Secularism within the ANC in South Africa

这项研究调查了为什么南非有一个非常虔诚的人口，但政治(到目前为止)仍然是世俗的。我的重点是非洲人国民大会(非国大)，一个长期占主导地位的政党，以及宗教在其成员的竞选活动中的作用，以及在分支机构一级关于公共政策的辩论。这项研究使用了非国大六个分支一年来的政治民族志，并对非国大历史上宗教与政治关系的变化进行了历史分析。世俗主义研究关注的是宗教和非宗教的类别是如何定义和谈判的。然而，这一奖学金主要集中在美国和欧洲，对中东和北非有一些(有限的)报道。关于撒哈拉以南非洲的世俗主义研究仍然很少--南非尤其如此。这使世俗主义理论变得贫乏，而世俗主义理论在“西方”之外的应用中受到了限制。这项研究进一步加深了对后殖民背景下世俗主义的非殖民主义的理解，而这一背景下的世俗主义研究严重不足。它将加深我们对当前和20世纪的宗教和非洲民族主义的理解，以及公共领域和私人信仰的界限是如何在政治和宗教精英之外谈判的。这是第一次通过田野调查而不是档案研究来全面调查南非的世俗主义。

This study investigates why South Africa has a veryreligious population, and yet a politics that has (so far)remained secular. I focus on the African National Congress(ANC), the long-dominant political party, and the role ofreligion in their members' electioneering and debates aboutpublic policy at a branch-level. This study employs politicalethnography at six branches of the ANC over a year, as wellas an historical analysis of the changing relationshipbetween religion and politics in the ANC's history.The study of secularism is concerned with how thecategories of the religious and the non-religious are definedand negotiated. However, this scholarship has focused onthe US and Europe, with some (limited) coverage of theMiddle East and North Africa. There are still few studies ofsecularism in Sub-Saharan Africa - and this is especiallytrue of South Africa. This impoverishes theories ofsecularism, which are strained in application beyond 'theWest'.This study furthers a decolonial understanding ofsecularism in a post-colonial context that is significantlyunder-researched. It will further our understanding of thenuances of religion and African nationalism, both at presentand in the 20th century, as well as how the boundaries ofthe public sphere and private belief are negotiated beyondthe political and religious elite. It is the first study tocomprehensively investigate secularism in South Africathrough fieldwork, rather than archival research.