Richard Turner (25 September 1941 – 8 January 1978), known as Rick Turner, was a South African academic and anti-apartheid activist who was murdered, possibly by the South African security forces, in 1978.
If you live in a fascist country, like we do, you have two options: you can be cowed and you can internalise the rules of fascism and live by them, and doing so you become a fascist to some extent; or you can choose to be free. I’ve chosen to be free, and I accept the consequences.
Turner reflects his philosophy that freedom required personal responsibility and resistance against unjust systems.
South Africa is an unequal society.
He said that these inequalities could not be solved only by removing racial discrimination but required deeper structural change.
A real change can be brought about only by a fundamental redistribution of wealth and of power.
Turner argued that political reform alone would not transform South African society.
Only in a participatory democracy can we both cooperate freely and openly with other people and at the same time maximize our own personal range of effective choices.
Turner developed the idea that democracy should not simply mean voting periodically, but should involve
A Christian society is one in which we prefer people to things, a society based on freely expressed love.
Turner used Christian ethics as a foundation for criticizing capitalism and apartheid. He argued that social institutions should be judged by whether they promoted human freedom and dignity.
The problem is to work out what kind of institutions, social, political and economic, would be needed for such a society.
Turner argued that creating a humane society required developing new democratic institutions rather than simply replacing one form of domination with another.
How practical is it to want a second car when the world is running out of petrol?
Turner used this question in The Eye of the Needle to challenge consumerism and argue that conventional ideas of economic success ignored moral and environmental limits.
Only in a participatory democracy are we able to develop the psychological skills and the knowledge required for social action.
Turner argued that democratic participation itself educates citizens and develops the ability to act collectively.
