Zhang Kai: Policy Adjustments and Practical Explorations of the South African Communist Party amid a Century of Political Changes
Founded in 1921, the South African Communist Party (SACP) has a history spanning over a century. As the oldest and largest socialist party on the African continent, the SACP has traversed a hundred-year historical journey marked by severe repression from the apartheid regime, South Africa's democratic transition, and the drastic changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Despite these political shocks, it remains vibrant and continues to exert a significant influence on the process of South African political development. Unlike communist parties in other capitalist countries, the SACP exerts influence on government decision-making and the labor movement through its alliance with South Africa's ruling party—the African National Congress (ANC)—and the country's largest trade union federation, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU). It actively explores paths to promote South Africa’s transition from a national-democratic society to a socialist society. The fundamental reason the SACP has endured for a century without declining lies in its consistent adherence to using Marxism to analyze the specific conditions [1] of South Africa, making timely strategic and tactical adjustments according to the evolution of those conditions to adapt itself to South Africa’s concrete national realities.
I. Racist Politics and the Policy Evolution of the SACP
The implementation of apartheid by the white regime and the anti-apartheid movement launched by the Black majority constituted the primary thread of South African political development during the apartheid era. The SACP's pursuit of socialist goals is inseparable from this thread. Based on the political reality of racism, the Party proposed the political theories of "Colonialism of a Special Type" and the "Two-Stage Revolution," and established a solid political alliance with the ANC at the practical level. From the early 1920s until the de Klerk government announced the lifting of the ban on political parties in 1990, the SACP continuously adjusted its policy positions and struggle strategies according to the development of racist politics. It not only weathered the continuous suppression of the apartheid regime but also developed into a vital force in South African politics. Specifically, the development of the SACP during this period can be roughly divided into the following stages.
(1) 1921–1950: The Founding and Development of the Communist Party of South Africa
The predecessor of the South African Communist Party was the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA), founded in 1921, though its origins can be traced back to the eve of the First World War. Dissension arose within the South African Labour Party (SALP) over whether to support South Africa's participation in WWI. Revolutionary progressives represented by Bill Andrews and S.P. Bunting opposed participation. After breaking away from the SALP, they joined former members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and the Socialist Labour Party in 1915 to found the International Socialist League (ISL). Influenced by the Russian October Revolution and the Comintern, the ISL merged with several socialist parties and political organizations—including the Cape Town Social Democratic Federation, the Communist Party of Cape Town, the Jewish Socialist Society of Cape Town, the Jewish Socialist Society of Johannesburg, and the Marxian Club of Durban—on July 30, 1921, to form the CPSA.
In its founding manifesto, the CPSA declared its affiliation with the Comintern and called upon all South African workers—organized or unorganized, white or Black—to unite and overthrow the capitalist system, expropriate the bourgeoisie, and establish a great international union of workers. At its inception, the CPSA was deeply influenced by the Soviet Union and the Comintern. On one hand, it received support from the Soviet Union and the Comintern in terms of funding and personnel training. For instance, in 1929, the CPSA received £12,000 in financial support from the Soviet Union, which was a considerable sum for a small African party. On the other hand, it primarily followed Comintern instructions regarding ideology and political theory. In 1928, the Sixth Congress of the Comintern in Moscow passed the "Resolution on the South African Question," which stated that the Communist Party's task was to influence the nascent liberation movement among the native Black population, helping it develop and integrate into a national agrarian revolution against the white bourgeoisie and British imperialists. Regarding the labor movement, the resolution required the CPSA to organize the masses of workers into trade unions and promote the development of union organizations that included both white and Black workers. This resolution played an important role in helping the CPSA strengthen its relations with trade unions and national liberation organizations, thereby expanding its influence within these two major forces.
From its founding in 1921 to its dissolution in 1950, the CPSA achieved a series of positive practical developments, which can be summarized in three areas. First, it promoted the development of the South African labor movement. In fact, before the CPSA was founded, members of the ISL had organized the Industrial Workers of Africa, the first African trade union in South African history. Its establishment further catalyzed the growth of African trade union organizations. As the vanguard of the working class, the CPSA joined forces with numerous unions to launch strikes, actively fighting for the rights of the broad worker masses. Second, it forged closer ties with national liberation organizations. Following the Comintern's "Resolution on the South African Question," the CPSA, while remaining an independent political organization, actively participated in indigenous nationalist organizations, helping them grow and expand their influence. This resolution laid the political foundation for the CPSA to tighten its links with the national liberation movement. The CPSA not only strengthened ties with the ANC but also increased support for political forces such as the All-African Convention, the Indian Congress, and the Coloured People's Congress [2], playing a pivotal role in promoting a united front for the South African national liberation movement. Third, it disseminated communist political theory and ideology. The CPSA established periodicals such as The Worker and The Guardian, widely propagating communist ideas and creating a significant impact among the masses of workers and peasants. The spread of communist ideology and the expansion of the Party's influence raised high alarms within the South African ruling authorities, which became a key reason for the introduction of the Suppression of Communism Act in 1950 and the subsequent self-dissolution of the CPSA.
