The Black Man's Place in South Africa¶
Peter Nielsen (1922). The Black Man's Place in South Africa. Juta & Co., Ltd., Cape Town.
| Type | book |
| Scope | Wider apartheid literature |
| Method | theoretical or conceptual |
| Period studied | 1900–1922 |
| Regions | South Africa, Southern Rhodesia, Cape Province |
| Themes | origins segregation, politics ideology elections, bantustans removals influx, comparative theory |
| Citation key | nielsen1922 |
Argument¶
Nielsen, a Rhodesian native commissioner and magistrate, argues from decades of first-hand observation that Africans are mentally and morally equal to Europeans, and that their lack of past achievement reflects conservatism and lack of opportunity rather than innate incapacity. He then argues that racial antipathy is instinctive, rooted in physical dissimilarity and sexual jealousy, and therefore will not diminish as Africans advance. He rejects 'parallelism' within a common society as unworkable and concludes that territorial separation, already law under the Natives Land Act and Native Affairs Act of 1920, is the only route to peace. The case is built on anthropological authorities (Boas, Keith, Wallace) and anecdotes of African reasoning. It is a liberal-paternalist text that gives a pre-apartheid intellectual justification for segregation, not an economic study.
Evidence and method¶
Secondary anthropological, psychological and philological authorities (Boas, Keith, Donaldson, Marett, Wallace, Sapir); the author's own thirty years of observation and notes on Africans in Rhodesia and courts; a few statistics on coloured population growth 1904-1911; the Beaumont Native Lands Commission minute; Smuts's 1920 Native Affairs Bill speech.
Place in the debates¶
- Innate racial mental inferiority vs environmental explanations of African 'backwardness' (see Origins, coherence and ideology of apartheid and Afrikaner nationalism). Rejects innate inferiority; attributes lack of achievement to conservatism, isolation and absence of opportunity and education.
- Segregation/territorial separation vs 'parallelism' and integration in a common society (see Origins, coherence and ideology of apartheid and Afrikaner nationalism). Rejects parallelism as plan-less drift and champions territorial separation as the only workable policy, endorsing the Natives Land Act and Native Affairs Act.
- Origins of segregationist ideology: liberal-paternalist rationales for separation (see Origins, coherence and ideology of apartheid and Afrikaner nationalism). Combines claims of equal capacity with an argument that instinctive racial antipathy makes shared citizenship impossible, which justifies separate development.
- Miscegenation and the status of coloured people (see Origins, coherence and ideology of apartheid and Afrikaner nationalism). Argues alarm over miscegenation is exaggerated and coloured people are not inherently inferior, but discourages mixing and opposes penal legislation.
Findings¶
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States that the crux of the 'Native Question' is whether Africans can acquire civilisation and whether equality can then be denied. (p. 9)
This I take to be the crux of the Native Question in South Africa.
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Concludes there is no distinct African mind. (p. 81)
there is no Native mind distinct from the common human mind. The mind of the Native is the mind of all mankind
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Locates the cause of limited African achievement in lack of opportunity, not capacity. (p. 88)
lies not, I think, in a lack of inherent capacity but in a lack of opportunity
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Explains African labour behaviour as economic compulsion and not racial laziness. (p. 102)
The rough and menial work of the world has always been done through some sort of compulsion, either slavery or some kind of economic coaction
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Argues school-leaving among Africans reflects absence of rewards, since there is little prospect of profit or preferment from education. (p. 104)
where there is neither penalty for failure nor reward for success we cannot expect more effort than we find.
