If Afrikaners had to give advice to Americans …

Some remarks after my conversation with Yuri Bezmenov

During a recent podcast interview with

Yuri Bezmenov

here on Substack, I was asked whether we could give any advice coming from an Afrikaner perspective to Americans. It is a great question, and I was happy to be asked this, because we believe that the Afrikaners of the 21^st century have learned some important lessons through our experience in South Africa – lessons that we would like to share with our friends abroad. By no means does this imply that we have all the solutions. It does point to the fact, though, that South Africa has gone through a certain experience over the past three decades that much of the world is yet to encounter. This is because the so-called “end of history” thesis is reaching its conclusion as the alleged final solutions of the 1990s (the implementation of liberal democracy in every possible context) are crumbling while communities the world over are beginning to reorganise themselves in terms of ideas on identity and the political action that sprout from this.

I know that my host did not expect me to provide some kind of silver bullet. The fact is –there are no silver bullets. The 20^th century provides enough evidence that attempts to “fix” macro societal issues by way of quick fixes tend to lead to catastrophe. This is because actual bullets tend to be used to enforce theoretical silver bullets. There is a reason for this: Theoretical solutions might make sense on paper, but that does not mean that they are compatible with reality. Needless to say, a solution that is incompatible with reality is not applicable, unless enforced by violence. Even then, the enforcement creates an illusion of compatibility, only to lead to eventual collapse.

From an Afrikaner perspective there is much that we can say about the solution. We believe in a multi-faceted approach. If, however, we were to simplify our approach to a one-liner, it would be this: Build community institutions and be actively involved in them. This is a practical solution; not a theoretical one. By this, I do not mean that it is not grounded in theory, but that its implementation depends on real-life action taken by ordinary people under the guidance of strong communal leadership, as opposed to some policy position enforced by the state through legislation.

In our experience the government and the state constitute the most important source of problem. This is because the South African government actively works to discriminate against minority communities such as ours. This does not mean that the state is the beginning and the end of our problems, because, like all communities, we also have to deal with issues of apathy, naivety and misguidedness within our community. It is easy (and indolent) to claim that the problem is merely an external one. Claiming such does not change the fact that there is always an internal component to societal and political problems too.

This is why we are actively working to build community institutions and to encourage community involvement in these institutions. Community institutions as the solution offer a multifaceted solution  - on the one hand they encourage communal involvement, combatting apathy and pessimism, while on the other hand they are “state-proofing the community, protecting the community from the state.

(The Sol-Tech campus in Centurion, South Africa. The single biggest donation to build this campus was R10 ($0.55). This private facility was built as a result of hundreds of thousands of people donating small amounts every month. It is privately owned by a network of community institutions. It is by far the best vocational training college in South Africa.)

If we were to give advice to Americans, it would be exactly this: Return to the community, encourage communal involvement and state-proof yourselves in the process.

However, given that our approach is based on experience preceding theory, I have to emphasize the fact that there are no universal solutions, because every situation – and every problem – is unique. I would argue that the solution offered by community institutions and involvement in those institutions is as close to a universal solution as one would get, because it is a natural solution, in tune with human nature. Therefore, I would argue that some element of this solution will be applicable to every society that faces animosity.

This does not change the fact that the American experience is different to the Afrikaner experience. In our situation, we simply have no way to gain control of the government. We are simply too few in numbers in the bigger South African territory. There are about 2,7 million Afrikaners in South Africa, compared to the total population of more than 60 million. This in itself should serve as a cautionary tale to the West – that by becoming a minority in your own country as a result of which there will be no prospect to stop active and continued government discrimination, is a tangible and serious threat.

In the American experience, however, there is some prospect to win an election, thus changing the government. These prospects are becoming increasingly dim as a result of immigration and consequential demographic factors though. Despite dwindling prospects, it would be irresponsible and unrealistic to try to convince Americans that they should turn their backs on the state and turn exclusively to community institutions.

The solution, I believe, is another multifaceted solution. The one facet is to actively participate in American politics and elections, while recognising that politics (in the narrow, modern sense of the word) can at best provide short-term solutions. This is because modern politics is inherently structured to aim for the next election, as opposed to aiming for the next generation. For conservative Americans to turn their back on politics would not only be reckless – it would be unfathomable. The other facet, however, is to recognise that an exclusive focus on narrow politics would be detrimental in the long run. This is first because even the best statist solutions can be turned around once a new government comes to power, and second because by nature statist solutions can never by comprehensive, sustainable or long-term solutions. This is because the state is an artificial construct, created by the community, but one that is operating detached from the community.

The somewhat philosophical moral of the story is that we should work with the means at our disposal and do what can be done, not because we have reached this conclusion through some ideological theory, but because we have learned certain lessons through our experience in reality. Reality is complex though, which means that real solutions based on experience shouldn’t be oversimplified. A healthy direction to follow is to keep track of the difference between natural solutions and artificial solutions. Natural solutions sprout from our natural inclinations, such as our desire for identity, belonging and to be part of a community; from our natural inclination to distinguish between what is objectively good and objectively evil; and from the actions we take as a result of these inclinations. Artificial solutions follow from the man-made entities that we have constructed to replace what is natural. In this regard, the modern state is the most important case in point. We would do well to take note of the concern expressed by Pierre Manent that modern philosophy has been completely swallowed by the state – that it is becoming increasingly difficult to think of societal solutions outside the realm of the state, despite the fact that the state as we know it is a recent development, in many ways out of sync with our natural proclivities.

There is a place for artificial solutions, but these solutions tend to be unsustainable. If our circumstances dictate that certain artificial solutions have to be pursued, that is fine. We must, however, never lose track of the natural solutions. And the most important natural solution lies in what Alexis de Tocqueville observed during his travels through America in the 1830s – strengthening our communities and the institutions that sprout from them.

Ernst Roets