South Africa

5. Hudson and Sharp, Australian Independence (29 January 2024)

by kurto

Australia’s independence ought to be dated to 11 December 1931, when the Statute of Westminster took effect, finally devolving legislative power to the country as well as the sister dominions of Canada, the Irish Free State, New Zealand, and South Africa. Diplomatic sovereignty had been granted in 1923, followed by the 1926 and 1930 release of executive powers (i.e., disallowance, reservation, annulment of the Colonial Laws Validity Act) and the assignment of governors-general as responsible to national ministries. Notwithstanding continuing anomalies, the substance of facts make 1930 sufficient.

1901’s federation established the potential for independence but not its lawful basis. Though newly united, Australia hadn’t fully separated from the United Kingdom; the states remained bound to the crown; and the governor general remained responsible to the king, in the tradition of English government as the sovereign’s government.

The transition was driven by Canada, Ireland, and South Africa, running contrary to the Australian political will and transpiring with little public appreciation. Four elements fueled interest in imperial continuity: defense, race (culture), economy (loans from London), and status (British hegemony). Neither the Canadians nor the South Africans depended on British security; both the Canadians and the Irish (given the same status in the 1921 agreement) objected to their inability to amend their own constitutions; the Irish rejected personal union under the king. Whereas through the 1920s, Aussie leaders tended to be born in the UK. Only the New Zealanders sided with Australia on defense; but the British had been withdrawing from the ‘far East’ since before World War I, save for the 1923 construction of Singapore’s naval base. There was no practical means of international cooperation within the Commonwealth because there was no prior imperial body, only Whitehall.

At the 1923 imperial conference the UK determined to allow the dominions to make international treaties: paradoxically, external affairs preceded domestic matters. Executive independence emerged from the 1926 conference, as a political bargain between the ‘radical’ dominions which aimed to appease domestic nationalists and the UK’s wish for equivocation on the crown’s role and the continuing projection of imperial unity. The Balfour formulation established that: ‘[The Dominions] are autonomous Communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown, and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations’. (p. 93) The radicals then focused on autonomy, the Australians on common allegiance. (Newfoundland was also a dominion but too small to wield influence.)

By 1929/30, disallowance and reservation of dominion legislation as well as Colonial Laws Validity Act were to be jettisoned; but the Canadians and the Irish technically had to ask the UK to revise their constitutions, so the Westminster statute was promulgated. The Australians insisted on proactively adopting the statute, and delayed doing so: opposition party leader John Latham provoked the states to protest to UK on the spurious grounds of Canberra’s intrusion into their matters. Then James Scullin’s Labor government fell, and though Robert Menzies proposed adopting Westminster in 1935 and 1936, it wasn’t established until 1942 under John Curtin, largely to facilitate the trans-shipment of war material, there being no public pressure nor motivation for politicians. The states didn’t sever from the UK until the 1986 Australia Act.

10. Krige, Right Place at the Wrong Time (27 June 2007)

by kurto

A capable but standard ghostwritten autobiography of Springbok hero Corne Krige. The account is most interesting for its narrative of South Africa’s infamous Kamp Staaldraad assembly prior to the 2003 World Cup. Krige, an Alan Solomons man, also acknowledges there were too many Japies at Northampton in 2004, which year sent the Saints spiraling toward relegation. Too little about SA schools rugby, but some interesting passages about prep school culture.

8. Carlin, Invictus (9 Dec 2009)

by kurto

Narrates Nelson Mandela’s 10-year odyssey from political prisoner to elected, popularly acclaimed leader of post-apartheid South Africa, an ambition spectacularly achieved by coopting the emblematic Springboks. South African rugby circa 1994 was more immovable object than irresistible force, so Mandela ingeniously converted the sport into a fulcrum for incorporating white society into the emerging sociopolitical order; the alternative was civil war. The monograph elaborates parts of Mandela’s

    Long Walk to Freedom

more than it retells the 1995 World Cup, while the movie focuses more on the world championship. It’s disappointing but not critical that the book (and movie) skips past controversial allegations of food poisoning and the birth pangs of professionalism, remarkably a contemporary phenomenon. The plot would have been strengthened by telling of Chester Williams’ belated inclusion. Also, while all stories must begin and end somewhere, the 1996 series loss to New Zealand and Afrikaner recidivism meant the road to the rainbow nation was not only one direction.