(2) 1950–1960: Reconstitution and Underground Activities of the South African Communist Party
After the National Party, representing Afrikaner interests, took power in 1948, it introduced a series of racist laws and regulations and implemented a more stringent system of apartheid, shifting South Africa’s political development toward a more conservative trajectory. Given its extensive influence in the labor movement and national liberation organizations, the CPSA became the primary target of the National Party government. In the eyes of the National Party, the CPSA was the main instigator of the "protests" launched by Africans. To address the challenge and threat it posed, the National Party government enacted the Suppression of Communism Act in 1950, attempting to strip the Party of its legal rights. On the eve of the Act’s formal implementation in May 1950, the CPSA Central Committee held a meeting in Cape Town and decided to dissolve the party organization. Many members believed that the decision to dissolve was part of a broader strategy aimed at establishing a new underground organization to conduct activities in an illegal state.
Although the CPSA was dissolved, its pursuit of communism did not perish. Some communists remained active in the labor and national liberation movements, actively exerting influence on unions and liberation organizations. Some former members held secret meetings to discuss the reconstitution of the party. These communists formed a series of discussion groups, each consisting of fewer than four people; members did not know of other groups and had no public contact or communication. After three years of coordination and preparation, approximately 25 delegates met in early 1953 at an Indian-owned shop in the Eastern Transvaal countryside to announce the reconstitution of the Party. They established organizational principles and membership rules and changed the Party's name to the "South African Communist Party" (SACP). From its 1953 reconstitution until it declared its public existence in 1960, the SACP remained an underground organization.
Despite its underground status during the 1950s, the SACP actively applied Marxism to analyze South Africa's specific conditions and creatively proposed the theory of "Colonialism of a Special Type," [3] providing a theoretical foundation for further close cooperation with the ANC. Within the SACP, differences existed regarding how to handle the relationship between class struggle and the national liberation struggle. Particularly with the rise of African Nationalism and Afrikaner Nationalism as ideologies, the Party urgently needed to respond at a theoretical level: namely, what position should class struggle hold in a political situation dominated by nationalism? Regarding this issue, a minority view held that the national liberation movement was led by the bourgeoisie and that the ANC, as its leadership, would not protect the interests of the working class; therefore, the SACP needed to prioritize class struggle. The majority view argued that South Africa differed from typical colonies in its uniqueness: "two nations" existed on the same land—a "white imperialist state" in a semi-independent position and a "Black nation" suffering from white exploitation and oppression. Consequently, South Africa had formed a "Colonialism of a Special Type" in which white South Africans held a dominant position and enjoyed various privileges, while the Black majority was stripped of basic human rights. Based on the majority view, the SACP eventually enriched and developed the theory of "Colonialism of a Special Type" and formulated the "Two-Stage Revolution" theory: after achieving victory in the national-democratic revolution, the movement would enter the second stage—the establishment of a socialist society. The theory of "Colonialism of a Special Type" integrated class struggle with national liberation and was also accepted by the ANC as a guiding theory, thereby laying a solid foundation for the SACP and the ANC to continue deepening their cooperation.
(3) 1960–1990: Shifts in SACP Revolutionary Strategy
In March 1960, the South African ruling authorities ruthlessly suppressed a Black mass demonstration, resulting in the Sharpeville Massacre, which shocked the world. Subsequently, the authorities declared a state of emergency and banned the ANC and the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC) on April 8. Clearly, the strategy of ending apartheid through non-violent peaceful protest had reached an impasse. Faced with the political reality of the "illegalization" of national liberation organizations, the SACP made strengthening the ANC its primary goal and shifted its anti-apartheid strategy from peaceful protest to armed struggle. In 1962, the SACP pointed out in its program, The Road to South African Freedom, that South African national liberation organizations, including the Communist Party, had consistently adhered to peaceful methods throughout their long and difficult struggle. However, the South African ruling class responded to non-violence with violence. Faced with this harsh reality, the SACP believed the national liberation movement had no choice but to meet violence with violence.
