Ray E. Phillips was born in 1889 and active in South Africa for four decades following World War I. He participated in the Joint Council movement and was a founder of the South African Institute of Race Relations. Long associated with the programs of the Bantu Men's Social Centre in Johannesburg, he was also the principal of the J. H. Hofmeyr School of Social Work for Africans. He wrote two major books. The Bantu Are Coming (1930), his Yale University doctoral dissertation, and The Bantu in the City (1938), works which emphasized the necessity to recognize Africans as a permanent urban community. He retired to the United States, where he died in 1967.
• Gerhart G.M and Karis T. (ed)(1977). From Protest to challenge: A documentary History of African Politics in South Africa: 1882-1964, Vol.4 Political Profiles 1882 - 1964. Hoover Institution Pres: Stanford University.