This is BooMan’s post in full.
I suppose some
Republican heads will explode when they learn that President Obama compared
Nelson Mandela to George Washington.
But there's one big
difference between them.
They both stood up to
an oppressive colonial regime.
They both won in that
struggle.
They both helped found
their countries.
They both served as
their country's first presidents.
They both stepped down
voluntarily in the interest of promoting democracy.
But Nelson Mandela
never owned any slaves.
Actually, in a very complex and interesting history, the
Boer’s and the Brits had already built an independent settler state in South
Africa by the time Mandela was a child.
The struggle of his lifetime was not to end a colonial regime but for participation of a demographically dominant indigenous non-white population in the politics and society of an already established post-colonial settler state.
In practical terms, he aimed at a political and racial revolution putting the indigenous blacks, overwhelming in numbers, in charge of the country in a context of "one man, one vote" democracy.
If we compare him to an American figure, the more common and less inapt comparison is with Martin Luther King.
The struggle of his lifetime was not to end a colonial regime but for participation of a demographically dominant indigenous non-white population in the politics and society of an already established post-colonial settler state.
In practical terms, he aimed at a political and racial revolution putting the indigenous blacks, overwhelming in numbers, in charge of the country in a context of "one man, one vote" democracy.
If we compare him to an American figure, the more common and less inapt comparison is with Martin Luther King.
Like nearly every European settler-state everywhere in the
world, including the one of which George Washington was the first President,
that south African state originally and for very long had excluded aboriginals from power, as it had also excluded from power non-native non-whites imported in significant numbers to provide labor.
In every single one of those settler-states in which the euro-whites were not or are not, by themselves, very nearly the entire population there emerged in the 19th and 20th Centuries struggles for social and political power by non-whites.
Mandela, originally a Communist and a figure in that struggle of the Africans of his homeland against white rule, was early sent to prison and spent most of his life there, a silent and motionless focal point of the indigenous revolution.
From first to last he stood against indigenist exclusivism and for continuance of a multi-racial South Africa, rejecting hatred of whites and any program to persecute, punish, or drive them out - or even to deny them participation in the social, political, and economic life of the country on, as individuals, a basis of equality.
In every single one of those settler-states in which the euro-whites were not or are not, by themselves, very nearly the entire population there emerged in the 19th and 20th Centuries struggles for social and political power by non-whites.
Mandela, originally a Communist and a figure in that struggle of the Africans of his homeland against white rule, was early sent to prison and spent most of his life there, a silent and motionless focal point of the indigenous revolution.
From first to last he stood against indigenist exclusivism and for continuance of a multi-racial South Africa, rejecting hatred of whites and any program to persecute, punish, or drive them out - or even to deny them participation in the social, political, and economic life of the country on, as individuals, a basis of equality.
That was his role in the struggle, to the end, a struggle fought by others and won when the remarkably stubborn eurowhite leadership gave in to persistent and heavy international pressure to allow so fundamental a change, conceding effective rule of the country to the overwhelming, aboriginal black majority.
It is too early to tell whether that change was a step toward disaster; it was pretty much unavoidable, by the time it came about.
It is too early to tell whether that change was a step toward disaster; it was pretty much unavoidable, by the time it came about.
It was a struggle quite different from that of Washington and his
cohorts, and only somewhat less dissimilar to one that did not begin in earnest in United States until the Civil War and Reconstruction Era, subsiding for decades and then renewed with much success in the Civil Rights Era of the mid-20th Century.
The struggle in which Mandela played so important a role is more comparable to that second, 20th Century phase of the battle for political and social equality, at the individual level, in America of America's black minority that had, mostly among whites, begun over a century before.
The struggle in which Mandela played so important a role is more comparable to that second, 20th Century phase of the battle for political and social equality, at the individual level, in America of America's black minority that had, mostly among whites, begun over a century before.
It is true Nelson Mandela never owned slaves, as BooMan writes.
He lived in the 20th Century, after slavery had
been abolished in lands controlled by Europeans for quite a long time.
Washington lived in the 18th Century.
Washington lived in the 18th Century.
Slavery, which of course he did not personally establish there, would not be ended in the settler-state he helped to
found in 1776 until 1865, by the Europeans who still dominated the land at the time, many of whom had by then come to believe that slavery was wrong, contrary to nature, and contrary to God's will.
It continued after that in parts of the Americas and even considerably longer where whites did not dominate.
It continued after that in parts of the Americas and even considerably longer where whites did not dominate.
No comments:
Post a Comment