Chapter 6 begins by offering a broad look at some of the concrete contributions Black Consciousness cadres gave to the African National Congress of South Africa (ANC) and Umkhonto We Sizwe (MK) in exile. At the same time, the reality of MK fighting a war against the apartheid regime backed by its imperialist allies made the resistance movement all the harder. Consequently, Black Consciousness–oriented cadres were trapped in the internal power struggles of the movement, paranoia around the reality of infiltration and the high casualties being inflicted on MK by the apartheid war machine. Close attention is paid to the 1984 MK Mutiny by reassessing some of the oral accounts and written reports which document this sad event. Additionally, Chapter 6 carefully examines statements made by President Oliver Tambo at the Kabwe Conference in 1985 where he discusses at length the new ANC disposition towards Black Consciousness. In summation, this chapter shows how elements of Black Consciousness found ways to survive and, in some cases, thrive within the ANC/MK and South African Communist Party (SACP). However, far too many suffered from distrust, neglect in the camps and imprisonment in part because of their Black Consciousness politics.

This chapter maps the history of efforts of Black Consciousness activists to rebuild their shattered armed wing post-1976. It advances the story in exile through a careful look at attempts at Black Consciousness organizing to restart their armed struggle. This tenaciousness, ever-present in the Azanian Black Nationalist Tradition, highlights the continued importance and relevance of Black Consciousness to the eventual fall of apartheid post-1977. They continued to fight up until 1993 despite the ANC actively obstructing and preventing state or NGO support from being given to organizations under the Black Consciousness banner. These newer formations (IRE, SAYRCO and AZANLA) would engage closely with the wider Third World Revolution and find ways to adopt different lessons, tactics, strategies, theories and perspectives into their ever-expanding political praxis. This did not lessen or dilute their Black Consciousness praxis; on the contrary, it complimented its theoretical and organizational capacities. Nevertheless, the lack of state support, unevenness in centring the gender question, the continued strength of the apartheid war machine and serious disagreements among different Black Consciousness factions hurt the movement in exile. Regardless, they continued to fight.

Chapter 2 re-examines a broadly documented history of the formative years of BCM. A whirlwind of activity laid the groundwork for lesser researched aspects of the early BCM years such as the development of Black Consciousness among working people, the creation of literacy projects, community development programs, internal debates on the merits of taking up arms and the central role played by Black women in the growth and development of the movement and its various projects. It was from within these events, agendas and projects that armed struggle was returned to by cadres such as Bokwe Mafuna, Nosipho Matshoba, Welile Nhlapo and Tebogo Mafole. For Black Consciousness, one could not respect picking up arms without also respecting and building from the social conditions and organizational details/skills/labour of their non-violent stage/wing. They mutually reinforced each other. Black Consciousness activists saw picking up arms as adding another layer to a powerful internal social movement against white settler colonialism. After the banning of key leaders in early 1973, by the end of the year, the first wave of activists left for Botswana to begin building this new armed wing of the movement.

This chapter details the first attempt of the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) to put together an armed wing in exile in Botswana. After engaging with the different movements in exile Mafuna, Matshoba, Mafole and Nengwekhulu had to figure out how their Black Consciousness praxis would fit in this new phase of struggle. Based out of Botswana, they were able to maintain close communications with the internal wing of the movement that was growing rapidly. They had to use the skills they learned building BCM inside the country in exile to keep their work discreet, yet, continue to organize in plain sight. Eventually, they were able to receive help from the PAC and North African/Middle Eastern radicals in their quest for military training. This represented a continuation of the Azanian Black Nationalist Tradition in Botswana and showed Black Consciousness had the ability to learn from and absorb tactics, strategies and theories from wider Third-World struggles. Critically, the movement would have to encounter patriarchy and sexism as it pertained to who could even obtain military training. Marginalizing the gender question weakened the formation and demeaned the labour, triumphs and sacrifices of Black women who had with the men made their work possible.

Chapter 5 delves into the presence of Black Consciousness as a powerful current of thought and praxis inside Umkhonto We Sizwe (MK). The period from 1977 to 1981 is generally agreed upon by scholars and activists as one in which MK was able to assert itself as the leading South African liberation movement. It was also clearly recognized that Soweto generation recruits who came to MK during the uprising were fundamental to this transformation. However, the details on how this generation brought its Black Consciousness politics into the armed wing of the ANC have been underemphasized. The Soweto generation recruits who dominated the rank-and-file and mid-level commanders in the immediate years after 1976 carried a politics of Black Consciousness into MK which temporarily enabled it to become a more radical organization. Building on Stephen Davis’s conception of Novo Catengue and other camps in Angola as spaces of both repression and the positive foundation of the newly re-forged MK, this chapter will attempt to interrogate the role Black Consciousness played within this space.

The conclusion begins by sketching some key events in the Southern African Liberation Struggle, namely, the battle of Quito Cuanavale and the release of Nelson Mandela from prison. It then proceeds to discuss some of the implications of the latter through brief political biographies on Chris Hani and Winnie Madikizela-Mandela. After this engagement, a broad summary of the Black Consciousness Movement and its armed wing takes place followed by an examination of the broader implications of this work to the study of the African Liberation Movements. The conclusion closes by taking a brief look at contemporary South African politics and political activism and closes with a call for unity across the Black International.

This introduction maps out the local, national, regional and world-historical implications and motivations for Arming Black Consciousness. It begins with an examination of Khotso Seatlholo and his motivations for joining and leading the Soweto Uprising in 1976. It then moves to a discussion of how little we know about the armed wings of the Black Consciousness Movement, suggests some reasons why and engages with Steve Biko and his coyness around the question of armed struggle. The introduce then proceeds to map out the importance of the Haitian Revolution to the theoretical concept of the Black Radical Tradition and African Liberation Struggles. This is a perspective that is not engaged with much in the literature on the liberation struggles in Africa so some detail is given to its intricacies here. This is followed by a brief literature review on Black Consciousness, armed struggle, Black Power and some engagement with the Cold War. The introduction closes by discussing the importance in centring Black women in these narratives of revolution, makes some interventions around methodology and then discusses the various sources used to construct this narrative.

Chapter 1 begins by broadly sketching how the movement of the masses of African peoples towards armed struggle can be understood within the framework of Robinson’s Black Radical Tradition. Within this context, the First All-African People’s Conference (AAPC) of 1958 takes centre stage as it brought a number of soon-to-be liberation movement figures together with older veterans of the post-WWII anti-colonial struggle on African soil to deliberate on the direction the decolonization process would take. During the conference, a debate emerged among conference participants on Kwame Nkrumah’s non-violent positive action versus Frantz Fanon’s armed struggle. After exploring how this was resolved, the chapter moves on chronologically to a broad examination of the Azanian Black Nationalist Tradition as it in consistent patterns fuelled non-violent insurgencies, dreams of freedom and decisions to return to armed struggle. The second half of the chapter follows Stokely Carmichael in Tanzania. This section is less about Carmichael or Tanzania, but more about tracking how Black Power ideas, concepts and praxis interacted with and within various liberation movements and continental African peoples. Carmichael saw Black Power as important for emerging states which were majority African/Black but was met with resistance by the ANC.