The Political Mythology of Apartheid

An eminent historian of southern Africa examines the myths that have fused the Afrikaners' Volk and justified their costly and peculiar elaboration of dominance over blacks. He shows how the mythology has evolved-from indignant resistance to British imperialism to a God-sent superiority over blacks to a complicated dogma about separate development. Now solid convictions about Afrikanerdom are breaking down, but racial myths endure tenaciously.