The Growth of African Opposition and Intensified State Political Repression in Rhodesia, 1960–1970s

Abstract

This chapter documents the growth of African nationalist opposition to Rhodesian colonial rule and the intensification of state repression in the 1960s and 1970s. First, the chapter suggests that unlike the dominant nationalist narrative that stresses the critical mobilizing role of African nationalist leaders, in which ordinary people blindly followed the leadership of elite nationalists, I argue for a more nuanced understanding of the complex and often contested encounter and dialogue between ordinary rural and urban Africans on the one hand, and radical African political activists on the other. I stress that based on their personal experiences, many ordinary men and women in both rural and urban Rhodesia formulated critiques of colonialism that propelled them to act in concert with those elite nationalists who formed and led political organizations. In this process of political cross-fertilization and dialogue, neither were urban workers or rural peasants simply led from above or outside. Second, in the face of increased African political agitation and urban civic disobedience, the government intensified its long-term policy of arresting and silencing dissenting voices. This was not an entirely new policy, but the product of two mutually reinforcing conditions that necessitated the massive wave of political detentions in the 1960s.