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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 January 2009
This article draws attention to the comparative lack of material on the origins of African nationalism in Zambia, and suggests a framework of analysis and possible future areas of research on the subject. In contrast with some other East and Central African territories, Zambia offered little or no primary resistance to the imposition of colonial rule, but in other respects the country resembled neighbouring territories in the first three decades of colonial rule. There is a need for further study of Watch Tower and the Welfare Associations, the former in the inter-war years, the latter in the 1940s. The Copperbelt from 1930 to 1950, with its problems of urbanization and the colour bar, is a vital factor setting Zambia apart from other tropical dependencies. Here, Africans were confronted with the determination of Europeans to retain political and economic power, whatever the policy declarations of the government. The politicization of the territory can be traced from here, and the role of the Bemba-speaking peoples as the spearhead of protest had its origin in their powerful position on the Copperbelt.
1 Robert, I. Rotberg, The Rise of Nationalism in Central Africa (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1966).Google Scholar
2 Ranger, T. O., ‘Connexions between “Primary Resistance” movements and modern mass nationalism in East and Central Africa’ (a parts), J. Afr. Hist., ix, 3 and 4 (1968);Google ScholarRanger, T. O., ‘African reaction and resistance to the imposition of colonial rule in East and Central Africa’, in Gann, L. H. and Duignan, P. (general editors), The History and Politics of Modern Imperialism, Vol I: Colonialism in Africa, 1870–1960 (Stanford, 1969);Google ScholarLonsdale, J. M., ‘Some origins of nationalism in East Africa’, J. Afr. Hist., IX, 4 (1968).Google Scholar
3 Chimba, M. J., M.P., , ‘The struggle for independence’ in Zambia News (Lusaka), 20 10, 2 and 9 11 1969. Mr Chimba is Minister of National Guidance in the Zambian Government.Google Scholar
4 I have made some of these points in my article ‘Pre-nationalist resistance to colonial rule in Zambia’, African Social Research, 9 (1970).Google Scholar
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6 Gerald, L. Caplan, ‘Barotseland: the secessionist challenge to Zambia’. Journal of Modern African Studies, 6, 3 (1968).Google Scholar
7 Rotberg, , 73–6;Google ScholarHenry, S. Meebelo, ‘African reaction to European rule in the Northern Province of Northern Rhodesia, 1895–1939: A study of the genesis and development of political awareness among a colonial people.’ Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of London, 1969, 127–55.Google Scholar
8 Ranger, T. O., The African Churches of Tanzania (Historical Association of Tanzania Paper, No. 5, Nairobi: East African Publishing House, n.d., ?1969).Google Scholar
9 Rotberg, chapter vi; Ranger, T. O., ‘The “Ethiopian” episode in Barotseland, 1900–1905’, Human Problems in British Central Africa, 37 (1965).Google Scholar
10 Rotberg, , 136–9;Google ScholarMeebelo, , 183–261. I follow Dr Meebelo's spelling of Shindano's name.Google Scholar
11 Evidence taken by the Commission [Russell] appointed to enquire into the disturbances in the Copperbelt, Northern Rhodesia, July–September 1935 (Lusaka: Government Printer, 1935 and Cmd. 5009 of 1935), 271, evidence of John Smith Moffat.Google Scholar
12 Sholto, Cross, ‘The Watch Tower movement in Zambia: some historical questions’, unpublished University of Zambia History Seminar Paper, 1969.Google Scholar
13 Meebelo, , 346–8.Google Scholar
14 James, R. Hooker, ‘Welfare Associations and other instruments of accommodation in the Rhodesias between the World Wars’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, IX, I (1966).Google Scholar
15 In ‘The Second World War and Northern Rhodesian Society’ (Paper presented to the East African Social Science Council Conference, Nairobi, 1969), I briefly trace the formation of the African Mine Workers' Trade Union in 1948–49, and the role of non-mine Africans in it.
16 Gann, L. H., ‘The Northern Rhodesian copper industry and the world of copper, 1923–1952’, Human Problems in British Central Africa, 18 (1955);Google ScholarKenneth, Bradley, Copper Venture (London: Mufulira Copper Mines Ltd., 1952);Google ScholarMerle Davis, J., Modern Industry and the African (London, Cass, 1967; first edition 1933).Google Scholar It is impossible to list all the publications of the Rhodes-Livingstone Institute touching on our theme. Three outstandingly influential publications have been: Clyde Mitchell, J., The Kalela Dance (Rhodes-Livingstone Paper No. 27, 1956);Google ScholarWatson, W., Tribal Cohesion in a Money Economy (Manchester University Press and the Rhodes-Livingstone Institute, 1958);Google Scholar and Epstein, A. L., Politics in an Urban African Community (Manchester University Press and the Rhodes-Livingstone Institute, 1958).Google Scholar
17 The British South Africa Company's claims to the mineral royalties in Northern Rhodesia (Lusaka: Government Printer, 1964), p. I. It is, of course, arguable that company profits in the late 1930s constituted only a modest return on a decade of heavy investment without return in the years 1925–35.Google Scholar
18 Report of the Commission appointed to enquire into the financial and economic position of Northern Rhodesia (Colonial No. 145, 1938)Google Scholar(The Pim and Milligan Report), 19–20;Google ScholarRobert, E. Baldwin, Economic Development and Export Growth (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1966) 14–57.Google Scholar
19 Gann, , 9.Google Scholar
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21 SEC/LAB/79 items 77, 81, 83. This series of Northern Rhodesia secretariat files is in the National Archives, Lusaka.
