Flooding the Networks: The Aftermath of the South African Constabulary, 1902–14

Abstract

This article examines the aftermath of the short-lived South African Constabulary (1900–1908), raised during the South African War from across British domains to provide post-war security for reconstruction. The SAC peaked at just over 10,000 white officers and constables in the War's final months, then steadily declined to less than 2,000 at disbandment in 1908. Circumscribed by a path dependence, thousands of retrenched SAC men sought to continue their careers as imperial administrators. Those with patrons or who fit the ‘uniform’ (fit, young, and fair-skinned) parlayed their experience into new positions. The men of the SAC form a large, recognisable cohort that scholars can follow to locate the natural paths of the British World, recovering how men, ideas, and methods flowed over place and time in the heterogeneous but singular British Isles-and-Empire. The timing of colonial administrative expansion mattered, more for the available ‘experienced’ personnel than the ‘acceptable’ ideologies and justifications of rule that they carried. Ex-SAC men affected particularly the development of policing in colonial West, East, and Southern Africa. Those institutions formed or reorganised in the early twentieth century retained the stamp of former SAC officers and constables for decades.