SOCIOLOGY OF CONFLICT THEORY 41 Rex's interest in the colonies, particularly South Africa17 is also historical. The decolonized "colonies", the Commonwealth, was simultaneously a boon and a curse for British capitalist recovery. The choice became one between the Commonwealth and the European Economic Community which was to act as a booster to western Europe's capitalist recovery. Britain initially chose the former where its investments were heavy, and the returns necessary for recovery and surplus, accumulation. Decolonization does not mean the end of British capitalist interest in the Commonwealth. It has taken the new form of powerful multinational corporations, with a relative shift away from classical extractive imperialism. Under pressure from Black Africa, Britain formally denied South Africa a membership in the Commonwealth. But what is important to remember is that South Africa cannot develop except with the assistance of Britain and other developed capitalist nations. This has given rise to new alignments and some tensions between groups of capitalists. Model for Inaction Rex notes this and calls attention to the penetration of what he calls the secondary colonists. It is important to note that while capitalist relations are introduced in one sector, Africa permits and utilizes the tribal organizations for its own ends. Rex's book is a-historical and full of half-truths. This style gives it an air of apparent objectivity but effectively distracts one from the main truth. He also fits the situation into the conflict framework. Rex begins his analysis at the point of production. Introduction of white man's law in Africa makes it theoretically an "imperatively co-ordinated group" in contrast to the pre-colonial days when the n-ative worked for himself and his family, and Africa was free from conflict. In the new situation, however, the white group coerces the black to work for it and even brainwashes it to believe in its inferiority. What is more important is that the white group has effectively prevented proleterianization by drawing in only a small section of the black into the industrial orbit while forcing the rest to live as subsistence farmers in the reserves. Introduction of skilled white labour force further weakens the labour movement. Rex shows that entry of secondary colonizers, Asian trading groups and missionaries, creates a stratified society rather than class polarization in South Africa. But from here he goes on to say that power, not class struggle, is the important factor in the the colonial situa-^ tion. In other words, Wright Mills, not Kati Marx, is correct.18 This is a blatant misrepresentation of Marxism. The class struggle that Marx visualizes applies to advanced capitalist countries, whereas in an underdeveloped country the major contradiction is imperialism. If Rex could see the alliance between the Western capitalists cutting across the national and international borders and the tensions between them merely as "conflict between economic and political interests", surely he cannot be blind to the possibility of other forms of class alliances developing to overthrow imperialism. Successful revolutions in other underdeveloped