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Mogobe B. Ramose

An African perspective on justice and race

 
Summary

Most cultures uphold the principle that all humans are equal in their humanity. From this flows the idea of justice as giving to the other what is due to them. In practice this means, accordingly, equal and nondiscriminatory treatment to equal cases. Colonization and racism are a negation of this and as such an injustice because fundamentally both deny that other human beings are equally human. The colonization of Africa was at the same time the introduction of racism to the continent. It was the double injustice of conquest in an unjust war and the denial of the humanity of the conquered. The ubuntu African understanding of justice as balance and harmony demands the restoration of justice by reversing the dehumanizing consequences of colonial conquest and by eliminating racism.


Content

español  

Introduction
The philosophy of ubuntu
The ubuntu conception of law
Colonization and reparations
Racism
Sovereignty since the beginning of time: the quest for historical justice
The transition to democracy in South Africa
Molato ga o bole: challenging extinctive prescription
The reversion to unencumbered and unmodified sovereignty
Conclusion: Towards a post-conquest South Africa and Zimbabwe



 Introduction

»The aim of law is to pursue and actualize the demands of justice.«

1

  It is no longer tenable to argue that the idea and practice of law was alien to the indigenous African peoples prior to colonization.  1  There is, on the contrary, abundant evidence supporting the view that indigenous African systems were organized around their conception of law.  2  On this basis we shall proceed straight to consider, from the standpoint of the ubuntu conception of law, the question why for the indigenous conquered peoples of South Africa justice demands the restoration of their humanity through the reversal of the dehumanizing consequences of colonization. Racism is an example of the dehumanizing consequences of colonization. It will be considered in the present essay.

2

  Justice further demands that restitution and reparations are due to the indigenous conquered peoples. The statement of our question implies that, theoretically, there is a direct and indissoluble link between the idea of justice and law. The aim of law is to pursue and actualize the demands of justice. In our examination of the question we will adopt the ubuntu understanding of law. After a presentation of this understanding we will focus upon its application to colonization and racism.



 The philosophy of ubuntu

 

3

  Ubuntu is actually two words in one. It consists of the prefix ubu and the stem ntu. Ubu evokes the idea of being in general. It is enfolded being before it manifests itself in the concrete form or mode of exstence of a particular entity. In this sense ubu is always oriented towards ntu. At the ontological level there is no strict separation between ubu and ntu.  3  Ubu and ntu are mutually founding in the sense that they are two aspects of being as a oneness and an indivisible whole-ness. Ubu as the generalized understanding of being may be said to be distinctly ontological; ntu as the nodal point at which being assumes concrete form or a mode of being in the process of continual unfoldment may be said to be distinctly epistemological. Accordingly, ubuntu is the fundamental ontological and epistemological category in the African thought of the Bantu-speaking people.  4  The word umu shares the same ontological feature with the word ubu. Joined together with ntu then it becomes umuntu.  5  Umuntu means the emergence of homo loquens who is simultaneously a homo sapiens. Umuntu is the maker of knowledge and truth in the concrete areas, for example, of politics, religion and law.



 The ubuntu conception of law



J.Y. Mokgoro:
Ubuntu and the Law in South Africa.
1998.
external linkArticle


Dirk J. Louw:
Ubuntu: An African Assessment of the Religious Other.
Paideia World Philosophy Conference Paper.
1998.
external linkArticle

4

  According to M'Baye, African communal life revolves around the principle that all life is protected by the supernatural forces. Resort to these latter forces constitutes the basis of African law. Communal life can hardly be protective if it is both  6  by definition and intent designed to eliminate whatever method or means of protection. Nor can refuge to the supernatural forces endure if these forces are perceived to dispense with everything except the much-needed protection. Justice is determined by the supernatural forces. Their determination seeks to restore harmony and promote the maintenance of peace. Justice as the restoration of equilibrium is a central element of the ubuntu philosophy of law. This determination by the supernatural forces is consistent with the metaphysics of ubuntu law. This consists in a triadic structure of the living, the living dead (the supernatural forces) and the yet-to-be-born.

