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Perception and Place in the interpretation of communism
Perception and Place in the Interpretation of Communism: A Comparative Analysis of South Africa and Algeria, 1920-1962.
I am engaged in a long-term comparative study of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA) and the Communist Party in Algeria. This study seeks to compare the development of the CPSA and the Communist Party in Algeria and to explore the relationship of these two parties with their national liberation movements and with the communist parties in their metropolitan counterparts, Britain and France. Its aims are three-fold. Firstly, it seeks to explain how a general model of change propagated by the Comintern was interpreted in different ways with diverse consequences in these two settler societies. Secondly, it aims to explain both the distinctive experiences of the CPSA and the Communist Party in Algeria and the divergent paths of their national liberation struggles against a similar backdrop of political economies that were rigidly divided along national and ethnic lines. Finally, it seeks to illuminate how the perceptions and experiences of being either colonizer or colonized coloured the understanding and practice of socialism — an ideology purporting to be international in scope and applicability.
The Communist International sought to build communist movements and to support movements for national liberation through the imposition of a general model. However, this model was refracted through a variety of social conditions and perceptions, inevitably producing different reactions and outcomes. South Africa and Algeria offer important bases for a comparison of communist parties and of communist interactions with national liberation movements. Both countries were settler societies characterized by rigid ethnic and national divisions between European colonizers and indigenous majorities but they also differed in such crucial respects as the pattern of proletarianization and the nature of the political regime.
The first stage of this project looks at the 1920s, with particular reference to the policies of bolshevization and indigenization. Through a comparative analysis of common and variable factors, I am examining how local communists in these settler societies reacted to and implemented these policies. A goal of bolshevization was the creation of mass communist parties. In settler societies this necessarily meant the indigenization of the local communist party: ie, that the communist party should aim to be demographically representative of the local population.
In both countries there was great variation in the way that individual communists reacted to this agenda, with some communists being supportive of bolshevization and indigenization and others being resistant. While the Communist Party of South Africa was successful in its goal of indigenization, becoming an overwhelmingly black organization by the end of the 1920s, the Communist Party in Algeria remained predominantly European in composition in the 1920s and 1930s. A standard explanation for the failure of indigenization in the Algerian case refers to the paternalistic and racist attitudes of the numerically dominant European members. Yet, by comparison with the CPSA, it is difficult to sustain this argument. A comparative analysis shows that the difficulties faced by the Communist Party in Algeria in indigenizing were more complex. A meaningful explanation must include consideration of the patterns of proletarianization, political traditions and political conditions in these two countries during the period of bolshevization. By pattern of proletarianization I refer to the manner and form in which the working class of a particular country was created. For example, South Africa's working class was characterized by a migrant proletariat in which African workers were kept in a continual state of movement between towns and rural areas. By contrast, in Algeria male workers frequently went to and remained in France, remitting part of their earnings back to their families in Algeria. Hence, the Algerian working class was characterized by a displaced proletariat.
By all indications, including the number of cadre imprisoned and duration of prison sentences, the onslaught of repression against communists in Algeria seems to have been greater than in South Africa and impeded the chances of a very small party to grow. Certainly, the different degrees of repression experienced by communist activists in Algeria and South Africa in the middle and late 1920s helps to explain the discrepancies in the two parties' ability to indigenize. However, the starkly contrasting patterns of proletarianization and urbanization in these two cases posed constraints both on the immediate prospects for organizational development in the respective working classes and, in turn, on the perceptions and attitudes of local communists.
I am interested in hearing from other scholars who are examining socialist and communist movements in formerly-colonized areas and can be contacted at: AlliZDrew@aol.com.