In the 1960s, following the ban on the ANC, the SACP used its extensive experience in underground activities to actively help the ANC rebuild its organization. In 1961, it helped the ANC create its military wing—Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation). Umkhonto we Sizwe became a vital tool for the joint armed struggle of the SACP and the ANC. The South African authorities intensified their suppression of the Black national liberation movement; many leaders of the ANC and SACP were arrested and imprisoned, and after the Party's leadership organs were severely damaged, they moved overseas. After the mid-1960s, strategic cooperation between the SACP and the ANC was further strengthened. Ending apartheid by coordinating with nationalist forces became the guiding principle of the SACP's revolutionary strategy. Following the ANC’s Morogoro Conference in 1969, non-Africans were permitted to join the ANC [4]. Thereafter, many SACP members joined the ANC while adhering to SACP policy, and some ANC members were selectively recruited into the SACP. Overlapping membership became a significant symbol of the close ties between the SACP and the ANC.
During this period, the South African Communist Party (SACP) exerted a significant influence on the ANC’s organizational development, policy decision-making, and military struggle strategies. On one hand, by strengthening ties with the ruling parties of the Soviet Union and Eastern European socialist states, the SACP secured support—including funding, cadre training, and military instruction—from these countries for national liberation organizations like the ANC. On the other hand, numerous SACP cadres occupied high-ranking positions within the ANC and Umkhonto we Sizwe [5], thereby influencing the ANC’s strategic decisions and armed struggle tactics. For instance, in 1985, of the 35 members elected to the ANC’s National Executive Committee, 21 were communists. Regarding this, some scholars have pointed out that in the mid-1980s, communists played a central role in the ANC's strategy formulation process, particularly in its military strategy. Simultaneously, after the 1980s, the SACP continuously strengthened its ties with trade union organizations, actively establishing Party organizations among workers and intensifying ideological propaganda and political education through publications such as The Umsebenzi [6] to raise the class consciousness of the workers. In 1985, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) was established, becoming the largest trade union organization in South Africa. In 1988, the SACP, the ANC, and COSATU formed a formal Tripartite Alliance in Harare, Zimbabwe, with the goal of overthrowing the apartheid system. In 1989, the SACP held its Seventh National Congress in Cuba. This meeting defined the Party’s new objective as the seizure of power and established a new strategic concept combining mass political movements with military struggle, specifically proposing a struggle strategy of resolving issues through negotiation. The convening of the Seventh Congress pointed the way forward for the SACP to effectively respond to South Africa’s democratic transition in the early 1990s.
II. Democratic Transition and the Adaptive Development of the SACP
In February 1990, the de Klerk government announced the lifting of the ban on political parties. Political forces such as the ANC, the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC), and the SACP regained their legal status, and South Africa’s political development entered a new stage of democratic transition. Meanwhile, viewed from the broader international context, the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s led to the disintegration of the bipolar pattern; many communist parties changed their banners, and the world socialist movement fell into a deep crisis. This domestic and international political transition dealt a severe double blow to the SACP. On one hand, after entering the democratic transition phase of political consultation, the alliance between the SACP and the ANC faced trials. Some members believed the SACP was merely a "junior partner" in the Tripartite Alliance and had no necessity for existence under the new era's conditions. At the same time, some individuals holding dual membership in both the SACP and the ANC renounced their communist party membership. In 1990, nearly half of the SACP’s Central Committee members quietly resigned. Among the SACP’s exiled leaders and members, a view emerged that "after the halo of heroic struggle, the Party cannot survive for long," especially against the backdrop of the Soviet Union's collapse. On the other hand, the drastic changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe caused the SACP to lose external support from those states; in particular, the fact that the world socialist movement had hit a low ebb triggered a crisis of confidence in socialism among some party members. Under the context of these drastic changes, how to re-understand socialism and how to bolster confidence in socialism became prominent tasks facing the SACP. To adapt to the changing political landscape and seek survival and development under new historical conditions, the SACP undertook a series of new adjustments and explorations in ideology, policy positions, organizational building, and struggle strategies.