5

  This metaphysical structure ensures communication among the three levels of being. On the basis of this structure, justice determined by the supernatural forces is declared on their behalf by the living who are in authority. Orientation towards the supernatural forces is the abstract dimension of ubuntu law. Its quest for justice is not focused in the world of the supernatural forces. Instead, it is directed immediately towards the world of the living in the first place and, the yet-to-be-born in the second place. Thus with regard to the application of justice it accords primacy to the concrete, the world of the living. In this sense it is different from Western legal thought which apparently stresses the abstract.

»A debt or a feud is never extinguished till the equilibrium has been restored, even if several generations elapse.«

Kéba M'Baye
(Note 8)

6

  Another feature of ubuntu law is that it is flexible, unformalised, reasonable and linked to morality. The flexibility of ubuntu law speaks to the idea that it is law without a center. This is because ubuntu philosophy holds that being is one continuous wholeness rather than a finite whole. On this reasoning, the legal subject cannot be the center of the law. This does not deny the importance of the legal subject in law. Thus conceived the legal subject is the active negation of a false abstract necessity and finality claiming to be the truth about law. This means that law consists of rules of behaviour contained in the flow of life. The idea that life is a constant flow and flux means that it cannot be decided in advance that certain legal rules have an irreversible claim to exist permanently. This speaks to the reasonableness of ubuntu law even though it might be unformalised. In this sense ubuntu law is a dynamology  7  in search of justice as the restoration of equilibrium.

7

  The ubuntu understanding of justice as the restoration of equilibrium means that law as a continually lived experience cannot reach a point of finality. Accordingly, »prescription is unknown in African law. The African believes that time cannot change the truth. Just as the truth must be taken into consideration each time it becomes known, so must no obstacle be placed in the way of the search for it and its discovery. It is for this reason that judicial decisions are not authoritative. They must always be able to be called into question.«  8  This constitutes the basis for historical justice in the ubuntu understanding of law. In stating that prescription is unknown in African law, M'Baye reaffirmed an already known fact. Before him it was already observed that: »A debt or a feud is never extinguished till the equilibrium has been restored, even if several generations elapse ... to the African there is nothing so incomprehensible or unjust in our system of law as the Statute of Limitations, and they always resent a refusal on our part to arbitrate in a suit on the grounds that it is too old.« Thus in the ubuntu understanding of law, an injustice that endures in the historic memory of the injured is never erased merely because of the passage of time. It is on this basis that we will focus upon both colonization and racism as issues of historic justice according to the ubuntu understanding of law.

8

  Both the justice and the validity of law are judged by the criterion of ubuntu (botho). Umuntu  9 , a human being in the biological sense, is enjoined to become a human being proper by embracing ubuntu. Umuntu must be the embodiment of ubuntu because the fundamental ethical, social and legal judgement of human dignity and conduct is based upon ubuntu. Ubuntu is the principle that we act humanely and with respect towards others as a way of demanding the same from them. Similarly, law to be worth its name and to command respect must evince ubuntu. This will be our criterion for assessing the colonial and racial experiences in South Africa.



 Colonization and reparations

Yazeed Kamaldien: "Restorative Justice in Legislation".
In: Today, 2 February 2001.
external linkArticle


Jennifer J. Llewellyn / Robert Howse:
Restorative Justice – A conceptual framework.
2001.
external linkArticle

9

  Colonization was predicated on the idea that the African was not a full and complete human being. According to this idea, the African was devoid of reason and could therefore not qualify as a human being. On this basis, colonization unilaterally allocated itself the task to civilize  10  and christianize the African.  11  In order to achieve these aims colonizers waged wars against the Africans and this included the indigenous African peoples of South Africa. Judged on the basis of the just war doctrine, none of the colonial wars could be justified. They were thus unjust wars which resulted in the conquest and the subjugation of the conquered indigenous peoples of South Africa. The latter lost their title to their land as well as sovereignty over it.

