Meanwhile back on the “boereplaas”

ABSTRACT

In this article it is argued that in spite of the strains the governing Nationalist party in South Africa might have imposed on its traditional ethnic support base when it embarked on its reform venture and despite the ostensive failure of this venture, its support and legitimacy has not been eroded among the Afrikaner middle‐class youth as represented by the students at the University of Stellenbosch. The findings support the suggestion that this is so because the major institutions binding the Afrikaners into a community are still consonant on their support for the Afrikaner domination of the policy – thus giving continued comfort to the profound presumption in Afrikaner political culture that with the consummation of a Republican polity they established a prerogative to rule it for themselves (and for others).