Memory Politics and Archive in South African-Russian Relations

Introduction

The researcher argues that memory politics and archives are the foundations of international relations. This implies that memory politics and archives are building block of cultural diplomacy between South Africa and Russia since the 1920s. This is so because relations between these two nations is based on historical memory of the role played by the USSR during the apartheid period. This historical events created archives materials of military cooperation between the Union Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR) and the African National Congress (ANC) need to be documented. Therefore, there is a need to collect, document records about South African history relations with USSR. South Africa recognized that memory and archives materials contributed to establish international relations with Russians. For example, records preserved by the National Archives may illustrate role of USSR support to Umkhonto we Sizwe and indeed ANC and the SACP during the liberation struggle (lisson 2015, p. 159, Filatova, 2012 p. 508). The Umkhonto We Sizwe was the military wing of the ANC and the South Africa Communist party during the apartheid period. This military wing was abandoned after 1994. The ANC received support in the form of military, financial, educational, logistical, and political support from the USSR to fought against the apartheid government (Gurganus & Rumer 2019 p.13).

This chapter highlighted the significance of cultural diplomacy on cultural heritage of archives materials. Hence, It is the role of state to raise the awareness on cultural heritage (Nisbett 2013). This implies that nations engage in diplomatic relations with the view to promote cultural exchange programme, archives and museum archives exhibitions, facilitate public lectures, seminars on archives management and celebration of archives international days. These initiative contributed to build international reconciliation,cooperation and understanding.

The research attempted to answer the following research question:

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  What role have archives played in South Africa – Russia Federations?

Problem Statement

The National Archives of South Africa is responsble to collect archives about South Africa relations with USSR and Russia Federation. However, the review of literature shows that National archives has limited collection about the historical and cultural records (Flinn, 2008). It seems that the National Archives of South Africa has limited archives collections about the USSR relations with the ANC and South Africa.

Records created during the struggle for South Africa liberation were not fully preserved by the National Archives (Namhila 2015). Archives created during the USSR era were either destroyed or neglected. Hence the role of archivists is to discover records created during the USSR era of cold war (Marschall 2019 p. 1091). Most of the archives during the USSR and cold war were not fully collected by the State archives of South Africa (now the National Archives of South Africa). Archives about political parties interact with other countries are sensitive because it includes records of military interactions (Phillips 2016).

Political transformation and the search for social justice provided the stimulus for memory creation and public memory as stated by (Jacobsen, Punzalan, & Hedstrom 2013). Archival records figure in the preservation, extension, and promotion of cultural diplomacy. Hence, the ANC archives relation with USSR need to be preserved and documented as the history of South Africa. Furthermore, archives knowledge gap between South Africa and Russia presented an opportunity to conduct a research that bridge the gap through cultural diplomacy between two countries especially in arts, culture, and heritage. Despite South Africa relation with Russia, South Africa is also a regional hub of African cultural and political influence high – levels between respective countries promote cultural exchange as well as political, social, and economic interaction. This despite the legacy of colonialism and apartheid still affects socio-economic, political, cultural, and environmental realities (Marschall 2019).