Colonial Captivity during the First World War: Internment and the Fall of the German Empire, 1914—1919

Abstract

practices they used to keep the apartheid system in existence. Sitze believes its mandate was too limited to examining individuals rather than denouncing the whole system and that, by not choosing to follow a judicial path and to try malefactors, it has encouraged evasions of the law by the successor governments. Perhaps, but they could not see so far ahead; like the British colonial rulers before them, the new government in South Africa had to deal pragmatically with the situation which faced them. Their main objective was surely to achieve a smooth transition and to avoid violence, acts of reprisal and further disharmony. From this point of view what they achieved was one of the great success stories of the late twentieth century. But Sitze is Professor of Law at Amherst (p. 256), and lawyers cling to the letter of the law as motor mechanics cling to cars; what statesmen should do is respond pragmatically and as humanely as possible to circumstance. If the Nuremberg pattern had been followed, the trials would have continued at enormous cost, further poisoning relations between the races in South Africa. A much better title for this book would have been ‘Justice or Reconciliation: Colonial Example and ANC Practice’.