Labnet: Information on Labor History Price winner Lucien Van Der Walt

[labnet at lists.labourhistory.net]

From: Labourhistory.net

Information on Labor History Prize winner Lucien Van Der Walt
http://labourhistory.net/news/i0804_9.php 

The journal 'Labor History' has awarded Lucien Van Der Walt of Wits
Sociology its international prize for the best Ph.D. dissertation of
2007 for his thesis on 'Anarchism and Syndicalism in South
Africa,1904-1921: rethinking the history of labour and the left'. Labor
History, published by Routledge, is widely considered the pre-eminent
journal for historical scholarship in its field in the world. The highly
prestigious and competitive prize is awarded for the best Ph.D. on a
labour topic, historical or contemporary, regardless of discipline, and
draws entrants worldwide. It is awarded for the significance,
originality, and quality of research, the sophistication of methodology,
the clarity of presentation and cogency of arguments, and the
contribution to the field of labour studies.

Van der Walt was supervised by Professor Jonathan Hyslop of the Wits
Institute for Social and Economic Research (WISER). Hyslop says "Van der
Walt's thesis is a remarkable feat of scholarship which effectively
challenges much of the received wisdom in South African labour history.
The award of this prize is richly deserved international recognition for
truly original work". The thesis looked at the influence of anarchism
and syndicalism on left, labour and nationalist movements in southern
Africa from the 1890s into the 1920s. Internationally, this was a period
of widespread anarchist and syndicalist influence: van der Walt showed
that, contrary to conventional wisdom and partisan accounts, these
currents had a pervasive influence locally as well. This radical
tradition worked across the colour line, and across borders; it
pioneered socialism and labour unionism amongst people of colour;
sceptical of both African and Afrikaner nationalism, it aimed at a
universal human community based on internationalism, self-management and
libertarian socialism.

Bert Altena
Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam



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