10

  Having understood the conquest to be unjust, the indigenous conquered people mounted resistance to recover their territory and regain full, unencumbered sovereignty over it. In response the conqueror enacted oppressive legislation especially in the political and economic spheres. The oppressive legislation was reinforced by the institutionalization of racism as the way of life in South Africa. The conqueror persisted in repelling the resistance of the indigenous conquered peoples.  12  This assumed other forms of strengthening "the right of conquest" such as Bantustanism, the Group Areas Act and the creation of a three chamber Parliament under the 1983 Constitution.  13  The latter ironically sounded the death-knell to the last white Parliament.  14 



 Racism

 

11

  Aristotles  15  definition of "man" as a rational animal constituted the philosophical  16  basis for racism in the West.  17  In order to qualify as a human being one had to be rational. When the colonizer encountered the colonized there was a striking similarity in some physiological features. At the same time there were discernible physical differences. These were then used as a reason to exclude the colonized from the category of being human. The colonized were no and never had been human beings, it was claimed, because they lacked rationality. Reason or rationality was not part of their nature even though in appearance they looked like human beings. The hallmark of racism then is the claim that other human-like animals are not truly and fully human.

12

  This paved the way to colonization, subjugation, oppression and enslavement of the colonized. For centuries this remained the case. The colonized went through a history of humiliation and dehumanization. Neither desalinization nor the abolition of slavery completely erased the dehumanizing effects of racism. Instead, the posterity of the colonized continue to live under the burden of the conviction that the notion of "man being a rational animal" did not mean the African. The contemporary resurgence of racism underlines the need to remedy the history of humiliation and dehumanization that continues to resurface in overt as well as subtle covert forms.



 Sovereignty since the beginning of time: the quest for historical justice

»It cannot be emphasised enough that there was sovereignty and there were sovereigns long before these terms were coined.«

E.N. van Kleffens
(Note 18)

13

  It may well be worth to recognise, as van Kleffens reminds us, that: »The word 'sovereign' for the highest, supreme power in a given legal order may have been a product of the feudal age, but the notion it represents had forced itself upon the human mind ever since men began to establish independent political groups, and that goes back to the dawn of time. It cannot be emphasised enough that there was sovereignty and there were sovereigns long before these terms were coined«.  18  The point of van Kleffens' reminder is that we take note of both the notional status of sovereignty as a philosophical concept and its historical evolution. Philosophically, there was sovereignty and there were sovereigns before these terms were coined. Regardless of the historical coinage of the word 'state' sovereignty is held by a people in perpetuity.  19 



 The transition to democracy in South Africa

David A. Crocker:
"Retribution and Reconciliation".
In: The Report of the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy 20.1 (2000).
external linkArticle


Constitution of the Republic of South Africa 1996.
external linkConstitution









14

  In the "negotiations" leading to the new South Africa two contending paradigms have played a prominent role, namely, the decolonisation and democratisation paradigms.  20  The former speaks to the restoration of title to territory and sovereignty over it. It includes the exigency of restitution. It would bring the conqueror to renounce in principle title to South African territory and sovereignty over it. In this way sovereignty would revert to its rightful heirs. The conqueror's South Africa would be dissolved. This would then lay the basis for state succession.  21  The legal consequences flowing from total state succession  22  or the Nyerere doctrine  23  (the clean slate doctrine) would then follow. By its nature then the decolonisation paradigm is contrary to and inconsistent with the conqueror's claims pertaining to extinctive prescription.

15

  By contrast, the democratisation paradigm conforms to and is consistent with the conqueror's claims concerning extinctive prescription. It proceeds from the premise that given the evolutionary character of constitutionalism in South Africa, the major weakness of the 1983 constitution consists in the exclusion of the indigenous conquered peoples. Therefore, democracy will be achieved through the inclusion of the latter in the new constitution. In this way nonracialism would be one of the hallmarks of the new constitutional dispensation. In its determination to achieve victory over apartheid, the democratisation paradigm lost sight of the fact that the land question was a basic issue  24  long, long before apartheid was born. Despite this oversight, democratisation won the day and so the question of title to territory and sovereignty over it did not become an integral part of the "negotiations" agenda.

