A Happy People
THE authors of this book are Field Marshal Smuts's nephew and his wife, both South African anthropologists, one of whom is the author of The Social System of the Zulus. In a foreword the Prime Minister of South Africa says he " found it a fascinating distraction to the war problems which form my daily life. Perhaps the curious reader may find it no less entertaining." He will, even though he may not be particularly interested in anthropology, especially if he has got the stamina to persist to Chapters HI, " Bases of Subsistence," and the two succeeding chapters, " Co-operation and Exchange " and " Family Ties." Readers of Melville's delightful .Typee will remem- ber his fascinating account of a prosperous people and their rich and contented way of life in a Pacific island before it was destroyed by impact with hostile and uncomprehending Europeans; bringing a new environment and no civilisation ; they will find here an equally attractive, though more scientific, account of the life of a South African tribe, now living under their Queen, Mujaji III, the " Rain-Queen," North of the Transvaal, in their traditional way, and as yet uncorrupted, and only very slightly influenced by European civilisation.
In spite of the great expansion of our knowledge, due to scientific curiosity during the nineteenth century, there still persists, even among the educated and governing classes in Europe and America today, the delusion that we, modem Europeans and Americans, possess a culture and a social organisation superior to any other, past or present. On the whole, in spite of our undeniable material advantages, this is an illusion, and one under which the majority of us still suffer blindly. If any reader doubt this, let him note the evil social results among the Lovedu tribe that have followed the introduction of the plough into their agricultural economy, as described in Chapter III. Not only has it accelerated soil erosion (a material loss to offset its saving of labour), but also it has " released a large amount of energy for which there is little creative outlet." This last sentence is crucial. As we read this book we discover • that the Lovedu live a far more rich, contented, active and purposeful life from childhood to old age than ours. They still enjoy in large measure what we have lost. Machinery developed beyond our social powers has robbed us of much creative activity without our having anything to put in its place. It has delivered the masses to be helpless victims to the purveyors of large-scale superficial amusements, so unsatisfying to the people who flock to them in desperation that, in their restlessness, they are the prey of any Hitlerian adventurer offering them excitement and a purpose - and at the same time it has thrown that perennial minority, gifted with some special faculty, into a sterile, highbrow culture without any real relationship to the world they live in, or the lives of the majority of their fellows—since the gulf between the purposeless masses and the talented few is without a bridge.
Every observing and perceptive mind writing in the last twenty- five years between the two wars, hasarecognised that the chief need of our times is a fresh scale of values. Here also we may learn something from the Lovedu tribe. They have achieved co-operation without competition. They have been the masters, not the slaves, of their efficient economy. For them work is a feast and a recreation, and they do not lose individuality. " A man's whole upbringing and train-S ing conditioned him for the ideal of reciprocity and helpfulness.", The authors describe the new changes now coming with Christianisa- tion and the proximity of the Europeans.
" Collective replaces co-operative activity ; for personal profit, not sociability, is the prime motive ; the social gala is converted into a labour situation, and the interests of employer and employee begin to diverge. Room for roundabout reciprocity is narrowed ; instead of the indefinite mutuality upon which a man who helps others today may rely in the future he receives an immediate and indi- vidual reward ; faith in long-range equivalents of services and obligations gives way to a desire for direct personal satisfaction. . . . Direction, hitherto unknown in the economic relations of equals, degenerates to exploitation."
The Lovedu had no commercial instincts ; they did not think begging wrong, and did not contrast it with self-reliance, but with theft= a man should always ask for, not steal, the things of another." Their traditional trade was sharply distinguished from " bizmis (business), which is associated with subterfuge and personal gain ; but the Christianised natives have become depraved middlemen, who exploit their fellow men. " The Christian church, with its fees and' collections, falls, to the Lovedu manner of thinking, within the bizmis ' scheme ; one buys baptism and confirmation ; at com- munion one pays for the flesh and blood of Christ. How different is the institution of munywalo. No wonder the work of the Church is infinitely difficult."
No wonder Europe is in chaos. We have every one of us a great deal to unlearn as well as to learn, and such books as this—the fruit of more than ten years' sympathetic, first-hand study—may widen our horizon and help tis in our long and arduous search not for Utopia, but only for a solidly based genuine and good
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