Awarded COFAS Marie Curie fellows
– For the FOIP programme
Project:
Business as usual? SKF and Metall in South Africa
1967–2007
Jonas Sjölander
E-mail:
[email protected]
Home University:
Linnæus University, School
of Humanities, History
www.lnu.se
Host University:
Rhodes University,
Department of History,
South Africa
www.ru.ac.za
Abstract: The project concerns parts of the Swedish South Africa Policy
during the period 1967 to 2007. Focus is directed on The Swedish Metal
Workers Union (Metall), and its South African sister unions towards,
apartheid and disinvestment. The activities of the Swedish multinational
SKF (ball bearings) are examined. Work- and union conditions during
and after the liberation from Apartheid are studied in depth. Interviews
with former workers and unionists in South Africa are one of the main
sources in the study. Some of the interviews have been done in the township Kwanobuhle outside “Africa’s Detroit”, Uitenhage, where many of
the unemployed SKF-workers live. The attitude to economic sanctions
against South Africa constituted a crucial frontier in the debate about
Swedish attitudes to the apartheid system. In Sweden there was popular
support for disinvestment and sanctions against South Africa during the
1980s. Metall preferred anyhow to support the black and non racial
trade unions through direct links rather than unreservedly joining the
Anti-Apartheid international campaign for total disinvestment. Metall
found it hard to accept that SKF was denied small but necessary reinvestments in machinery when SKF’s giant neighbour, Volkswagen made a
huge direct investment in building a new painting unit. The German investment occurred without protest or discussion. The different positions
concerning the Swedish South Africa policy are of central importance in
the survey. The study relates to and corresponds with perspectives and
analytical concepts that have been developed within newer research on
international labour and solidarity. As well economic and trade union
power relationships, as coinciding and antagonistic interests average
workers and companies are studied. My research also contains discussions on social movement unionism, and conflicting perspectives between
traditional trade unions and the anti-apartheid movement in Sweden
and South Africa. The crucial role of organized trade union movement,
nationally and internationally, in the successful struggle against apartheid
is one main result that I already now would like to emphasize.
Career plan: I’m a Marie Curie fellow at Rhodes University in South
Africa (2010-2012). It has been a fantastic experience to be here so far.
Many interviews have been done and the archives are very useful to me.
I have had one seminar at Rhodes and one article has been published in
the South African Labour Bulletin. I’m planning to get another article published in an international publication for Social History during 2011. The
final results of the project will be published in a book by the end of 2012.
This is the first time someone from Sweden has been in contact with
the SKF workers in Uitenhage since the factory was closed down in June
2007. Many of them are very interested in telling their story and to give
their opinion on for example the question of disinvestment and sanctions
during the days of apartheid. The fellowship has made it possible for
me to continue the research approach that I was developing in my PhD
thesis. Now I have been given the opportunity to give new perspectives
on those issues.