Fundamental changes to the composition of the black migrant labour force to the South African gold mines occurred in the 1970s. These have been interpreted by many as merely a shift from foreign to local sources either because certain labour frontiers had been closed to South Africa, or because the South African state was imposing a policy of 'internalisation' (deriving labour supplies from local areas) on the industry for its own reasons. While there is very little truth in the second explanation, there is a great deal in the first: the closing of certain labour frontiers, the loss of the option of expanding to others, and the potential loss of still others certainly had a catalytic effect in hastening the transformation of the black mine labour force on the mines. This is not to argue, however, that a fundamental transformation from a migrant labour force to a conventional industrial labour force has taken, or will imminently take, place. What has happened has rather been the opening of new labour frontiers in which old sources of supply are far more intensively exploited, and the development
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Yudelman et al. (1986) studied this question.