(i) Re-understanding Socialism
The drastic changes in Eastern Europe and the collapse of the Soviet Union triggered in-depth reflection and grand debates within the SACP regarding socialism and its future prospects. In January 1990, SACP leader Joe Slovo published the article "Has Socialism Failed?", providing a theoretical reflection on the shocks in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, the relationship between socialism and democracy, and the future prospects of socialism. In his view, the fall of the Berlin Wall presented socialism with its most serious crisis since the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution; however, the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe did not mean the failure of socialism, but only reflected the failure of the Soviet model of socialism. Stalinism, characterized by a bureaucratic-authoritarian leadership model, harmed the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and distorted the practice of socialism. Although the socialist movement suffered setbacks, the SACP believed that Marxist theory remained valid in all respects, providing indispensable theoretical guidance for achieving a society free of all exploitation. The weaknesses of socialism in practice resulted from the distortion and improper application of socialism. He argued that the regimes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe were "socialism without democracy"; based on the lessons of these countries' failures, the SACP needed to grant "socialist democracy" a proper place in its future development. State power in the post-apartheid era must explicitly belong to elected representatives rather than directly or indirectly to the administrative dictates of a single party. The relationship between the party and state organs must not, in any way, compromise the autonomy of elected institutions.
Slovo’s article sparked immense controversy within the SACP. In early December 1991, the SACP held its Eighth National Congress in Johannesburg, the first congress held within South African borders after the Party was legalized. In the political report submitted to the congress, Slovo advocated for using the term "democratic socialism" to replace "socialism," but the congress did not adopt this. The new Party Constitution adopted by the congress clearly stated that the SACP is the leading political force and vanguard of the South African working class in the struggle for national liberation, socialism, and peace. The SACP’s ultimate goal is to establish a communist society under the guidance of Marxism-Leninism. While upholding the guidance of Marxism-Leninism, the Party—in light of the political reality of South Africa’s democratic transition—recognized political pluralism, supported the implementation of a multi-party system and competitive elections, advocated for a Bill of Rights and the formation of independent mass democratic institutions, and supported representative and participatory democracy as well as the empowerment of the people. The SACP both adhered to traditional Marxism-Leninism and, based on summarizing the lessons of the shocks in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, advocated for political pluralism; this seemingly contradictory stance was, in fact, an adaptation to South African political reality. As an SACP Central Committee discussion document pointed out: if we are to build socialism in South Africa, it must be rooted in our reality, in the rich experience and traditions of our own revolutionary struggle. Rediscovering the democratic values of socialism and emphasizing the democratic participation of the masses, especially the broad ranks of workers, was both the result of the SACP’s reflection on the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe and an expression of its pragmatic adaptation to South African political reality.
(ii) Building a "Mass-based Vanguard Party"
Before 1990, the SACP was in an illegal state. The Party's mode of activity under such conditions placed high demands on the quality of its members and did not involve broad recruitment among the masses. After the ban was lifted in 1990, the SACP regained its legal status and began to conduct political activities actively and openly. The number of party members climbed rapidly; between January and November 1992 alone, membership grew from 5,000 to 21,000. Facing the rapid expansion of political space, a debate emerged within the SACP regarding whether to build a "vanguard party" or a "mass party." In response, the SACP believed that to adapt to the development of the new situation, it was necessary to build itself into a "mass-based vanguard party," ensuring the Party had grassroots representation while maintaining its vanguard nature, and that this vanguard should always remain the "political vanguard of the working class."
The working class is the political foundation for the SACP's survival and development, and safeguarding the interests of the working class is its strategic pursuit. Since the 1980s, the economic crisis in South Africa increased the complexity of the working class, with a massive unemployed population becoming a significant component of the South African working class. In the early 1990s, there were approximately 7 million unemployed people in South Africa. While the SACP’s political ally, COSATU, possessed strategic importance, its members constituted only a minority of the South African working class. The vast majority of workers—accounting for 70% of South African laborers—occupied a marginalized status, including non-unionized unskilled workers, a majority of migrants, rural laborers, those employed in the informal economy, and the unemployed. Faced with this reality, how could the interests of the working class be protected to the greatest extent? The strategic choice made by the SACP was to develop Party organizations in major industrial centers and focus on recruiting members from among organized industrial workers. Regarding the marginalized majority of workers, the strategy was to support the ANC so that it would introduce policies favoring these workers, thereby maintaining the overall interests of the working class. In the Party's view, this was the optimal choice for maximizing output using limited resources. Through the above analysis, it is not difficult to find that with the start of South Africa’s democratic transition process, the SACP expanded its scope of recruitment and began transforming into a mass party; meanwhile, however, its focus remained on organized industrial workers, which was also an expression of the SACP’s status as a "vanguard party."
