ABSTRACT
Much of the literature on collective resistance in South Africa has tended to focus on organizational and campaign history. The struggles of the oppressed have all too often been evaluated in terms of organizational or campaign goals and, therefore, are viewed as having 'failed' because the basis of state power had apparently been left intact. None the less, high levels of mobilization and participation have frequently been achieved and these processes are both important in themselves and indications of the possibilities of popular involvement in future transformations. Resistance also involves a variety of struggles, confrontations and circumventions that do not always coalesce into organized opposition to state power. 'People in struggle' respond to a variety of oppressive or exploitative forces in society, of which the state is but one.