22 Northern Rhodesia Approved Estimates of Revenue and Expenditure 1939 (Lusaka: Government Printer, 1939);Google ScholarGann, , 8.Google Scholar
23 Merle, Davis, 53.Google Scholar
24 Report of the Commission appointed to inquire into the disturbances in the Copperbelt, Northern Rhodesia (Lusaka, Government Printer, n.d., but 1941)Google Scholar(The Forster Report), paras. 16–20.Google Scholar
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27 The Pim and Milligan Report, Appendix vi.Google Scholar
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29 In 1940, for example, the average number of Africans employed on the copper mines Was 28,034 out of a total of 121,939 wage earners within the territory. In the same year about 46,000 Northern Rhodesians were employed in Southern Rhodesia, and 7000 in South Africa. See my paper, ‘The Second World War and Northern Rhodesian Society’, Appendix, Table 2.
30 SEC/LAB/12: Minutes of a meeting of the Standing Committee [on the Salisbury Agreement] held at Salisbury, 25 October 1939; also Howe (Labour Commissioner) to Chief Secretary, 1 November 1939.
31 C.O. 795/76/45083 item 100: SirAlison, Russell to SirJohn, Maffey, 08 1935. The C.O. series is in the Public Record Office, London.Google Scholar
32 The Forster Report, para. 17.Google Scholar
33 St J. Orde Browne, G., Labour Conditions in Northern Rhodesia (Colonial No. 150, 1938), paras. 279–95.Google Scholar
34 Ibid., para. 8.
35 Roux, E., Time Longer than Rope (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1964, 2nd ed.), chapter xvii.Google Scholar
36 See my paper, note 29 above, for a more detailed account of this episode.
37 SEC/LAB/78, I: note by the Chief Secretary, I April 1940; Provincial Commissioner, Ndola to Chief Secretary, 14 April 1940; SEC/LAB/70, II: Governor, Northern Rhodesia to Secretary of State, 9 April 1940.
38 Report of the Board of Inquiry appointed to inquire into the advancement of Africans in the copper mining industry in Northern Rhodesia (Lusaka: Government Printer, 1954) (The Forster Board Report), paras. 16–21.Google Scholar
39 Evidence to the Commission [Forster] appointed to enquire into the disturbances in the Copperbelt, Northern Rhodesia (typescript, 1940, ZP/12, Lusaka Archives), 708.Google Scholar
40 Mulford, D., Zambia, The Politics of Independence (London: Oxford University Press, 1967), 228.Google Scholar
41 For example, in Ranger, T. O. (ed.), Emerging Themes of African History (London: Heinemann, 1968).Google Scholar See also Jones's, D. H. review of this book in J. Afr. Hist., x, 4(1969).Google Scholar
42 Peter, Harries-Jones, ‘The tribes in the towns’ in Brelsford, W. V., The Tribes of Zambia (Lusaka: Government Printer, n.d., ?1965).Google Scholar
43 Audrey, Richards, Land, Labour and Diet in Northern Rhodesia (London: International African Institute and Oxford University Press, 1939);Google ScholarGodfrey, Wilson, An Essay on the Economics of detribalisation in Northern Rhodesia (Lusaka: Rhodes-Livingstone Institute Papers No. 5 and 6, 1941 and 1942).Google Scholar
44 Robert, Rotberg, The Rise of Nationalism, 126, quotes Chief Musokotwane of the Tonga as complaining in 1930 that the Europeans were ‘chasing us from our lands where our forefathers died to lands which are strange to us where we are not allowed to cut down trees’. The chief was attending a meeting of the Livinstone Native Welfare Association.Google Scholar
45 See my essay on Zambia, in The Annual Register: World Events in 1969 (London: Longmans, 1970);Google Scholar also Robert, I. Rotberg, ‘Tribalism and politics in Zambia’, Africa Report, xii, no. 9, 12 1967.Google Scholar
46 Richard, Hall, The High Price of Principles (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1969), 194.Google Scholar
47 Wina, A., ‘The future of local government in Zambia’ (Lusaka: Government Printer, Zambia Enformation Services Press Release, No. 1229, 1968),Google Scholar quoted in Magubane, B., ‘Pluralism and conflict situations in Africa: a new look’, African Social Research, 7 (1969).Google Scholar
48 Evidence to the Russell Commission, 1935, 282.
49 Robert, I. Rotberg, ‘The Lenshinaist movement of Northern Rhodesia’, Human Problems in British Central Africa, 29, (1961).Google Scholar
50 See Andrew Roberts's essay on the Lumpa Church in Robert, I. Rotberg and Ali, Mazrui (eds.), Protest and Power in Black Africa (New York: Oxford University Press, 1970).Google Scholar
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