The United Front and Revolutionary Strategy and Tactics in South Africa

This chapter focuses on the united-front strategy: Its origin, history and main elements. It looks at the relationship between Lenin and Gramsci’s theories of revolutionary strategy and tactics and revolutionary developments in South Africa during the period under review. The chapter also focuses on the political and economic conditions of social transformation in South Africa. It argues that revolutionary developments in South Africa during the period of review conformed to a Leninist/Gramscian model of a united-front strategy. The theoretical origins and initial implementation of the united-front strategy are open to debate. The most comprehensive account of the Vietnamese revolutionary strategy was provided by Vo Nguyen Giap, major strategist of the Vietnamese Communist Party. The emergence of European Communist Parties in Western Europe gave rise to a renewed interest in the writings of Antonio Gramsci on the revolutionary organisation and strategy.