Paper short abstract:

To re-insert into the debate on land reform the concept of racial capitalism, namely, how the interlocking of class exploitation and legacies of racial discrimination continue to stymie progressive land reform, especially if we critically review the outcomes of land restitution in South Africa.

Paper long abstract:

The concept of racial capitalism was arguably first coined by South African neo-Marxist scholars such as Martin Legassick, Dave Hemson, Neville Alexander, etc. In the USA, there has been a revival of the ideas of Cedric J. Robinson's conceptualisation of the relationship between class exploitation and racial oppression with a focus on racial capitalism. An assessment of land reform processes in South Africa in the 21st century, that is, in the post-apartheid post-colonial era, suggests that legacies of class exploitation and racial discrimination continue to influence power relations on the countryside and have significant consequences for land reform. In this paper, I will conduct an overview of the literature that assesses land restitution processes in South Africa using and testing the lens of 'racial capitalism'. Agrarian scholars such as Mnqobi Ngubane have argued that ideas that are racially based such as 'blacks can't farm' and other stereotypes seek to undermine rural actors because of their racial and class identities. This suggests that re-theorisation of land reform and restitution processes might benefit from analyses that locate themselves in the current revival of and debates around the concept of racial capitalism; especially the continuities and discontinuities of oppression and exploitation related to South Africa's apartheid past and, more broadly, the Global South's colonial past. The paper grapples with the relationship of class struggle to national liberation and suggests that the race/class conundrum is key in understanding the possibilities and limitations of nationalist and socialist aspirations in land reform in the Global South.