16

  In these circumstances it was relatively easy for the conqueror to realise the resolve to defend and consolidate all the benefits resulting from extinctive prescription. To this end the conqueror argued for the abolition of the principle of the sovereignty of parliament. This was rather odd since the sovereignty of parliament was a basic constitutional principle in South Africa for as long as the conqueror held sole and exclusive political power. This principle did not become suddenly inadequate. Instead, the conqueror feared that the indisputable numerical majority of the conquered people would probably abuse the principle. To avert this abuse abolition was considered the best solution. The conqueror's fear was based on the experience of its own abuse of this principle. It was pertinently observed in this connection that: »Several modern critics of the South African constitution have argued cogently that the foundation fathers of the Union created the wrong sort of constitution for this sort of country, urging that greater decentralization ... plus the incorporation in the written constitution of a bill of rights enforceable by a more independent judiciary endowed with testing power, all established on a much broader basis of popular consent, would have made it a more acceptable and enduring document. With these opinions we need not quarrel. The absence of safeguards of this sort resulted in the attribution of supremacy to a legislature which is not and never has been thoroughly representative, and which has since shown a disposition to use that supremacy with singular lack of restraint.«  25 










»There is no a priori reason why ubuntu should not be the basic philosophy for constitutional democracy in South Africa.«

17

  In an effort to win the support of the numerical majority population in the country, the conqueror appealed to ubuntu  26  and used it tactfully to remove the causes of its own fear. Here it is important to understand that the majority of the South African population continues to be nurtured and educated according to the basic tenets of ubuntu, notwithstanding the selective amnesia of a small segment of the indigenous elite. For example, ubuntu was included in the interim constitution to justify the necessity for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.  27  It was excluded from the final one. Why? Ubuntu was again invoked by the Constitutional Court delivering the judgement that capital punishment is unconstitutional. With respect, the invocation of ubuntu in this case was obiter dictum as the same conclusion could have been reached without recourse to ubuntu. Knowing why and how the death sentence affected mainly the conquered people in the past, the conqueror once again was driven by fear in opting for the abolition of the death sentence. These transparent tactics apart, it is curious that the final Constitution should remain completely silent about ubuntu. If a constitution is at bottom the casting into legal language of the moral and political convictions of a people then the mere translation of Westminster and Roman Law legal paradigms into the vernacular languages of the indigenous conquered people is not equal to the constitutional embodiment of their moral and political convictions. There is no a priori reason why ubuntu should not be the basic philosophy for constitutional democracy in South Africa.

18

  Contrary to its rejection of this in the past, the conqueror now urged for the Constitution as the basic law of the country. The essence of the argument here is that the Constitution as the basic and supreme law of the country shall be above the law-making power vested in parliament. The laws enacted by parliament shall, in principle, always be subject to their conformity and consistency with the Constitution. Parliament would therefore be the prisoner of the Constitution whose principles  28  possessed the character of essentiality  29  and immutability. What then is the meaning of popular sovereignty in the form of representative parliamentary democracy?  30  Without attempting to answer this question it is clear that the option for Constitutional supremacy by the conqueror was not simply a matter of juridical considerations.

19

  The cumulative result of the conqueror's arguments and tactics is that the democratisation paradigm carried the day. Its success was in fact the victory of extinctive prescription. Thus the injustice of conquest ungoverned by law, morality and humanity was constitutionalised. This constitutionalisation of injustice places the final Constitution on a precarious footing because of its failure to respond to the exigencies of natural and fundamental justice due to the indigenous conquered peoples. But the constitutionalisation of an injustice carries within itself the demand for justice. Accordingly, the reversion of title to territory and the restoration of sovereignty over it did not die at the birth of the new Constitution for South Africa.