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Dismisses 'parallelism' as a continuation of drift. (p. 138)
Parallelism, when applied to the Native problem of South Africa, is clearly nothing more than the old, plan-less drift continued
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Catalogues the colour bar and pass-law disabilities faced by educated Africans. (p. 140)
it is hard that he must do only rough or menial, but always ill-paid, work when he is capable of doing skilled and well-paid labour
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Admits that separation would require removals and expropriation. (p. 143)
The Natives may in some places have to leave the land where their ancestors are buried, and the whites will, in many places, have to accept the price of expropriation
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Foresees the risk that white cupidity over minerals would breach African areas. (p. 147)
It is the possibility that the cupidity of the whites may lead them to remove their black neighbour's landmarks in the event of the discovery of new fields of gold
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States the book's thesis that the black man's place is 'apart'. (p. 148)
the black man's place in his own country must be assigned not below, nor above, but apart from that of the white man
Evidence ledger¶
Sources used¶
| Source | Kind | Period | How used |
|---|---|---|---|
| Author's own first-hand observations and notes of conversations with Natives (Matabeleland, Zambesi, Rhodesian courts) | author survey or fieldwork | c. 1890s-1922 ('nearly thirty years') | Anecdotes and reported speeches of Natives are used to show that Native reasoning ability equals that of Europeans. |
| Maynard and Turner, 'Anthropological Notes on Bantu Natives from Portuguese East Africa' | secondary literature compilation | not stated | Medical measurement evidence is cited to reject the claim that the Native skull is thicker than the European. |
| Manouvrier skull-capacity measurements as reported by Boas (The Mind of Primitive Man) | secondary literature compilation | not stated | Used to qualify the inference from skull capacity to mental capacity. |
| Union of South Africa population increase statistics, 1904 and 1911 (Cape Province coloured population; Union European and non-European increase) | population census | 1904-1911 | Used to argue that coloured/black population growth does not justify alarm and to question the source of coloured increase. |
| Report of the Native Lands Commission (Beaumont Commission), minute by Sir W. H. Beaumont, 1916 evidence | commission or official report | 1916 | Quoted to claim the great mass of Natives support territorial separation for more land and fixity of tenure. |
| General Smuts's speech introducing the Native Affairs Bill in the Union Parliament, May 1920 | parliamentary debates | May 1920 | Cited to show that territorial separation was now law and that pass laws were condemned. |
| Native Affairs Act of 1920 and Native Lands Act | legislation gazette | 1913/1920 | The legal basis of the territorial separation policy the author endorses. |
| German newspapers Der Christliche Pilger (9 May 1920) and Volkslinger Nachrichten (14 June 1920) | newspapers periodicals | 1920 | Cited to corroborate that German women were attracted to black troops, undermining the 'instinctive' racial aversion thesis. |
| Rhodesian press letters by white women during anti-miscegenation agitation | newspapers periodicals | c. 1920-21 | Used to claim that white women's concern was marriage chances rather than racial degradation. |
| Stephen Graham, Children of the Slaves (study of American Negro question) | secondary literature compilation | c. 1920 | Relied on for claims on Negro capacity for citizenship and on trends away from miscegenation in the US South. |
| Pre-modern and anthropological scientific literature (Keith, Donaldson, Boas, Marett, Sollas, Wallace, Kidd, Havelock Ellis) | secondary literature compilation | to c. 1921 | Cranial and heredity arguments are built from quotations of these authorities. |
| Court records of South African courts (generalised) | state archives | unspecified | Invoked in general terms to show that Natives sustain revenge against their own colour. |
Inference¶
Quantification: Illustrative figures.
Essay combining appeals to authority from contemporary anthropology and psychology, analogy with European history, and the author's own anecdotal observations of Natives, then moving to a normative argument for territorial segregation.
Key claims¶
| Claim | Basis | Strength |
|---|---|---|
| Africans have no anatomical or physiological disabilities that would make them mentally inferior to Europeans. (p. 18) | Quoted anthropologists (Keith, Boas, Marett, Donaldson) and a medical report on skulls; no new measurement. | Partial data |
| Native reasoning, emotions and moral sense are the same as Europeans'; there is no distinct 'Native mind'. (p. 75) | The author's own observations over thirty years and selected anecdotes of Native speech noted at the time. | Illustrative or anecdotal |
| Lack of civilisational achievement reflects conservatism and lack of opportunity, not lack of capacity. (p. 92) | Historical analogy to Egypt, China, Scandinavians, Red Indians; no systematic data. | Asserted |
| Miscegenation in South Africa is exaggerated; the coloured population is not growing alarmingly and is being absorbed. (p. 122) | Quoted 1904-1911 census growth percentages, with the author admitting they cannot distinguish sources of increase. | Partial data |
| Racial antipathy is rooted in instinctive sexual jealousy over physical disparity and will not diminish with Native advancement. (p. 132) | Speculative psychology, plus reports on German women and black troops from newspapers and Graham. | Asserted |
| The great mass of Natives favour the territorial separation policy. (p. 145) | Quotation from the Beaumont Native Lands Commission minute and the author's conversations with elderly Rhodesian Natives. | Illustrative or anecdotal |
| Territorial separation is the only policy giving lasting peace and the Native a home and full development. (p. 148) | Normative argument by the author, with reference to Smuts's Native Affairs Act speech and US Southern experience. | Asserted |
The author's caveats¶
The author concedes that the census figures do not show how much coloured increase comes from white-coloured unions, that proper multi-generational statistics would be needed to test fertility claims, and that final proof of Native capacity 'must be given by the Natives themselves'.
Gaps in the evidence¶
The argument rests on anecdote and quoted authorities rather than systematic evidence; census age, sex and race tabulations (1904, 1911, 1921), school attainment records and pass-law or labour statistics could test the claims about capacity, miscegenation and 'opportunity'. The Beaumont Commission's actual evidence from Native witnesses and Native Affairs Department records existed then and could test the claim of Native support for separation. No evidence is offered on economic effects of segregation, land availability or labour supply, although such data existed in the Union.
Replicability: Data poorly documented.