(iii) Building the Communist Party within the Broad National Liberation Movement
During the long-term anti-apartheid struggle, the SACP merged national issues with class issues, proposed the "Two-Stage Revolution" theory, and, guided by this, actively developed cooperation with national liberation organizations—especially the ANC—playing an important role in the South African national liberation movement. Because of this, the Party has always regarded itself as an integral part of the national liberation movement. After the start of the South African democratic transition in 1990, the ANC, as the leading force of the national liberation movement, and the then-ruling National Party (NP) of South Africa dominated the negotiation process. Facing the political reality that the ANC was about to take power after democratic consultations, how to handle relations with national liberation organizations like the ANC and how to build socialism in the post-apartheid era became major theoretical and practical issues that the SACP had to address. In response to these questions, the SACP chose to remain within the ANC-led national liberation movement and the broader mass democratic movement to strengthen Party building. In its view, this was a great advantage in its pursuit of the socialist revolutionary struggle.
Based on the political reality of belonging to the same mass democratic movement, the SACP emphasized the need to strive to avoid developing narrow, competitive, or duplicative functions. The SACP was not intended to do everything the ANC did, but rather to exert a left-wing influence on the ANC. In November 1990, SACP leader Jeremy Cronin stated in an interview that the SACP would certainly not become an opposition force, as this would weaken the ongoing national democratic transition and, in the long run, weaken the socialist cause as well. The task of the SACP was to build a progressive, working-class-led ANC and to ensure that the ANC did not oppose communism. Although the SACP regarded supporting and influencing the ANC as an important path toward achieving socialism in the future, it did not rule out the possibility of participating in elections independently. If the national liberation movement were hijacked by liberal causes, or if the unity of the mass democratic movement were destroyed and the goals of the national democratic revolution were lost, then the SACP would choose to campaign as an independent political force. But until such a situation arose, the SACP would, as always, support the ANC-led national liberation movement and strengthen its own development within that movement. Under this context, the SACP chose to continue strengthening cooperation with political forces such as the ANC and COSATU, and it fully supported the ANC in South Africa's first non-racial democratic election in 1994, rather than campaigning independently.
Overall, during the period from the unbanning of political parties in 1990 to South Africa's first non-racial democratic general election in 1994, the South African Communist Party (SACP) withstood the major tests posed by the upheavals in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe and South Africa's own democratic transition. Through a profound reflection on socialist ideology, the SACP clarified its character and positioning as a "mass-based vanguard party" and emphasized its continued pursuit of socialist values and goals by supporting the African National Congress (ANC) and the national liberation movement. The SACP's continuity of historical tradition and the tactical adjustments it made under new contemporary conditions are the fundamental reasons for its survival and its ability to play a significant role in the process of South Africa's political transformation. As some scholars have observed: after obtaining legal status in 1990, the SACP successively achieved two major leaps—transforming from an illegal party to a legal one, and from an opposition party to a major participant in government. Its strength and influence grew continuously as it maintained a struggle strategy based on cooperation with the ruling ANC. Large numbers of SACP members also held important leadership positions in the ANC or the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), becoming a force that cannot be underestimated in South African political life. They played a vital role in South Africa's deracialization, peaceful democratic reform, and in addressing the pauperization of the working class.
III. The SACP's Exploration of Socialism in the Post-Apartheid Era
In April 1994, South Africa held the first non-racial democratic general election in its history. The ANC won with 63% of the vote, becoming the ruling party and ushering in a new era of South African political development. Since 1994, South Africa has undergone five general elections; the ANC has won every one and maintained its ruling status, forming a party landscape in which one party is dominant and other parties are unable to pose a challenge. Theoretically, this party landscape created favorable conditions for the SACP to pursue socialist values by relying on the Tripartite Alliance [7] and mass democratic movements. Although the SACP adheres to the theory of "two-stage revolution," the national democratic revolution and the socialist revolution are not severed from one another, but are interconnected. After the democratic transition in 1994, although South Africa achieved victory in the first stage of the national democratic revolution, the traditional economic structure remained unchanged, and the vast majority of Black people remained economically marginalized. Against this backdrop, South Africa entered the second stage of the national democratic revolution—that is, the pursuit of economic liberation on the foundation of political liberation. In the view of the SACP, the process of national democratic revolution needs to be infused with socialist elements to drive the transition from national democratic revolution to socialist revolution. Judging by the practice of South African political development since 1994, the SACP has generally maintained its strategic alliance with the ANC and COSATU, believing this alliance remains an effective path for pursuing socialist values today. The core of this strategy is to participate in and influence the decision-making of the ANC government, ensuring that state policies are socialist-oriented and striving to protect the interests of the working class and impoverished groups. Specifically, the party's exploration of the socialist path has unfolded across three dimensions.