 Molato ga o bole: challenging extinctive prescription

»The thesis that the reversion to sovereignty is neither relevant nor applicable to sub-Saharan Africa is philosophically untenable and historically empty. It is therefore submitted that the restoration of title to territory and the reversion of sovereignty over it is the basic problem. It is an exigency of historical justice.«

20

  The paradox of democratisation and independence in South Africa is that the compromises which the political representatives of the conquered peoples made are philosophically and materially inconsistent with their peoples' understanding of historical justice. Philosophically, the peoples hold that molato ga o bole, that is, extinctive prescription is untenable in the African understanding of law. Until and unless equilibrium is restored through the restoration of title to territory and the reversion of sovereignty over it even the best constitution would be fragile for lack of homegrown credentials.  31  That »in general the doctrine of reversion to sovereignty does not apply to sub-Saharan Africa« is an untenable thesis.  32 

21

  The authority upon which the learned author relies for this thesis is burdened with an unmistakably cursory and superficial knowledge of African history. Nonetheless, he proceeds from such knowledge to draw sweeping conclusions about unspecified "African Rulers" and "African Chieftains". It is also crystal clear that the authority is committed to the untenable view that because Western Europe had a supposedly superior civilisation it therefore had the right to colonise.  33  The thesis that the reversion to sovereignty is neither relevant nor applicable to sub-Saharan Africa is philosophically untenable and historically empty. It is therefore submitted that the restoration of title to territory and the reversion of sovereignty over it is the basic problem. It is an exigency of historical justice.



 The reversion to unencumbered and unmodified sovereignty

»Place is space in which important words have been spoken and which have established identity, defined vocation and envisioned destiny ... a yearning for a place is a decision to enter history with an identifiable people in an identifiable pilgrimage.«

Walter Brueggemann
(Note 34)

22

  For the indigenous conquered peoples "democratization" and the deracialisation of South African society are a limited success because they exclude the reversion to unencumbered and unmodified sovereignty to the same quantum and degree as at conquest in the unjust wars of colonization. The matyotyombe phenomenon is a manifest reminder to the political leadership that the liberation agenda is incomplete. It is a Xhosa word designating conditions of squalor. It signifies a situation of extreme poverty, dirt and moral degradation. It speaks to conditions unbefitting to human habitation and derogatory of human dignity.

23

  The problem with matyotyombe is that they proliferate relentlessly in all directions. They penetrate any area and freely fix themselves. They even fix themselves on no man's land which subsequently turns out to be another's "private property". The latter then defines matyotyombe dwellers as squatters. Both the legality and the justice of the claimant's right to "private property" are assumed to be valid. But this assumption is not necessarily valid from the point of view of the so-called squatters. The injured party then seeks a remedy through the courts. The latter invariably hand down eviction orders. These evoke defiance instead of obedience from the dwellers.

24

  The reason for this may be found in the Sotho term for the same matyotyombe, namely, baipei. The latter is descriptive of people who have fixed and settled themselves into a particular place. The idea of being fixed to a place in the sense of belonging to it as of right underlies the meaning of moipei being the singular of baipei. Baipei does not fix themselves at any place as though they are in search of any space: a void without any history. Baipei assert their right to a place and not a space and the whole of South Africa is this place because it is »space which has historical meaning, where some things have happened which are now remembered and which provide continuity and identity across generations. Place is space in which important words have been spoken and which have established identity, defined vocation and envisioned destiny ... a yearning for a place is a decision to enter history with an identifiable people in an identifiable pilgrimage.«  34  The pilgrimage for the restoration of title to territory and the reversion of unencumbered and unmodified sovereignty over it is spearheaded by the baipei.