3. Millard, Hero of the Empire (19 Jan 2018)

by kurto

Narrates Winston Churchill’s Boer War capture and escape, which launched the immodestly ambitious young man into his Parliamentary career. Following an election loss, Churchill secured a journalism commission but acted as a (very brave) combatant during a Natal reconnaissance mission. Held in Pretoria, his escape from the Transvaal countryside turned on the good fortune of seeking help from an English-born mining manager and smuggled transport in the rail car of a compatriot wool exporter. Although generalizations weigh down the outset, the main tale is well told and the book holds some insight into Churchill’s personality. However, the attempt to connect every thread is too ambitious – and Jan Smuts is left out!

22. Sampson, Mandela (5 Dec 2020)

by kurto

An authorized biography, bolstered by the author’s contemporaneous journalism, seeking to assess the political temperament and performance of Nelson Mandela. Prepossessing the demeanor of a tribal chieftain and educated by Wesleyans, Mandela’s prison years instilled discipline and broadened vision, the crucial step toward peaceful revolution and African statesmanship par excellence. Taking to Johannesburg in the 1950s, where he practiced law and politics making expert (if ‘vicious’) use of the Socratic method, Mandela discovered a cultural energy comparable to the Harlem renaissance of the 1920s. He was impulsive and of two minds, torn between multiracial communism and black nationalism. Mandela opposed the socialistic element of 1956’s Freedom Charter, but contemporaries thought that if he wasn’t a member of the South African Communist Party, it was ‘merely tactical’. Less enamored of nonviolence than Oliver Tambo or Walter Sisulu, he abandoned the approach after the Sharpeville riots failed to catalyze political change. Following his capture and trial, Robben Island isolated Mandela from daily tactics: the African National Congress inmates turned to collegial development of strategy while learning to master animosity toward the Afrikaners. Meanwhile, the author tends to jump ahead consistent with contemporary left-liberal views, blaming the CIA and Thatcher for opposing sanctions, being slow to reconcile to the ‘inevitable’ ascendancy of Mandela and the ANC (soon coming to power in 1987?!), and failing to anticipate the end of the Cold War (in 1978!). Sampson notably overlooks that the Cold War’s end made it safer for the Nationalist government to retrench. But the dynamics of Mandela’s negotiations with Botha and deKlerk read more reliably, particularly in the portrayal of his views on renouncing violence, as do his thoughts on opposing general amnesty in exchange for commencing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Mandela misapprehended the cost of the ANC’s historic alliance with the USSR, and was slow to grasp the prospect of nationalization as deterring Western investors. In office, modeling is mixed (i.e., antagonistic) cabinet on Clemenceau’s, he displayed a quiet dignity, his forgiveness establishing moral supremacy, in contrast (the author says) to aggressive black American politicians. A persistent themes is the tension between the demands on a politician (i.e., winning power, projecting ideology) and the vision of a statesman (long-term good of the community). The last word: ‘You don’t lead by position but by the strength of your ideas’ (p. 529).

21. Reason, Unbeaten Lions (17 Nov 2020)

by kurto

The 1974 British Isles tour of South Africa, insistent on forward play and tactical kicking, shortchanged its potential by ignoring the UK’s world-class backs, thereby settling for inferiority to the 1971 Lions, Wales of 1970-71, and even the English South African tourists of 1972. Syd Millar, given the opening soliloquy, compares unfavorably with Carwyn James; his captaincy choice of lock Willie John McBride over center Mike Gibson showed not only the coach’s determination but also Ballymena conceit. Apartheid boycotts since 1970 contributed to the Springboks’ falling from first-class status, confirmed by the tour’s second test, a 28-9 match in Pretoria. Thus the undefeated tour flattered to deceive. Gareth Edwards was the tour’s key player; the ‘99’ call effectively sidelined African pugilism. There was little art in the Lions’ test selections; but the Springboks’ choices completely lacked strategy, revealing the bygone deficiencies of the selectorial system. (Reason also suggests the custom of visiting teams’ choosing referees from the host national nation have become an anachronism.) Springbok scrummaging was very poor; lineout lifting a novelty. Lock JG Williams should have been used to upset the British Isles’ dominant possession, as did New Zealand’s Peter Whiting in 1971. Danie Craven is described as the most influential man in world rugby, without elaboration. In 1971 John Dawes observed running was necessary to stop soccer’s inroads in rugby-playing nations, whereas the 1974 Lions never asked how good they could be. Transvaal is described as the one of the world’s richest sporting organizations, despite very poor grandstands. Reason unpersuasively sketches how black and coloured players might be integrated into the domestic game.