ABSTRACT
The Ciskei is an impoverished area in one of the less well developed regions of the Republic. An important factor in the basic structural dependence of the Ciskei is the imitative patterns of consumption set in train by its proximity to the affluent white society which encapsulates it. The degree of structural economic dependence is matched by political dependence, built into the political institutions and exacerbated by the stratification of Ciskeian society. To begin with, the most important industries are located in ‘white’ areas, thus outside the jurisdiction of the Ciskeian government. Finally the mass media constitute an important link in the chains of dependence, for they mediate news to blacks either from the Afrikaner nationalist perspective, or from the white progressive or liberal perspective. Issues are judged and set forth in terms of their meaning for white, rather than in terms of their meaning for black politics.
