Algebra and Splendour
Race and Nationalism. By Thomas Fra (Allen and Unwin, 30s.)
The Vision Splendid. By C. E. Lucas Philf (Heinemann, 25s.) THE pile of books purporting to be the real (1 on the Rhodesian Federation now mounts reviewer's knees. It forms a comfortable ence on which to kneel and pray that the dozen works on this subject may find it po to concentrate on the future of the Fe arrangement or to study only one aspect 0' sparing the reader these enormous, blac obscurely bilious chapters which clack tin' the constitutional history of Central Africa make it sound more and more like algebra. Franck's book is puzzling. His algebra is asii bidding as the next man's, but certain 01,1 chapters contain new facts and some fresh elusions, making it more of a pity that 01 ward-looking summary (this chapter is ust".;1 called 'Whither?' or 'Into the Rapids') is not To enterprising. The long-awaited Review C0;51 ence has now begun, and its first weeks rtiO trumpeted the question which was being mut more and more frequently in the press: W there remains the slightest chance that A change in the Federal structure cat: be fa.41 enough to tempt Africans to consider prese'Ll the Federation? It is very obvious now that is no such chance: all that the three Al!, leaders want from Federation is the 601'1 escape from it. Dr. Franck, on the other 11:4- is convinced that the Federation must he r served in order to help the Africans of Soul Rhodesia in their constitutional struggles. a which Mr. Joshua Nkomo does not seem to s He does not discuss policies of 'looser 3554 tion' (confiscating Federation's braces and laces), and he is sometimes very optinll"- `could [ten years] see a Welensky camPai.g actively for native support, perhaps even 111 native language of the masses'?' But Dr. Fed is more of a sociologist than a politician. an iit.131'• Franck may occasionally invent goblins Colonial Secretaries 'Arthur' Griffiths and '''e Oliver Lyttelton, but at least he has tried 11',.i.firid something out an then write it down. t'gadier Phillips, who ndormally writes adven- ture books about commando raids, says he went ;' find out too, but the funny thing is that he ilium that everybody who disagreed with Federa- ii°fl or belonged to the Labour Party or sympa- colscd with Congress was a blithering idiot, or a thqounded knave, or both. Scottish missions ii111.0ut to be rotten, weedy places; and Catholic l''slons, though rather good at discipline, have sine, have un-British about them; but Anglican ''ssions are splendid . . . except for that multi- ..ae!al mission farm place St. Faith's, 'where snolitical extremism brought the agricultural :•heille to disaster.' The Brigadier is deeply re- e'lled in sentences like these: `. . . in his very p tiraeeesses of thought and sense of values, the ntu differs fundamentally from the European. "(11 he mixed with us, he did not, for example. it 411(1 LIP in the presence of a superior.' SPECTATOR, DECEMBER 23, 1 9 6 0 enjoyed himself in the attempt to establish conservatism percentile' among Southern u9desian Europeans. To a key suggestion that ning-car segregation should end, Anglicans elled as far more liberal than Jews, who were turn more in favour of integration than Catho- ibes• 'Old Rhodesians' are less and not more e,ral than younger men. Women are more rellidiced than men and white workers are far Th °re prejudiced than white shopkeepers.
NEAL ASCHERSON
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