Jonathan Oppenheimer

Harry Oppenheimer biography shows the South African mining magnate’s hand in economic policies

Retrieved on: 
Friday, June 2, 2023

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.