25

  The baipei phenomenon is thus a call to the government of South Africa to rid itself of the burden of dominance by the juridical paradigm of the conqueror especially with regard to the putative eternity and immutability of "property rights". With particular reference to both rural and urban land both the government and the courts of South Africa must, at the very minimum, recognise and accept together with the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Brazil that: »The right to make use of urban land to guarantee adequate housing is one of the primary conditions for creating a life that is authentically human. Therefore when land occupations – or even land invasions – occur, legal judgments on property titles must begin with the right of all to adequate housing. All claims to private ownership must take second place to this basic need ... We conclude that the natural right to housing has priority over the law that governs land appropriation. A legal title to property can hardly be an absolute in the face of the human need of people who have nowhere to make their home.«  35 



 Conclusion: Towards a post-conquest South Africa and Zimbabwe

W.L. van der Merwe:
"'African Philosophy' and the Contextualisation of Philosophy in a Multicultural Society".
In: polylog 1 (2000).
Article

26

  We have shown that conquest ungoverned by law, morality or humanity is the original basis for the conqueror's claim to title to territory by appeal to extinctive prescription. Such a claim is, from the point of view of the conquered, untenable. The posterity of the original conqueror is therefore not the legal successor in title to absolute sovereignty. Extinctive prescription is inconsistent with the legal philosophy of the indigenous conquered people. It is also contrary to natural and fundamental justice. Accordingly, the restoration of title to territory and the reversion to unencumbered and unmodified sovereignty to the same quantum and degree as at conquest remains the basic demand of justice due to the indigenous conquered people. This includes the exigencies of restitution and reparations. To argue otherwise is to condone the questionable maxim that ex injuria ius oritur. These are the fundamental features of a post-conquest South Africa yet to be born.

Mogobe B. Ramose
is Professor of Philosphy at the University of South Africa, Pretoria.


27

  The conqueror by virtue of succession must renounce title to South African territory and sovereignty over it. This is inescapably necessary in order to dissolve the categories of conquered and conqueror. But the dissolution does not create automatically equality of condition in material terms. For this reason restitution and reparation arise as distinct necessities of historical justice. If this is a novelty in international law, there surely is nothing to suggest that the corpus of this law is comprehensive, exhaustive and definitive. The ordinary consequences of state succession must follow thereby delivering the conquered of the burdens which they neither created nor benefited from. This would create space to work out a homegrown post-conquest constitution. A post-conquest constitution for South Africa and, indeed for the rest of formerly colonised and enslaved Africa – would be predicated on the necessity to remedy the injustice of the past. Justice as equilibrium would, on this basis, appear to be an acceptable premise of constitution-making. Remove the element of responsibility then justice as experience and concept becomes totally devoid of meaning. Therefore, »reparations ... as a structure of memory and critique, may be regarded as a necessity for the credibility of Eurocentric historicism, and a corrective for its exclusionist worldview ... what really would be preposterous or ethically inadmissible in imposing a general levy on South Africa's white population?«  36 


Notes


 1   

A. Allot (1960): Essays in African Law. London: Butterworth, 13. 

 2   

K. M'Baye (1974): "The African Conception of Law". In: International Encyclopedia of Comparative Law 2, 138. 

 3   

J. Jahn (1961): Muntu. New York: Grove Press, 101. 

 4   

F.E. De Tejada (1979): "The future of Bantu law". In: ARSP Beiheft Neue Folge 11, 304. 

 5   

J. Jahn (1961): op. cit., 18-19. 

 6   

J.H. Driberg (1934): "The African conception of law". In: Journal of Comparative Legislation and International Law 16, 231. 

 7   

F.E. De Tejada (1979): op. cit., 523. 

 8   

K. M'Baye (1974): op. cit., 147. 

 9   

J. Jahn (1961): op.cit., 18-19. 

 10   

C. Schmitt (1996): "The land appropriation of a new world". In: Telos 109, 36-37. 

 11   

M.B. Ramose (1999): African philosophy through ubuntu. Harare: Mond Books Publishers, 19-20. 

