Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- List of tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- List of abbreviations
- 1 The uneasy special relationship: dynamics and divergencies
- 2 Breakdown: into war, 1895–1899
- 3 Post-war: the myth of magnanimity, 1905–1907
- 4 African interests and the South Africa Act, 1908–1910
- 5 ‘Greater South Africa’: the struggle for the High Commission Territories, 1910–1961
- 6 The economic dimension: South Africa and the sterling area, 1931–1961
- 7 Britain, the United Nations, and the ‘South African disputes’, 1946–1961
- 8 The political consequences of Seretse Khama and Ruth, 1948–1952
- 9 Containing Afrikanerdom: the geopolitical origins of the Central African Federation, 1948–1953
- 10 Strategy and the transfer of Simon's Town, 1948–1957
- 11 The parting of the ways: the departure of South Africa from the Commonwealth, 1951–1961
- 12 Enfeebled lion? How South Africans viewed Britain, 1945–1961
- 13 Springbok reviled: some British reactions to apartheid, 1948–1994
- Epilogue The relationship restored: the return of the new South Africa to the Commonwealth, 1994
- Select bibliography
- Index
Preface
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- List of tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- List of abbreviations
- 1 The uneasy special relationship: dynamics and divergencies
- 2 Breakdown: into war, 1895–1899
- 3 Post-war: the myth of magnanimity, 1905–1907
- 4 African interests and the South Africa Act, 1908–1910
- 5 ‘Greater South Africa’: the struggle for the High Commission Territories, 1910–1961
- 6 The economic dimension: South Africa and the sterling area, 1931–1961
- 7 Britain, the United Nations, and the ‘South African disputes’, 1946–1961
- 8 The political consequences of Seretse Khama and Ruth, 1948–1952
- 9 Containing Afrikanerdom: the geopolitical origins of the Central African Federation, 1948–1953
- 10 Strategy and the transfer of Simon's Town, 1948–1957
- 11 The parting of the ways: the departure of South Africa from the Commonwealth, 1951–1961
- 12 Enfeebled lion? How South Africans viewed Britain, 1945–1961
- 13 Springbok reviled: some British reactions to apartheid, 1948–1994
- Epilogue The relationship restored: the return of the new South Africa to the Commonwealth, 1994
- Select bibliography
- Index
Summary
‘A special relationship and its mutual benefits, which history has bound us in’ is how Nelson Mandela described relations between Britain and South Africa in the spring of 2001. The tragedy is that for most of the twentieth century this ‘special relationship’ was compromised, first by jingoistic Britain, then by Afrikaner nationalist South Africa. This book is about that tragedy.
We have worked together, with a shared outlook, over many years, with the long-term intention of producing a study more comprehensive than either of us could have managed to write by ourselves. Since it is based overwhelmingly on fundamental research in British government archives, there are two inevitable limitations. One is that the perspective is mainly, though not exclusively, from the British side – so the book finds its home in the general field of British imperial and Commonwealth history, as well as South African history. The other is that the emphasis is on the period before the departure of South Africa from the Commonwealth in 1961, the British government's ‘thirty-year rule of access’ – in practice more like thirty-five years – preventing us from tackling the issues after the 1960s with anything like the authority we hope we bring to the period before then.
Our main concern is with inter-governmental relations, and we do not aim to give an account of the long British tradition of radical and liberal criticism of what happened in South Africa.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Lion and the SpringbokBritain and South Africa since the Boer War, pp. xi - xiiiPublisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2003