Title Privileged precariat : white workers and South Africa's long transition to majority rule / Danelle van Zyl-Hermann

Published Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York, NY : Cambridge University Press, 2021 ©2021

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Description 1 online resource (xvi, 338 pages) : illustrations Series International African library ; 63 International African library ; 63. Contents Introduction: The return of the white working class -- White workers and the racial state -- Privileged race, precarious class: White labour from the mineral revolution to the 'Golden Age' -- From sweetheart to 'Frankenstein': The NP's changing stance towards white labour amid the crisis of the 1970s -- Rights and race at the rock-face of change: White organised labour and the Wiehahn reforms -- White workers and civil society mobilisation -- From trade union to social movement: The MWU/Solidarity's formation of a post-apartheid social alliance -- An 'alternative government': The Solidarity Movement's contemporary strategies -- Discursive labour and strategic contradiction: Managing the working-class roots of a declassed organisation -- 'Guys like us are left to our own mercy': Counternarratives, ambivalence and the pressures of racial gatekeeping among Solidarity's blue-collar members -- Conclusion Summary "Existing scholarship on South Africa's transition is theoretically and empirically weak when assessing the role of class in white society. This book offers the first study of how white workers experienced and negotiated the dismantling of the racial state and the establishment of black majority rule, and places this story in the global context of the ascendance of neoliberalism and identity politics. Starting from the escalating economic and political crises of the 1970s, it shows how late apartheid reforms constituted the withdrawal of state support for working-class whiteness. This sent white workers in search of new ways to safeguard their interests in a rapidly changing world. Focusing on the blue-collar Mineworkers' Union, the book shows how this organisation shed its working-class identity to reposition itself as a culture-based civil society organisation. By the new millennium, it had become the Solidarity Movement, a service-providing social movement appealing to cultural nationalism and expressing state-like ambitions. Locally and internationally, it presented itself as the voice of South African minorities and white Afrikaans-speakers in particular. This book integrates South Africa's recent past with current global debates to unlock new perspectives race and class under late capitalism, and on the growing appeal of identity-based politics"-- Provided by publisher Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index Notes Online resource; title from digital title page (viewed on April 27, 2021) Subject Working class white people -- South Africa -- Social conditions Working class white people -- South Africa -- Economic conditions Working class white people -- Political activity -- South Africa Working class white people -- Economic conditions Working class white people -- Social conditions SUBJECT South Africa -- History -- 1994- http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh2005007161 Subject South Africa Genre/Form History Form Electronic book LC no. 2020046744 ISBN 9781108924702 1108924700 1108934889 9781108934886

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