The Evolution of Research Collaboration in South African Gold Mining: 1886-1933¶
Pogue, Thomas Edwin (2006). The Evolution of Research Collaboration in South African Gold Mining: 1886-1933. PhD dissertation (Proefschrift), Universiteit Maastricht. Universitaire Pers Maastricht / Datawyse.
| Type | thesis |
| Scope | Economics and economic history of apartheid |
| Method | mixed |
| Period studied | 1886–1933 |
| Regions | Witwatersrand, Kimberley, Transvaal/ZAR, Union of South Africa |
| Themes | mining migrant labour, origins segregation, labour markets wages, unions strikes, business and state, manufacturing industrial policy, comparative theory, methods data sources, education human capital |
| Citation key | pogue2006 |
Argument¶
The thesis examines research collaboration in Witwatersrand gold mining through two cases: cyanide extraction (1892-1902) and the transformation of stoping practices (1903-1933). It applies three complementary frameworks (industrial district, collective action, distributed innovation) and argues no single one suffices. Cyanide development is best explained by an open community of metallurgists in a district with Kimberley legacies; the stoping transformation was driven by the Corner House group acting as a quasi-cooperative research organisation. It reinterprets the colour bar historiography by placing technology first: after the 1922 Rand Revolt, Taylorised drilling and hole-directors de-skilled stoping, so mines tolerated racial restrictions rather than pay the political cost of removing them, and the 1926 re-imposition followed.
Evidence and method¶
Chamber of Mines annual reports and statistics, Government Mine Engineer reports, proceedings and journals of professional societies (CMMSSA, SAIE, AMM), contemporary presidential addresses, TEBA and Chamber archives, and secondary histories (Johnstone, Yudelman, Jeeves, Katz, Leger, Bozzoli, Van Onselen); a short contemporary Ekurhuleni plastics case relies on interviews reported by others.
Place in the debates¶
- Origins and entrenchment of the colour bar (see The job colour bar, white labour and its erosion). Argues technological change in stoping (Taylorism, drill director, lightweight drills) rather than only capital-labour conflict shaped the mines' stance; mines tolerated de jure restrictions because efficiency gains were secured and removing them was politically costly.
- Cheap labour thesis and state-capital relations (see Cheap labour thesis and the function of the reserves). Treats the state, pass laws, hut taxes and the recruitment monopoly as supporting low-wage African labour, with the state aligned to mining capital, following Yudelman's co-optation of white labour.
- Technology versus labour-politics emphasis in South African historiography (see Historiographical approaches). Criticises Johnstone and Leger for treating technology within a capital-labour or racial-discrimination frame and argues technologies also transformed social relations.
- Outcrop vs deep-level viability / technological determinism of cyanide (see Pre-Union colonial economy, the mineral revolution and the South African War). Stresses that cyanide's eventual dominance was uncertain at the time and warns against retrospective determinism.
Findings¶
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Gold output on the Witwatersrand grew very rapidly in the early boom at a fixed sterling price. (p. 95)
Between 1887 and 1898, the amount of gold produced on the Witwatersrand grew at an average annual rate of 42%.
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Cyanide treatment of slime was an important economy because slime was a large share of pulp. (p. 91)
Slime accounted for between 30 to 40 percent of the pulp from the mills after amalgamation and represented an important shortfall in economies from the cyanide process.
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Cyanide displaced chlorination quickly during the 1890s. (p. 91)
In 1892, chlorination accounted for 17 percent of the gold extracted from pulp after amalgamation. By 1899, nearing the end of its days, chlorination only extracted four percent
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Hand-drilled stoping gave skilled European miners control of production, which the reorganisation of stoping later removed. (p. 126)
This skill was knowledge of blast hole placement to remove rock effectively. With this skill, European miners held effective control over underground operations
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Non-labour costs and the gold premium drove a profitability crisis motivating mechanised stoping. (p. 125)
without the gold premium 25 out of 35 Witwatersrand gold mines were producing at marginal or sub-profitable levels
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Afrikaners replaced Europeans in the non-African workforce during the First World War. (p. 134)
the Afrikaners rose from 40% of the non-African workforce in 1914 to 75% in 1919
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Post-1922 reorganisation and the RDIC drill director produced large productivity gains. (p. 137)
The RDIC research and its associated restructuring led to an increase of 400% in the length of holes drilled per shift
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Working costs fell sharply after the Rand Revolt. (p. 137)
by 1923, working costs per ton of ore milled had fallen 24%
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Mines did not exploit the 1923 legal ruling to remove all racial restrictions, then accepted their re-imposition in 1926. (p. 138)
Mine management did not take advantage of this decision, which had been initiated before the Rand Revolt, and remained satisfied with the restructuring they had already realized.
