Namibia old and new

Abstract

An expanded, updated (to 1976/7) but only lightly revised version of the author's doctoral thesis in Afrikaans. After introductory, largely historical chapters, the book presents, together with background data, an extended discussion of the attitudes of South African politicians and administrators and of Ovambo traders, clergy, bantustan officials and white-collar employees on a range of political and economic issues. Combining the tabulated results of a questionnaire survey with a wide range of documentary evidence and the author's own assessments, it provides an at times exceptionally detailed account of the failure of South Africa's attempt between 1967 and 1976 to make Ovamboland its showpiece Namibian bantustan. Its analysis is, however, weakened by a rather naive political sociology derived from modernization theory, counterpoising "traditional" and "modern" elites. The statistical significance of the survey method is also highly questionable. The study is nonetheless valuable not only forits empirical detail but also for being the work of an insider: at the time of his research in 1971-2 the author had privileged access to Ovamboland and the bantustan administration, and despite his subsequent estrangement from the National Party hierarchy, a reformist concern with the ineffectiveness of repressive policies informs his analysis. The extensive bibliography includes a list of government publications and unpublished dissertations (Eriksen/Moorsom 1989)