(1) Participation in Governance
Since 1994, the SACP has participated in the construction of state power by relying on its strategic alliance with the ruling ANC. The SACP does not contest elections directly; it provides full support to the ANC in every general election, and after the elections, members of the party take up positions in the cabinet, parliament, local government, and other public institutions under the name of the ANC. Participation in governance has thus become the party's most direct route to sharing state power and influencing the decisions of the ANC government. Looking at the historical process since 1994, the party's share of state power and its influence on ANC government decisions have been uneven. After the 1994 elections, the SACP's influence in state power structures was quite extensive. Of the 18 cabinet positions at the time, the party held five; it held approximately 51 seats in the National Assembly (about 13% of all seats), maintained a similar proportion in provincial legislatures, and saw SACP members serving as Premiers in two of South Africa's nine provinces. This broad presence in the government and parliament allowed the SACP to exert significant influence over the ANC government's policy planning.
During the presidency of Thabo Mbeki, the ANC government adopted many policies with a liberal [8] character, such as privatizing certain state-owned enterprises, relaxing regulation of financial markets, and weakening the government's role in market adjustment. These measures met with strong opposition from the SACP, and many party members were consequently excluded from the Mbeki government's decision-making, causing a temporary strain in the relationship between the SACP and the ANC. After Mbeki's resignation in 2007, the SACP's influence on the ANC government gradually strengthened. Particularly after the 2009 election, the party maintained a good relationship with the Jacob Zuma government. A large number of SACP members were placed in key interconnected departments such as economy, infrastructure, rural development, and skills training. They successfully pushed for the development of a series of economic infrastructures and related sectors, specifically driving the introduction of policy plans such as the "New Growth Path" and the "Industrial Policy Action Plan," and facilitating the establishment of the Presidential Infrastructure Coordinating Commission in 2011. Guided by the concept of the "developmental state," the ANC government continuously strengthened state functions and roles, and its overall direction of development aligned with the SACP's policy preferences.
In July 2017, the SACP held its 14th National Congress, electing a new central leadership body (2017–2022), with Blade Nzimande as General Secretary and Senzeni Zokwana as National Chairperson. After the 2019 election, a large number of SACP members entered the Cyril Ramaphosa government to hold leadership positions, especially in departments directly related to people's livelihoods and working-class interests—such as education, employment, mineral resources, agricultural development, and trade and industry—where the SACP could exert key influence through cabinet posts. The ANC explicitly defines itself in its constitution as a "non-racial and non-sexist democratic liberation movement." Therefore, being a "movement" is the core characteristic of the ANC; that is, the ANC seeks not merely to be a political party with popular support, but a movement with broad mass participation. The ANC is not a party representing the interests of a single class or stratum, but a political home for nationalists, Africanists, and socialists of various progressive ideological leanings, as well as for various classes and strata committed to pursuing national democratic transformation. It is precisely because of this "broad church" attribute that the ANC is influenced by various ideologies and political trends. The SACP's goal in supporting the ANC and participating in the ANC-led government is to ensure the ANC follows a left-wing route and to inject socialist elements into government decision-making, thereby driving the construction of a national democratic society toward a socialist direction.
(2) Reshaping the Alliance
The Tripartite Alliance formed during the apartheid era by the ANC, SACP, and COSATU was maintained after South Africa achieved its democratic transition and was transformed into a ruling alliance. The Tripartite Alliance is a highly distinctive political organization formed under specific historical conditions. Its core goal is to conduct a national democratic revolution, dismantle colonialism and apartheid, and subsequently build a society characterized by democracy, equality, and common prosperity without racial or gender discrimination. In terms of its nature, the Tripartite Alliance is an organic strategic alliance rather than a simple electoral pact. Within it, the ANC plays the leading role, the SACP acts as the vanguard of the working class, and COSATU serves as the organizational form of the workers' movement. The alliance is therefore regarded as the representative of progressive left-wing forces. In the national democratic revolution, the ANC assumed organizational leadership, while the working class, as the primary driving force, assumed class leadership. As the "strategic political center" of the national democratic revolution, the Tripartite Alliance played a key role in the process of overthrowing the apartheid system. However, after South Africa's democratic transition, the ANC became the dominant ruling party, and the role of the Tripartite Alliance as a strategic political center was weakened. Particularly during the Mbeki administration, government decision-making was eroded by neoliberal ideology, leading to a decline in the influence of the SACP and COSATU on government policy and intensifying their conflicts with the Mbeki government. Against this background, the Tripartite Alliance increasingly fell into a state of functional disorder. To address this crisis, the SACP actively explored the possibility of contesting elections independently on the one hand, and placed the issue of "reconfiguring the alliance" on the agenda on the other. In 2007, the SACP noted at its National Congress that if the national democratic revolution was to be advanced, deepened, and defended, and if the medium-term goal of building working-class hegemony in all centers of power (including the state) was to be achieved, the alliance had to be reconfigured. Reconfiguring the alliance had to include two aspects: first, establishing itself as a strategic political center; and second, ensuring this political center had the capacity to formulate strategy, influence policy, conduct campaigns, deploy cadres, and be held accountable. In December 2007, Jacob Zuma was elected ANC President at its 52nd National Conference, which opened up political space for reconfiguring the alliance. In May 2008, the alliance held a summit and, based on a summary of historical experiences and lessons, created the Alliance Political Council. This body became a standing platform for alliance partners to consult on policy issues. The Alliance Political Council could also establish task teams for specific issues or fields through the Alliance Secretariat, creating conditions for effective work and the achievement of goals.
