Harry Oppenheimer biography shows the South African mining magnate’s hand in economic policies
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Friday, June 2, 2023
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Based on a remarkable depth of research, it is written in an elegant style which makes for a delightfully easy read.
Key Points:
- Based on a remarkable depth of research, it is written in an elegant style which makes for a delightfully easy read.
- It is rendered the more impressive by the author’s deep conversance with the debates over the relationships between mining capital, Afrikaner nationalism and apartheid.
- Cardo’s reckoning is that Oppenheimer transcended his country’s parochial political arena to become a significant figure on the world stage.
The man behind the money
- Yet Oppenheimer emerges from this study not as a “malevolent monster” (p.1) but as a personally likeable individual, intensely loyal to his friends.
- One who was highly cultured and sophisticated, with a deep love of art, literature, old books and antiques for their own sake, rather than for opulent display.
- His devotion to his Anglican faith was deep and real, underlying his perhaps too-convenient conviction that wealth and power could be combined with “doing good”.
- His father, Ernest, was the founder of the Oppenheimer empire, but Harry would become its consolidator (p.18).
The conservative liberal
- He served as the party’s financial spokesman and was touted as a future leader.
- Later, when liberals formed the Progressive Party, he lent them his firm support.
- Cardo characterises Oppenheimer’s liberalism as “pragmatic”, opposing the idea of a universal franchise.
- Regarding himself heir to British colonialist and businessman Cecil Rhodes, he deplored the threat to civilisation represented by “primitive tribesmen”.
The influential magnate
- He exercised all the soft power at his disposal, through Anglo and his personal contacts with politicians locally and internationally.
- His advice to prime minister and president PW Botha to inaugurate multiracial negotiations was ignored.
- But when Botha’s notorious “Rubicon” speech in August 1985 prompted a massive outflow of capital, he urged US companies to resist the disinvestment drive.
- All these efforts were capped by Gavin Relly, who had succeeded Oppenheimer as chairman of Anglo, meeting with the ANC in exile.
- Oppenheimer and Anglo now reached out to leading figures in the ANC to reshape their ideas on the economy.
- This book does not offer a radical re-interpretation of either the Oppenheimers or the Anglo-American empire.