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The article presents a reply by the author regarding criticism of his article "The Afrikaners as an emergent minority." The author points out that the critics of his article fail to convince him that Afrikaners are geographically and culturally isolated. The author is annoyed when critics underestimate the offences of English-speakers over Afrikaners and the fact of their economic minority status. The author had nowhere offered an interpretation of apartheid theory in any terms. The critics have stated that many Afrikaners take an alternative view of Blood River as punishment of the Zulus. Such a view, if taken, is however not inconsistent with a belief in the existence of a military threat. The assertion that there has been a virulent English press throughout South Africa's history does not enhance their credibility. South Africa's history is far longer than the history of South Africa's press. The author had not said that the Voortrekkers are taken as a role-model or that Afrikaners overlook internal dissent.

The article discusses the factors underlying change in the South African general election of 1970. The general election of 1970 represented the first occasion in approximately a quarter of a century in which the United Party was able to make significant gains at the expense of the governing National Party. The "swing" of 4.3 per cent to the United Party was a small but important one. It is conceivable that a large number of English voters who supported the Nationalists in 1966 and who returned to the United Party were influenced by the split within the National Party, although they may not have been aware of this reason when deciding to shift their allegiance. There seem to have been several influences bearing on the behaviour of young Afrikaners. Amongst these are some of the products and by-products of the "permissive society." Differences between the younger and older generations of Afrikaners have been evident over the past few years and have manifested themselves in such diverse activities as style of clothing, views on enjoyment, sexual mores and the meaning of religion. A re-orientation of political thinking might simply be an outgrowth of this influence.

In the present study a sample of white English speaking South African students was asked to detail their voting preferences prior to the 1970 general election and complete personality and attitude questionnaires in order that some indication be gained of the voting patterns obtaining in this minority group as well as the pattern of psycho-social attitudes pertaining to each voting group. The data indicates that there is little to choose between persons voting for either the United or Nationalist parties, in terms of general authoritarianism; the difference in voter choice being in prejudice held, with Progressives showing significantly less prejudice than the others. The young White voter seems to vote Nationalist out of some need for ideological commitment--he is relatively speaking consistent in his ethnocentrism and social distance whilst the United Party voter appears to support that party for non-ideological reasons, since there seems no consistent relationship between prejudice variables indicating a lack of ideological motivation, or at least consideration given to the relationship between attitudes held.

The article presents a discussion on the Afrikaners as an emergent minority. Sociologist Drew Archibald's recent article on the Afrikaners achieves its stated aim of contributing to an understanding of the Afrikaners' behaviour and attitudes. However, his thesis requires qualification since some very important recent trends among Afrikaners are completely ignored. By disregarding emergent differences within the Afrikaans-speaking community he presents a view of the Afrikaners that can be very misleading. Archibald's arguments would have been much more valid had they referred to the Afrikaners of ten to fifteen years ago. Afrikaans group has largely emerged from its former minority group orientation, and that only certain factions continue to be influenced very strongly by the pressures of the past. The Afrikaner group is rapidly assuming the identity of a bureaucratically organized white elite, and as such, their stance is coming to resemble that of the English-speakers more and more closely. Accurate theoretical analysis of the caste-system as it operates in South Africa requires that certain important additional factors be recognized.

Understanding of the Afrikaners' present behaviour and attitudes is perhaps facilitated by viewing them as an emergent minority. They have enjoyed political supremacy for so long that this is difficult at first. However, the required alteration in focus has merits simply as an exercise in objectivity, and may also serve to illustrate the unpleasant truth that the worst effects of discrimination are often on personalities of its victims. Few care to recognize the extent to which minority status can be morally disabling. The Afrikaners' experience includes military defeat and occupation, a long history of discrimination of many kinds and at least two determined attempts to suppress their language. It should perhaps be emphasized that since minority status is relative, Boers under British rule were no less a minority than the still lower status Africans. Minorities come into being because territory, political authority, people, and culture only rarely coincide. At various times and in different areas Afrikaners have been subject to a wide variety of governments, both their own and other peoples.

This article discusses the history of passive resistance in South Africa. The effects of the introduction of the plough on the division of labor in the tribal economy of the Bantu peoples of South Africa, the repercussions of conversion to Christianity on tribal authority, and the modification of family structure as a result of mine labor, provide a ready demonstration of the applicability of the law of cultural radiation. During three centuries of acculturation, this selective borrowing of items in isolation from their original setting has transformed the culture of the Bantu tribes. But the consequences are very much more complex at the present time, when the groups are completely interdependent, assimilation is proceeding rapidly and white and non-white participate in the same institutions.