Talk:1948 South African general election

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Elections and Referendums

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Slogans

I have removed an edit listed NP slogans in the article intro (the slogans listed were: 'die kaffer op sy plek' and 'koelies gaan huis toe'. My feeling is that this sort of indepth information is not suitable for an intro which is supposed to give a brief overview. Furthermore, I do not think it appropriate to include the slogans in the main body, given that the NP's attitude towards non-Europeans is made abundantly clear by the rest of the content of the article. The sentiment of these slogans (essentailly, that Black South Africans needed to be kept in their place and that Indian SAns needed to be expatriated) is subsumed under the slogan 'Swart Gevaar' (Black Peril) which was much more widely used and is much more famous than the other two slogans under discussion. In short, I removed the two slogans to avoid redundancy.Eccohomo (talk) 08:08, 1 July 2010 (UTC)Eccohomo[reply]

You removed useful slogans, now reverted three times. If someone reverts you, why do you insist on removing sourced text?--Chris (クリス • フィッチュ) (talk) 13:56, 5 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that these slogans are useful. I dispute that they should be placed in the Introductory section which is supposed to give a broad overview of the topic without going into too many specifics. You may be able to make a case for including them in the main body, though my point about the sentiment of the slogans being subsumed under the general heading 'Swart Gevaar' still stands. Articles on other election campaigns conducted in other countries don't exhaustively list every slogan used, so I'm not really sure that this one shouldEccohomo (talk) 09:57, 7 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have removed these slogans from the Intro and included them in the main body. You will see I have re-translated them to give a more idomatic and natural rendering and have formatted the style of this text to make it consistent with that used elsewhere.Eccohomo (talk) 10:10, 7 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That's acceptable, I took out "gloss" as unnecessary, parenthesis and quotes make it clear to the reader. Thanks.--Chris (クリス • フィッチュ) (talk) 04:42, 8 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Coloured voters

I removed a paragraph which stated that Coloured voters boycotted this election in large numbers. I could find no evidence for this assertion; indeed, the paragraph was not referenced.Eccohomo (talk) 08:08, 1 July 2010 (UTC)Eccohomo[reply]

In accordance withe the citation neede policiy of WP ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_needed ), I have moved this material to the talk page:

"Many Coloured voters boycotted the election in protest at their restriced franchise and other discrimination ^{[citation needed]}: this may also have helped the NP victory ^{[citation needed]}, leading to government efforts first to give Coloureds separate and reduced representation (by Whites) and later to remove their votes altogether.^{[citation needed]}"

I have done so for two reasons: i)Despite numerous and extensive searches, i have been unable to find any evinced for the view that Coloured voters boycotted the polls in significant numbers. Data relating to this election seems quite scarce, and I don't know of any extant record which explicitly states the numbers of each race group that voted.

ii)The statement that Coloured voters stayed away from the polls strikes me as incredible (as in, hard to believe). Given that the NP was avowedly dedicated to depriving non-Europeans of rights,and the UP had attempted over the years to protect Coloured rights, it makes sense to argue that the Coloured voters had compelling reasons to show up to vote, and to vote for the UP.

Having said all this, I would feel happy to move this paragraph back to the page if evidence for this statement was forthcoming

Assertion

" the UP supported vague notions of slowly integrating the different racial groups within South Africa." - That's not true, in fact that's NP propaganda. On the race question NP/UP were essentially in agreement. I'd like to see prove of NP gerrymandering as well. They weren't in position to actually do that, while the subdivision of voting districts may actually have benefited them. --41.246.14.49 (talk) 01:02, 22 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Racist election system

The article should mention that the election was far from fair. If I understand e.g. Elections in South Africa#Segregation of black voters correctly, black people basically had no vote at all, and coloured people's votes were heavily restricted. When I read the current version of the article, and I recall (e.g. from Demographics of South Africa#Population) that black people always were the overwhelming majority of the population, I wonder how a pro-Apartheid party could win a general election... But I know very little about South Africa, and I'd like to discuss the details before I change the article. — Chrisahn (talk) 12:18, 28 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It does already say By legislation relating to franchise requirements, very few people of coloured and Asian descent were able to vote in this election; Africans had been banned altogether since the late 1930s, with the limited number of Africans meeting electoral qualifications voting for seven "own" white MPs separately. However, you are more than welcome to create a separate 'Electoral system' section and move it there so it stands out a bit more. Number 5 7 02:19, 29 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Oops, I totally missed that. I guess I only skimmed the article... I moved that part to its own paragraph. I'll try to clarify it a bit more. — Chrisahn (talk) 08:23, 29 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]