Division to save the country is wisdom : the short life of the Zimbabwe National Party and its lasting impact on Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle, 1961-1963

Abstract

The Zimbabwe National Party (ZNP), an anti-colonial nationalist movement in Southern Rhodesia, was a prominent force on the colony’s political scene for only a matter of months in 1961 before collapsing entirely two years later. However, this brief existence belied the Party’s lasting institutional contributions to Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle and Rhodesia’s broader political culture. First, the ZNP’s emergence pushed the main wing of the nationalist movement away from a policy of limited co-operation with the white settler regime which had made limited concessions to black political participation in a constitutional dialogue earlier that year. Second, the ZNP exerted significant efforts to woo external African leadership, inaugurating an era of competitive pan-African diplomacy within Zimbabwe’s protracted and divided liberation struggle. Finally, the relentless and often violent attempts to derail the ZNP solidified a culture of anti-colonial nationalism that rejected political pluralism.