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The Corner House drove stoping innovation and diffused it as a quasi-cooperative research body. (p. 168)
Research collaboration in this case involved a leading agent actively releasing proprietary technologies. The Corner House drove development of the technologies necessary to transform stoping practices.
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Gold's importance to the state's finances and the Gold Law tied the state to the industry. (p. 154)
Under the Gold Law, the State leased exclusive rights to mine on land proclaimed public diggings.
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Legal racial restrictions on occupations were imposed and re-imposed in 1911, 1918 and 1926. (p. 124)
1918 Status Quo Agreement Imposes de jure racial mobility restrictions on semi-skilled occupations
Evidence ledger¶
Sources used¶
| Source | Kind | Period | How used |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chamber of Mines (COMSA) Annual Reports 1892-1899 (extraction method percentages, cyanide vs chlorination) | company records or reports | 1892-1899 | Compiled by the author into Table 6.4 to show cyanidation displacing chlorination on non-amalgamated gold. |
| COMSA Annual Reports: Witwatersrand gold output, price and world share 1886-1933 | company records or reports | 1886-1933 | Supplies gold output series (Tables 7.1, 9.1) and South Africa's share of world output (Figures 7.1, 9.1) to show growth and international significance. |
| Handley (2004), employment data for COMSA member companies and contractors | secondary literature compilation | 1887-1902 | Source for Figure 7.2 employment series used to estimate White and African labour force growth to 1898. |
| COMSA Annual Reports: employment, racial composition, state revenue from mining, annual statistics | company records or reports | 1903-1933 | Builds Figures 8.3, 9.2, 9.3, 9.5, 9.6 on employment, labour origins, state revenue share, output and excavation efficiency. |
| Transvaal and Union Government Mine Engineer Annual Reports (drill use, rock excavated by drill) | official statistical series | 1902-1933 | Source for drill counts (Fig 8.1) and share of hauled rock drilled by rock drill (Fig 8.2), the proxy for transformation of stoping; also 1907 strike employment Table 8.5. |
| Johannesburg Sanitary Board census of Johannesburg, July 1896 | population census | 1896 | Gives sex and racial composition of Johannesburg's population in the 1890s. |
| Union Statistics 1910-1960 (population census data 1904-1936; retail/consumer price indices) | official statistical series | 1904-1936 | Population by race (Fig 9.4) and deflators for real price of gold (Table 9.1). |
| Katz (1994) estimates of White workforce origins | secondary literature compilation | 1890s-1905 | Provides national composition of the White mine workforce (85% British, 58% of those Cornish). |
| Proceedings and Journals of the Chemical and Metallurgical Society (CMMSSA) 1894-1934 | newspapers periodicals | 1894-1934 | Papers, presidential addresses and discussions trace slime treatment and precipitation innovations and evidence open knowledge exchange. |
| South African Mining Journal / SAMEJ, Mining and Industrial Magazine, JSAIE and other technical society journals | newspapers periodicals | 1891-1936 | Contemporary technical papers and commentary on rock drill trials, stoping costs, scientific management and diffusion of Corner House research. |
| Ross Browne (1907), 'Working Costs of the Mines of the Witwatersrand' | company records or reports | 1904-1905 | Corner House study showing economies of plant scale and recommending routinization of stoping; start of 'study standard methods'. |
| Report of the Low Grade Mines Commission (1920), U.G. 34/1920 | commission or official report | 1920 | Quoted to show the perceived situation on the colour bar and labour before the 1922 Rand Revolt. |
| Milner Commission Report 1903 (African miner death rate) | commission or official report | 1902-1903 | Baseline mortality of African miners (58 per 1,000) against which health improvements are measured. |
| Leger (1990) statistics on miners' phthisis, TB and accident fatalities | secondary literature compilation | 1910-1930s | Disaggregated health statistics showing declines in phthisis, tuberculosis and accidents. |
| Packard (1987) data on tuberculosis at Rand Mines (Corner House) group | secondary literature compilation | 1916-1935 | Shows TB incidence among African miners dropping from 12.5 to 2.5 per 1,000. |
| Johnstone (1976) cost and premium data | secondary literature compilation | 1914-1920 | Provides labour cost increases, gold premium effects and Afrikaner share of non-African workforce. |
| Chamber of Mines Archives: Technical Advisory Committee Minute Books 1922-1933; TEBA Archives: Native Recruiting Corporation correspondence 1913-1918 | state archives | 1913-1933 | Listed as primary manuscripts in the bibliography; not visibly cited in the argument text. |
| Published correspondence of Lionel Phillips (Fraser and Jeeves 1977) | secondary literature compilation | 1890-1924 | Evidence of Corner House dominance of COMSA policy and inter-group ties. |
| Dobreva et al. (2005) plastics industry study and structured interviews, Ekurhuleni | author survey or fieldwork | 2005 | Contemporary illustration of lack of collaboration in the concluding chapter. |
Inference¶
Quantification: Descriptive tables.