From 2008 to 2015, because the SACP and COSATU believed a new political climate had emerged, internal discussions within these two political forces regarding alliance reconfiguration subsided. However, after 2015, surrounding issues of corruption and "state capture," [9] factional struggles within the ANC intensified, and the ANC's image among voters weakened. In the 2016 South African local government elections, the ANC suffered a "Waterloo," losing control of metropolitan areas such as Johannesburg, Tshwane, and Nelson Mandela Bay, and facing its most serious governing crisis since 1994. Faced with this problem, calls within the SACP for independent electoral participation rose again, and the issue of alliance reconfiguration was once more placed on the agenda. In March 2017, SACP General Secretary Nzimande stated that "factionalism is destroying the alliance" and that "we are not an ally of a faction of the ANC, but an ally of the ANC." Following Cyril Ramaphosa's election as ANC President at its 54th National Conference in December 2017, alliance reconfiguration met a new opportunity. Since 2018, the SACP, COSATU, and the ANC have successively published position papers on alliance reconfiguration to explain their respective views. After repeated discussion and close consultation, the three parties published "Towards a Reconfigured Alliance: A Common Platform for Alliance Reconfiguration" at the end of 2019. They reached a consensus that reconfiguring the alliance is an ongoing, deepening process rather than an isolated event. The core issues are maintaining unity and organizational renewal, with constant adjustments as the times evolve. The three parties pledged to turn the Alliance Political Council into a consultative body and a successful model for seeking consensus.
From the perspective of the reconfiguration process, the consensus among alliance partners on several issues has been significantly strengthened. Institutional arrangements such as the Alliance Summit, the Alliance Political Council, and the Alliance Secretariat have provided effective platforms for partners to enhance consultation, significantly raising the level of the alliance's institutionalization. In the SACP's view, to realize the transition from national democratic revolution to socialism, the role of the Tripartite Alliance must be strengthened. By reconfiguring the alliance, they aim to increase its influence over the ANC's electoral manifesto, government decision-making, parliamentary legislation, and the deployment of cadres in public institutions. The leadership of COSATU and the SACP believe that the current strategic imperative is not to leave the alliance, but on the contrary, to strengthen the presence of the proletariat within the alliance and the ANC. This has proven to be a correct choice. Relying on the reconfigured Tripartite Alliance to actively promote the construction of a national democratic society has become a necessary prerequisite and an important foundation for moving toward a socialist society.
(3) Conducting Campaigns
While engaging in national governance by relying on the Tripartite Alliance, the South African Communist Party (SACP) has simultaneously and continuously strengthened its ties with the working class and the poor. By launching mass movements to exert influence on government decision-making, it ensures that the country’s policy orientation aligns with the interests and demands of the working class and the broad masses of the poor. During the apartheid era, the Party was suppressed by the white regime and could not exist as a legal political party within South Africa; this objectively limited its close contact with the masses. In the early 1990s, South Africa initiated the process of democratic transition, which opened up political space for the SACP to establish close ties with the masses. It was against this backdrop that the Party realized its transformation into a "mass-based" party. The SACP actively initiated mass movements, relying on the power of the masses to promote South Africa’s democratic transition. Chris Hani, the then-General Secretary of the SACP, launched the "3H" (Health, Housing, and Hunger) campaign. This early political movement exerted a tremendous influence on the African National Congress (ANC) 1994 election platform, the "Reconstruction and Development Programme" (RDP), ensuring that the ANC government, in its early period of governance, invested large amounts of capital into basic livelihood security fields such as housing and healthcare through redistributive methods.
After the ANC took power, although the SACP became a participating party in government, its influence on the ANC government’s decision-making did not rely solely on this channel. In the Party’s view, state power is the central issue of all revolutions. State power is distributed across different domains, including the executive, legislature, judiciary, national security, state-owned enterprises, and public institutions. While electoral politics are important, they are not the only way to contest state power.
