Allison Drew - Discordant Comrades: Identities and Loyalties on the South African Left

Discordant Comrades

Identities and Loyalties on the South African Left

Allison Drew

First published 2000 by Ashgate Publishing

Reissued 2019 by Routledge
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Copyright 2000 by Allison Drew

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ISBN 13: 978-1-138-71654-4 (hbk)
ISBN 13: 978-1-315-19694-7 (ebk)

Many people have helped me over the years in the preparation of this long manuscript. Research for this book has been carried out at libraries and universities in South Africa, Britain, the United States and Russia, and I would like to thank the staff of the following institutions: in South Africa, the Historical Papers Library at the University of the Witwatersrand, the Manuscripts and Archives Department of the University of Cape Town Libraries, the Mayibuye Centre Historical Papers Archive at the University of the Western Cape, and the South African Reference Library in Cape Town; in Britain, the Borthwick Institute of Historical Research at the University of York, the British Library in London, the Brynmor Jones Library at the University of Hull, the Institute of Commonwealth Studies Library and the School of Oriental and African Studies Library at the University of London, the Kingston upon Hull Local Studies Library, the Modern Records Centre at the University of Warwick Library, the National Museum of Labour History in Manchester, the Public Records Office at Kew, and the Working Class Movement Library in Salford; and in the United States, the Hoover Institution Archives at Stanford University, the Houghton Library at Harvard University, the Prometheus Research Library in New York City, the Special Collections at the University Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles, and the Manuscripts and Archives office at Yale University Library.

My research in Moscow was possible thanks to grants from the British Academy and the Lipman-Miliband Trust. The latter, and the Barry Amiel and Norman Melburn Trust, also provided grants to help with the manuscripts production. I am very grateful to a number of Russian colleagues for their help. Professor Vladimir Shubin and the staff at the Institute for African Studies helped me to find my way around Moscow. Dr Kirill Anderson and the staff at the Russian Centre for the Conservation and Study of Modern History Records provided a congenial working environment and patiently assisted me with my queries. Professor A. B. Davidson of Moscow State University and Professor Valentin Gorodnov of the Institute of Universal History discussed various aspects of this research with me. Dennis Pennington assisted me as translator and interpreter during my sojourns in Moscow.

Ned Alpers has shown continuing encouragement over the years, and Charlie van Gelderen has engaged me in many stimulating conversations about South African socialist history. Neville Alexander, Alex Callinicos, Ron Kieve, Lungisile Ntsebeza and John Saville read the entire draft and gave me many insightful comments, Ralph Saviile prepared the index. Alec McAulay at Ashgate Publishing has been a very supportive editor. Most importantly, David Howell read endless drafts, engaged in endless discussions with me about the histories of the South African and British socialist movements and has helped me to appreciate the role of contingency in history - and in life. Any errors are, of course, my own responsibility.

South Africa's socialist movement has attracted little interest from scholars despite its prominence in the country's liberation struggle and in present-day politics. The dominant body of historical writing about the South African left has been by South African Communists or former Communists.