecdotal
South African corporate power was extremely concentrated, with four conglomerates controlling 83 per cent of JSE-listed companies in 1987 and mining houses providing the corporate model. (p. 11)	Figure from Jones, ed., Financial enterprise; business histories of Anglo American, Sanlam and the banks.	Partial data
There was no evidence that concern to protect gold supplies motivated British aggression in 1899. (p. 6)	Searches of Bank of England and British government records by Ally and others.	Partial data
Three competing analyses explain the late-twentieth-century crisis: racial Fordism, the minerals-energy complex, and denial of a structural crisis. (p. 12)	Contemporary economic literature (Gelb, Fine and Rustomjee, Moll, Heyns) characterized in summary.	Asserted
There are virtually no overall statistical estimates before Union in 1910, and later statistics are often questionable. (p. 2)	Reviewer's general assessment of the statistical record, not tied to a specific source.	Asserted

The author's caveats¶

Iliffe notes that there are virtually no overall statistical estimates before 1910 and that later statistics are often questionable. He also notes that many gold-mining sources remain closed, that records of National Party industrial policy are largely in Afrikaans and little studied, and that he has not seen Koen's Sanlam thesis. He also notes much uncertainty in dating the decline of the reserves.

Gaps in the evidence¶

As a historiographical essay it does not examine primary data itself; the quantitative claims (tractor numbers, 83 per cent concentration, 16 per cent of manufacturing GDP) lack named official series, years or table references. Verifying the arguments on tariffs, parastatals, mechanization and crisis would need national accounts, census and agricultural census series, company archives (Anglo American, Sanlam) and Defence Resources Board and parastatal records. Many of these exist in archives or are now more accessible, but the essay does not cite them directly.

Replicability: Not applicable.