THE NEW RADICALS, a generational memoir of the 1970s

283pp., illus., paperback, Reprint, Johannesburg, (2014) 2014

"The New Radicals is a generational memoir, or rather a political memoir of a generation of white South African student radicals that came of age in the early 1970s through the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS). This generation formed a key part of the emerging movements that awakened South Africa from the political slumber of the 1960s ... Moss was a leading student activist at the University of the Witwatersrand, later in the trade union movement and one of the founders of such important labour-oriented left publications as Work in Progress and the South African Review. The book is largely based on his own memory and that of his comrades. Rather than being an exhaustive work of archival research, it is an account from the perspective of an active participant in the events described." Journal of Asian and African Studies

 "Fascinating and important insight into the emergence of a brave young radicalism of the early 1970s embracing white campuses, Black Consciousness and trade unionism which raised questions and challenges not only for the apartheid-capitalist nexus but also for the mainstream liberation movement ... Looking back there is much need for honest reflection and the author does us a service with his well worked research and writing. It leaves one with tantalising thoughts as to whether the incipient democratic left challenges from civil society and trade union circles in South Africa today might fundamentally change our political landscape." Ronnie Kasrils, chief of intelligence for Umkhonto we Sizwe and a government minister 1994-2008

Glenn Moss was a student leader at Wits University in the 1970s. Detained and charged under security legislation in the mid-1970s, he was eventually acquitted after a year-long trial. He was editor of the South African Review and Work in Progress, head of Ravan Press an a consultant to South Africa’s first democratic government.