The white monopoly of political power; the attempt to make race coincide with space; the regulation of the labour supply; the maintenance of social control. Originally published in 1986 and now reissued with a new preface by Robin Cohen, this book acknowledges that the above are the four pillars of apartheid and asks if white political power were dislodged whether the other three pillarswould crumble. This is a concise book which evaluated social and political change in South Africa at a key moment in the nation’s history and which assesses the limits and possibilities of ideological adaptation