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In this Labour Studies Podcast, Luke Sinwell, 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 of Johannesburg & Siphiwe Mbatha, Thembilihle Crisis Committee, discuss the working-class rebellion and power that shook the mines and withstood the Marikana massacre, with reference to their classic book, “The Spirit of Marikana: The Rise of Insurgent Unionism in South Africa.”
The podcast is provided by the Neil Aggett Labour Studies Unit (NALSU), Rhodes 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网, South Africa. Please follow the link for the podcast: https://anchor.fm/nalsu (You can also download the Anchor FM app for your phone at the Google Play Store).
TALK:
On August 16, 2012, thirty-four black South African and immigrant mineworkers were shot by police working under the auspices of the African National Congress (ANC)-led government in what has become known as the Marikana massacre. An attempt to stop the rise of independent working-class power, the massacre was a major turning point in the history of South Africa and its politics.
"The Spirit of Marikana" is the story of the struggle that shook the mines and the nation. It tells the story of the worker activists and leaders at the world's three largest platinum mining companies, who survived ongoing state-sponsored campaigns of violence, intimidation, torture, and murder to push forward a worker's rights agenda and begin the hard work of transforming their workplaces and their nation. A close-up ethnographic account, the book brings the seemingly ordinary people behind the movement to life through vivid interviews and oral histories, and examines what changed and what didn’t. From initial meetings to workers' committees to the mass strikes of 2012 and 2014, this is their story.
SPEAKERS:
Luke Sinwell, a Senior Researcher at the 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 of Johannesburg, spends a significant amount of time writing about grassroots militants, but believes that he is at his best while standing by their side in a common struggle for social and economic justice. He is co-author of "Marikana: A View from the Mountain and a Case to Answer," co-editor of "Contesting Transformation: Popular Resistance in Twenty-First-Century South Africa" and the author of numerous articles on participatory democracy and contentious politics in South Africa.
Siphiwe Mbatha is a coordinator of the Thembelihle Crisis Committee (TCC), a socialist civic organisation in South Africa which fights for basic services for all. He first visited Marikana the day after the massacre to provide solidarity to the striking mineworkers. He is also a part-time researcher at the 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 of Johannesburg and Wits 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 and co-author of "The Spirit of Marikana: The Rise of Insurgent Trade Unionism in South Africa" (Wits 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 Press/ Pluto Press, 2016).
This talk was originally given on 23rd August 2017. The Labour Studies Podcasts are from our popular Labour Studies Seminar Series, launched in 2015.
We cover "labour studies" in the broadest sense: labour and left history, policy and political economy, unions and popular struggles. NALSU, based in the Eastern Cape, South Africa, is engaged in policy, research and workers' education. Built around a vibrant team from disciplines including Economics, History and Sociology, it has active partnerships and relations with a range of advocacy, labour and research organisations. It draws strength from its location in a province where the legacy of apartheid and the cheap labour system, and the contradictions of the post-apartheid state, are keenly felt. We are named in honour of Dr Neil Hudson Aggett, a union organiser and medical doctor who died in 1982 in an apartheid jail after enduring brutality and torture. /nalsu/