Modern South Africa was built on the foundations of white racism and black resistance to racism and oppression. For generations white politics revolved around the issues of who among the white political parties had the best formula to, on the one hand, contain black development and protect whites from having to treat blacks as equals, and on the other hand to protect whites from the black backlashes for what was done to them.

Divisions in black politics have flowed from a division of opinion in black society about how to oppose apartheid and how best to reconstitute South African society. One stream of thought has seen a need for revolutionary change and the imposition on the country of a black majority government powerful enough to re-order the State itself. In this school of thought white racism has been seen as being so deeply entrenched that only a Marxist form of government, with massive powers to change the nature of the State, could bring about the changes blacks require.

Another stream of thought has seen the need to reconstitute the country by infusing the black population into the existing institutions to free them of white racist exclusivity. In this stream of thought the forces of democracy are regarded as sufficient to ensure that, over time, evolutionary change, hastened by black political initiatives, will liberalise society and transform the country's institutions to make them race free.

The differences of approach between revolutionists and evolutionists are not confined to the senior echelons of political parties. When one speaks to their rank and file adherents, it is clear that stark differences of orientation and aspiration exist also at grass root level. The differences one encounters are politically irreconcilable and it must be recognised that the forces these differences have generated will keep political parties locked into conflicts of formidable proportions if strong and innovative steps are not taken to normalise political relations.

Whatever policy statements were made latterly, and whatever lip-service was given to the importance of democracy, exiled politicians committed to the armed struggle saw their task as not only to bring about change, but to do so in such a way that it would be them and nobody else who ended up ruling the country. In fact most of them thought that the only suitable democracy for South Africa was a one party democracy.

Exiled revolutionaries were sustained by the hope that South Africa's black population were eagerly waiting for revolutionary change, and were ready to take up arms and in the ripeness of time to install the ANC's Mission in exile as a revolutionary government of the people.  They were wrong about the readiness of people actively to join in revolutionary activity.

Inkatha, as an alternative to revolutionary organisations, sought to bring about change through non-violent democratic means and sought to establish government by consensus in an open democratic society. Inkatha has always been prepared to take its chances alongside other political groups and to rely on political support in a society where there is real freedom of choice between political parties and political programmes. For the sake of national reconciliation, for the sake of the politics of negotiation, and for the sake of a peaceful solution to South Africa's problems, Inkatha was prepared to make compromises to achieve an all-party constitutional and political settlement.

When black politics is seen in its historical context it must be recognised that there have been irreconcilable differences between black political groups, and it must be seen that the struggle for liberation in this country has a duality about it. There has not only been a general black struggle to bring about radical changes, but there has also been an intense black conflict about the fundamental questions of how to bring about change, and about what kind of society should be established. The ANC's Mission in exile aimed to bring about changes in a manner which would entrench them as a powerful post-revolutionary government. Inkatha aimed to bring about changes in such a manner that there would be real power-sharing between race groups.