Anti-apartheid scholars displaced race with class precisely because race was so pervasive.

Evidence

Academic modes of analysis have therefore been closely aligned with the politics and discourses of opposition to apartheid. If the power of the apartheid state derived in large measure from its capacities to “normalize” race in the discourses and experiences of South Africans, Marxist theories which displaced race with class as the most fundamental cleavage in apartheid became instruments of intellectual and political subversion. The experiential ubiquity of race became exactly the reason to shift the primary focus of analysis to its material underpinnings. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 577

Categorization

• XREF: Directly echoed — nearly contradicted — by Omi & Winant’s insistence that racial formation is irreducible to class; useful context for why race-as-primary fell out of favor politically. — connects to: Race achieved maximum structural salience in apartheid South Africa compared to other societies. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 546; The apartheid of race has been subsumed into an apartheid of class — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 1592; Ubiquitous racial effects under apartheid meant nearly all literature touched race indirectly (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• The Marxist-led race-class debate reframed apartheid analysis around class while sidestepping race itself #corroborates (0.85) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 556
• The apartheid of race has been subsumed into an apartheid of class #expands (0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1592
• The canonical race-class debate on apartheid actually diverted attention away from race #complicates (0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 556
• Ubiquitous racial effects under apartheid meant nearly all literature touched race indirectly #qualifies (0.75)
• Race scholarship has displaced class as the center of social inequality debates #contradicts (0.75)
• Liberal apartheid scholars reduced race to a tool of Afrikaner ethnic factionalism #expands (0.75)
• Apartheid scholarship flourished directly in response to state oppression #complicates (0.72) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 576
• Race and class are interdependent formations, each lived through the other #corroborates (0.72) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 1113
• The race-class debate over apartheid was really about capitalism versus class analysis #expands (0.70)
• Race is the lived modality of class, affecting the whole class. #corroborates (0.70)
• Apartheid historiography sidestepped the theoretical question of what race actually is #expands (0.70)