 12   

Our use of the term "indigenous conquered peoples" must be understood in its historical context. Taking the year 1652 as the beginning of colonization, it is reasonable to assume that at least ten months after the arrival of the colonialists babies were born out of the sexual contact between the colonizer and the colonized. Following the South African terminology, babies born out of such unions continue to be called the Coloured people. On the other hand, the Indian population became part of South Africa since 1860. The 1983 constitution shows clearly that these population groups were never fully accepted by the colonizer as South Africans second to none. For this reason we here acknowledge the fact that together with the indigenous conquered peoples, these population groups suffered a common oppression under the same colonizer. Accordingly, they are included in our use of the term indigenous conquered peoples even though it cannot be said, historically, that they lost their title to territory and sovereignty over it. 

 13   

H. Booysen / D. van Wyk (1974): Die '83 Grondwet. Johannesburg: Juta & Kie. 

 14   

F. van Zyl Slabbert (1985): The last white parliament. Johannesburg: Jonathan Ball Publishers. 

 15   

L. Hanke (1959): Aristotle and the American Indians. Chicago: Henry regnery, ix. 

 16   

H.M. Bracken (1979): "Philosophy and racism". In: Philosophia 8, 243-244. 

 17   

R.H. Popkin (1974): "The philosophical bases of modern racism". In: C. Walton / J.P. Anton (eds.): Philosophy and the civilizing arts. Athens: Ohio University Press, 128-129. 

 18   

E.N. van Kleffens (1953): "Sovereignty and International Law". In: Recueil de Cours 82.1, 11-12. 

 19   

Janna Thompson (1990): "Land rights and Aboriginal sovereignty". In: Australian Journal of Philosophy 68.3, 316. 

 20   

J.M. Rantete (1998): The African National Congress and the negotiated settlement in South Africa. Pretoria: J.L. van Schaik, xv-xix. 

 21   

J.L. Brierly (1963): The Law of nations. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 144. See also Krystyna Marek (1968): Identity and continuity of states in Public International Law, Genève: Libr. Droz, 5-6. 

 22   

D.P. O'Connel (1967): State succession in municipal and International Law. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 4. See also G. von Glahn (1986): Law among nations. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company. 

 23   

Y. Makonnen (1983): "International Law and the new states of Africa". In: UNESCO (ed.): Regional participation programme for Africa. Addis Abeba, 133. 

 24   

L.J. Sebidi (1986): "The dynamics of the Black struggle and its implications for Black theology". In: I.J. Mosala / B. Tlhagale (eds.): The Unquestionable Right to be Free. Johannesburg: Skotaville Publishers, 26. 

 25   

T.R.H. Davenport (1960): "Civil Rights in South Africa 1910-1960". In: Acta Juridica, 13. 

 26   

M.B. Ramose (1999): op. cit. 

 27   

The Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act No. 34 of 1995. 

 28   

M. Wiechers (1990): "Namibia: the 1982 Constitutional Principles and their Legal Significance". In: South African Yearbook of International Law 15, 321. 

 29   

Kesavananda vs. State of Kerala case (A.I.R 1973 S.C. 1461). For an extensive discussion of this case see D.G. Morgan (1981): "The Indian 'essential features' case". In: The International and Comparative Law Quarterly 30, 307-337. 

 30   

C. Schmitt (1988): The crisis of parliamentary democracy. Cambridge/Mass.: MIT Press. 

 31   

Alison van Horn (1994): "Redefining 'property': the Constitutional Battle over Land Redistribution in Zimbabwe". In: Journal of African Law 38.2, 160. 

 32   

D.J. Devine (1979): "The Status of Rhodesia in International Law". In: Acta Juridica, 403. 

 33   

C.H. Alexandrowicz (1969): "New and Original States. The Issue of Reversion to Sovereignty". In: International Affairs 45.3, 471-473. 

 34   

W. Brueggemann (1977): The Land. Place as Gift, Promise and Challenge in Biblical Faith. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 5. 

 35   

R.H. May (1991): The Poor of the Land. New York: Orbis Books – Maryknoll, 122. 

 36   

W. Soyinka (1999): The Burden of Memory, The Muse of Forgiveness. New York: Oxford University Press, 25 and 39. 



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