Two sequential historical case studies (cyanide 1892-1902; stoping 1903-1933) interpreted through three theoretical models (industrial district, collective action, distributed innovation). Evidence is contemporary technical society literature, Chamber of Mines series and secondary historiography; claims are established by narrative reconstruction and model application rather than hypothesis testing.
Key claims¶
| Claim | Basis | Strength |
|---|---|---|
| Cyanide extraction was industrialized through research collaboration among metallurgists in an open community, centred on the CMMSSA, solving slime treatment and precipitation. (p. 102) | CMMSSA Proceedings, presidential addresses, Butters, Williams, Carter papers; Chamber of Mines reports. | Partial data |
| Cyanidation displaced chlorination during the 1890s, from 83% to 95% of gold extracted after amalgamation. (p. 83) | Chamber of Mines Annual Reports 1892-1899 compiled in Table 6.4. | Systematic data |
| Stoping transformation (lightweight rock drills, Taylorist reorganization, health measures) was driven by Corner House research that was diffused to other groups via COMSA and professional societies. (p. 158) | Technical journals, committee reports (RDIC, CMIC, TAC), Leger and Johnstone, Corner House histories. | Partial data |
| Rock drilling came to predominate stoping excavation after the 1922 Rand Revolt and efficiency rose, with working costs per ton falling 24% by 1923. (p. 129) | Mine Engineer annual reports (Fig 8.2), COMSA statistics (Fig 8.3), Yudelman. | Partial data |
| Mills' capacity and a profitability crisis under a fixed gold price, together with labour costs and shortages, drove reorganization of stoping work. (p. 116) | Contemporary quotations (Hatch and Chalmers, Browne), Johnstone, Richardson, COMSA price series. | Partial data |
| Mine managers tolerated re-imposition of the colour bar in 1926 because the efficiency gains from further relaxation did not justify the political costs. (p. 2) | Interpretive reading of the Hildick-Smith judgment, Mines and Works Act amendments, Yudelman and Johnstone. | Asserted |
| Introduced technologies lowered net welfare of European and African miners and benefited mining professionals; occupational disease declined over time. (p. 109) | Secondary literature (Katz, Packard, Leger) and statistics cited from them. | Illustrative or anecdotal |
The author's caveats¶
Notes that there are no readily available statistics on the composition of the workforce in the 1886-1902 period and that all mortality and health statistics are incomplete but indicative. Real gold prices are estimated for several years (1920-24, 1933). Efficiency by mining-finance group is available only for 1908-1914. Admits informal collaboration is hard to quantify and that the study is an initial investigation.
Gaps in the evidence¶
The collaboration claims rest mainly on published society papers and contemporary quotations, with no systematic measure of who contributed, how often knowledge flowed, or counterfactual cases without collaboration. Corner House/RDIC/CMIC internal records, TAC minutes and company archives, which exist, are listed but hardly used to document motives and decisions. Mine-level cost, output and wage data and Chamber of Mines minutes could test the efficiency and colour-bar claims and the profitability-crisis argument more rigorously.
Replicability: Data poorly documented.