1st Edition
Endgame in South Africa? The Changing Structures and Ideology of Apartheid
The white monopoly of political power; the attempt to make race coincide with space; the regulation of the labour supply; the maintenance of social control. Originally published in 1986 and now reissued with a new preface by Robin Cohen, this book acknowledges that the above are the four pillars of apartheid and asks if white political power were dislodged whether the other three pillarswould crumble. This is a concise book which evaluated social and political change in South Africa at a key moment in the nation’s history and which assesses the limits and possibilities of ideological adaptation
1. Apartheid as Ideology 2. Ordering Space 3. Regulating Labour 4. Maintaining Social Control. Conclusion: Apartheid is Dying But Will It Lie Down?.
Biography
Robin Cohen is Emeritus Professor of Development Studies at the University of Oxford. For the first decade of his academic career, he worked on comparative labour issues. His books included Labour and Politics in Nigeria (1974) and the co-edited collections The development of an African working class (1975), International Labour and the Third World (1987), African Labor History (1978) and the current title, Peasants and Proletarians. He subsequently wrote on the themes of migration, globalization and diasporas. His best-known work is Global diasporas: An introduction (3rd edition, 2022).
Original Reviews of Endgame in South Africa?
‘Cohen draws fruitfully on the work by human geographers on the relationship between spatial patterns and social relations. His sophisticated analysis of the role of ideology is offered with wit and insight.’ Jack Spence Times Literary Supplement, 15 August 1986.
‘In Endgame in South Africa, Robin Cohen has produced a short, intelligent book … Cohen has a great talent for sifting particularly telling nuggets – facts, obscure events, quotations – from the mass of data he commands.’ – Kenneth Vickery International Journal of African Historical Studies, 21 (2) 1988.
‘As might be expected from one of the leading figures in the field, Cohen’s short book is ably written, refreshingly free of conceptual clutter, authoritative in its deployment of comparative insights and lucid in exposition.’ – Richard Moorsam Third World Quarterly, 9 (2) April 1987