State power can also be acquired through political mobilization and mass movements. The Red October Campaign [10], which developed on the basis of the "3H" campaign, is the SACP’s primary channel for mobilizing the masses around specific issues. Since 1994, through the Red October Campaign, the SACP has achieved a series of significant results in areas such as promoting the transformation of the financial sector, accelerating the land reform process, building a public healthcare system, and fighting corruption. Taking the public healthcare system as an example, since 2007, the Party has launched a series of mass movements centered on healthcare reform, pushing the ANC government to introduce the National Health Insurance (NHI) plan. Its goal is to achieve universal health coverage for all citizens to change the current situation of severely unbalanced distribution of healthcare resources. The South African Department of Health drafted the National Health Insurance Bill in June 2018 and submitted it to the National Assembly for discussion in August 2019. According to the National Health Insurance Bill, South Africa will establish a "National Health Insurance Fund" to provide free medical and health services to all citizens.
From a practical perspective, the mass movements initiated by the SACP produce several effects: first, they strengthen party-mass relations [11], recruiting the masses into the SACP during the political campaigns; second, they disseminate communist ideas, exposing the evils and defects of the capitalist system and strengthening ideological education for the broad ranks of Party members and cadres; third, by relying on mass movements, they influence government decision-making on certain issues, causing government policy and national legislation to be oriented toward maintaining the interests of the working class and the poor. Chris Hani, the former General Secretary of the SACP, repeatedly stated that socialism must not be seen as a distant, abstract utopia; socialism is not a piece of hyperbole, but relates to very basic things—nutritious food, decent housing, safe drinking water, and accessible healthcare services. It is in this sense that the SACP believes the building of socialism should begin in the present. In the stage of National Democratic Revolution (NDR), satisfying the basic needs of the people through political movements naturally becomes the Party's fundamental approach to exploring the construction of socialism.
IV. Conclusion
In its century-long historical journey, under the guidance of theories such as "Colonialism of a Special Type" and "Two-Stage Revolution," the SACP formed a strategic alliance with political forces such as the ANC and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), and has continued this Tripartite Alliance into the post-apartheid era. This unique political organizational form of the Tripartite Alliance provides institutional protection for the SACP's participation in political processes such as government decision-making, national legislation, and local governance. The SACP has actively utilized the political space opened by the democratic transition to build itself into a socialist party with over 300,000 members. In terms of scale, it has become the second-largest party, following only the ANC. Since the democratic transition in 1994, the core strategy of the SACP has been to rely on the Tripartite Alliance to promote a radical second phase of the National Democratic Revolution, thereby laying the foundation for the transition to a socialist society. For this strategy to be effective, it requires both the organizational leadership of the ANC and the role of the working class as a whole as the leading class. However, in recent years, the two major forces upon which the Party relies to expand its influence—the ANC and COSATU—have both encountered serious difficulties. On the one hand, the ANC is plagued by internal factional struggles and corruption issues; its status in South Africa’s party landscape shows a declining trend, and its leadership capacity has diminished. On the other hand, COSATU has experienced divisions, and the fragmentation of the working class is severe, posing a serious challenge to the Party's goal of creating a "unified trade union alliance."
In view of this, the SACP is actively encouraging the ANC to strengthen its capacity building and to "reconfigure" the Tripartite Alliance, attempting to deepen the second radical phase of the National Democratic Revolution by revitalizing the ANC’s revolutionary vigor and enhancing the role of the Tripartite Alliance. At the same time, the Party is also actively exploring ways to participate in elections independently to cope with the risks and challenges brought about by changes in political development. Some scholars believe that no matter how close an alliance the SACP maintains with the ANC, the two sides will sooner or later fall into increasing conflict regarding goals and methods. In the long run, the ANC’s goal is to build a national democratic society, while the SACP’s goal is to build a socialist society. However, in the view of the latter, building a national democratic society is an important foundation for building a socialist society; the intrinsic connection between the two provides a guarantee for the continuation of strategic cooperation between the two political forces. Therefore, for the time being, the SACP will still choose to rely on the Tripartite Alliance to explore the building of socialism. Whether the SACP will eventually abandon the alliance and embark on a path of independent electoral participation depends on the developmental trend of the alliance partnership and the future direction of the ANC as the leader of the National Democratic Revolution.
(The author’s affiliation: Contemporary World Magazine, International Department of the Central Committee of the CPC) Network Editor: Tong Xin Source: Journal of Contemporary World and Socialism, Issue 5, 2021