48 ibid, p. 118.
49 ibid, p. 118-121. The Report suggested that Africans should be employed as school inspectors as soon as possible to address these shortcomings.
50 ibid, p. 122. The Report also argued that schooling more generally was ‘too academic/, p. 163. 51 ibid, p. 122.
The Commissioners argued for separate education by highlighting the inherent dangers of the existing system:
schools o f a western type have been introduced, schools which are concerned primarily, not with reinforcing, or being reinforced by, the other social institutions o f Bantu society but more largely with the transmission o f ideas, attitudes and skills which have not been developed in Bantu society itself and are often not in harmony with its institutions52
In their view such schools had produced a
group o f people who break away too rapidly from the views and habits o f their own people and sometimes act against their own community. Such a stray minority is readily formed where two cultures are in close contact.. .he is an outcast among his own people and can find no anchorage with the people o f the other culture53
The Report attempted to show how the 'staggering power and glitter of Western culture'54 had an adverse effect upon the 'relatively simple social organisation of the South African Bantu.'55
The Commissioners reasoned that African education though well intended, was inappropriate given the nature of the relationship between Africans and whites in South Africa. Existing policy created Africans who were divorced from their milieu, but who found little opportunity elsewhere, because, as a culturally distinct race, ‘the Bantu’ could not be successfully assimilated into ‘European culture.' The picture painted was one of impending doom; the country was seen to be facing social crisis as Africans were educated for an unattainable lifestyle which, they argued, could lead to social and political turmoil.
Although the Eiselen Report can be seen as part of a wider project the reports from British settler colonies condemned the existing state of African education in remarkably similar
52 Eiselen Report, p. 130. 53 ibid, p. 128.
54 ibid, p. 130.
terms. Thus, the Beecher Report referred to a ‘general criticism of the school system because of its lack of identity with the true needs of the community.’56 All the reports condemned the ‘bookish’ and unrealistic nature of African education, Binns arguing that ‘enlightened teachers and administrators [must be] alive to the danger of a theoretical and bookish education.’57 They also argued that existing education policy created Africans who were averse to manual labour and strove for white-collar jobs.58 The Beecher Report noted that
African chiefs and responsible African leaders indicated in evidence that they are much exercised by this element in African society which, in their judgement, is capable of becoming a discontented and indeed subversive
force’59
The Kerr Report noted that this group of academically educated Africans was acquiring 6 a deep sense of frustration and grievance - a state of mind capable of having an effect on an educated group similar to that which a detonator has on dynamite. ’60
The Eiselen Report as Solution
Kros has argued that ‘the foundations of ‘Grand Apartheid’ are clearly apparent in the Eiselen Report. ’61 The solution to the problems of African education, as it saw them, could
56 Beecher Report, p. 34. 57 Binns Report, p. 66.
58 See in particular, Beecher Report, p. 39,. The Jeffrey Report noted that ‘Contempt for manual work is certainly widespread5, Jeffrey Report, p. 20.
59 Beecher Report, p. 39. 60 Kerr Report, p. 12.
61C. Kros, ‘Economic, Political.., p. 325. She adds ‘The Report should be read as a programmatic outline of apartheid5, p. 324. On the one hand this seems to contradict Posel’s assertion that there was no ‘grand plan5 for apartheid, however, it also supports her contention that there was considerable tension within the National Party as to what apartheid actually meant. Despite the fact that the Eiselen Report was a ‘visionary’ document this does not mean that it was not to be tempered in its early stages by a period of pragmatism (which would explain Hyslop’s contention that Bantu Education was partly conceived to stabilise the African urban youth). As Lazar has remarked ‘ apartheid ideology was a complex, changing and often contradictory mix of both short-term pragmatism and general ideological thrust.5 Lazar, ‘Verweord versus...’, p. 362.
not be via simple piecemeal improvements. The Report emphasised a massive programme of social and political engineering that drew the central state, and all its constituent parts which dealt with ‘Bantu affairs,' into a unified ‘plan' to finally address the ‘Native Question’ in its entirety. Eiselen was committed by the late 1940s to the idea of complete territorial separation. In 1948 he told the Witwatersrand People’s Forum that he understood the word apartheid to mean:
the separating of the heterogeneous, ... population of this country, into separate socio-economic units, inhabiting separate parts of the country, each enjoying in its own area full citizen rights62
It would appear the Commission was never solely concerned with education and greatly overstepped its initial purpose.63 Rather, it was concerned with the role that education would play within an elaborate plan for the wholesale socio-economic development o f ‘Bantu Communities’. In a particularly revealing passage it argued;
Bantu development and Bantu education should be largely synonymous terms. Education is more than a matter of schooling...Education must be co-ordinated with a definite and carefully planned policy for the development of Bantu societies64
It continued, ‘It has become essential for Bantu education and all other Bantu social services to be co-ordinated in a series of reforms. ’65 The phrase ‘plan for Bantu development’ occurs repeatedly throughout the Report. This emphasis on the need for a programmatic examination of all aspects o f ‘Bantu life’ was, unsurprisingly, welcomed by the SABRA which commented
In our view the Commission has undoubtedly succeeded in carrying out its
62 Eiselen to the Witwatersrand People’s Forum 8th August 1948. KCL H. Nicliolls Collection, File 3 ‘Bantu Affairs. ’
63 The Commissioners even admitted as much, ‘Your Commission is aware that the