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This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2007) |
| Apartheid in South Africa |
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| Events and Projects |
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Sharpeville Massacre · Soweto uprising |
| Organizations |
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ANC · IFP · AWB · Black Sash · CCB |
| People |
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P.W Botha · Oupa Gqozo · DF Malan |
| Places |
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Bantustan · District Six · Robben Island |
| Other aspects |
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Apartheid laws · Freedom Charter |
| History of South Africa |
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| General periods |
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Ancient (before 1652) |
| Specific themes |
Apartheid in South Africa (apartheid meaning segregation in Afrikaans, cognate to English apart and -hood) was a system of legalized racial segregation enforced by the National Party (NP) South African government between 1948 and 1994. It arose from a longer history of settler rule and Dutch and British colonialism. These colonial relations became policies of separation after South Africa gained self-governance as a dominion within the British Empire and were expanded and formalised into a system of legitimised racism and white nationalism after 1948. Apartheid was dismantled in a series of negotiations from 1990 to 1993, culminating in elections in 1994, the first in South Africa with universal suffrage, but the legacies of apartheid still shape South African politics and society.
Apartheid legislation classified South Africa\'s inhabitants and visitors into racial groups (Black, White, Coloured and Indian). The system of apartheid sparked significant internal resistance. Lodge, Tom. 1983. Black Politics in South Africa Since 1945. New York: Longman. The government responded to a series of popular uprisings and protests with police brutality, which in turn increased local support for the armed resistance struggle.African National Congress (1987). Armed Struggle and Umkhonto / Morogoro. Retrieved on 28 December, 2007. In response to popular and political resistance, the apartheid government resorted to detentions without trial, torture, censorship, and the banning of political opposition from organisations such as the African National Congress, the Black Consciousness Movement, the Azanian People\'s Organisation, the Pan Africanist Congress, and the United Democratic Front, which were popularly considered liberation movements. Despite suffering extreme repression and exile, these organisations maintained popular support for the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa and forged connections with the international anti-apartheid movement during this period. Lodge, Tom. 1983. Black Politics in South Africa Since 1945. New York: Longman.Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa (21 March). Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report (PDF). Retrieved on 28 December, 2007. White South Africa became increasingly militarised, embarking on the border war with the covert support of the USA, and later sending the South African Defence Force into black townships. The anti-apartheid organisations had strong links with other liberation struggles in Africa, and often saw their armed resistance to apartheid as part of the socialist struggle against capitalism.Lisbon Conference of the African National Congress (March). Colonialism of a Special Type. Retrieved on 28 December, 2007.
In South Africa, under apartheid, blacks were stripped of their citizenship, legally becoming citizens of one of ten, theoretically sovereign, bantustans (homelands). The government created the homelands out of the territory of Black Reserves founded during the British Empire period. These reserves were akin to the US Indian Reservation, Canadian First Nations reserves, or Australian aboriginal reserves. Many Black South Africans, however, never resided in these "homelands." The homeland system disenfranchised black people residing in "white South Africa"That part of the country in which whites resided. by restricting their voting rights to the black homelands, the least economically-productive areas of the country. The government segregated education, medical care, and other public services with inferior standards for blacks. The black education system within "white South Africa", by design, prepared blacks for lives as a labouring class. There was a deliberate policy in "white South Africa" of making services for black people inferior to those of whites, to try to "encourage" black people to move into the black homelands, hence black people ended up with services inferior to those of whites, and, to a lesser extent, to those of Indians, and \'coloureds\'.
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Although the creation of apartheid is usually attributed to the Afrikaner-dominated government of 1948-1994, it is also partially a legacy of British colonialism which introduced a system of pass laws in the Cape Colony and Natal during the nineteenth century. This stemmed from the regulation of blacks\' movement from the tribal regions to those occupied by whites and coloureds, ruled by the British. There were similar regulations in Australia and New Caledonia[citation needed] (the French Code de L\'indigenat).
Laws were passed not only to restrict the movement of blacks into these areas, but also to prohibit their movement from one district to another without a signed pass. Blacks were not allowed onto the streets of towns in the Cape Colony and Natal after dark and had to carry their passes at all times. Mahatma Gandhi, a young lawyer at the time, cut his political teeth by organizing non-violent protests against restrictions which hurt middle-class Indians. Jan Smuts\' United Party government began to move away from the rigid enforcement of segregationist laws during World War II. Amid fears integration would eventually lead the nation to racial assimilation, the legislature established the Sauer Commission to investigate the effects of the United Party\'s policies. The commission concluded integration would bring about a loss of personality for all racial groups. The practice of apartheid retained many of the features of the above segregationist policies of earlier administrations. Examples include the 1913 Land Act and the various workplace "colour bars". However, Werner Eiselen, the man who designed apartheid, argued the government could not sustain segregation and white supremacy.[citation needed] He also proposed in 1948 apartheid as a "political partition" policy instead of segregation in public facilities. Hence, the idea behind apartheid was more one of political separation, later known as "grand apartheid," than segregation, later known as "petty apartheid." Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd is considered the most influential politician in the growth of apartheid.[citation needed] Natives were discriminated against in almost every facet of life. Legislation stated where and how they could live, travel, work, be educated, get married and mingle.
There are numerous distinct differences between segregation and apartheid:
"Petty apartheid": sign on Durban beach in English, Afrikaans and Zulu (1989)
In the run up to the 1948 elections, the National Party (NP) campaigned on its policy of apartheid. The NP narrowly defeated Smuts\' United Party and formed a coalition government with the Afrikaner Party (AP), then under the leadership of Protestant cleric Daniel Francois Malan. The coalition government immediately began implementing apartheid policies, passing legislation prohibiting miscegenation, classifying individuals by race, and creating a classification board to rule on race-based infractions. The Group Areas Act of 1950, designed to geographically separate racial groups, became the heart of the apartheid system. The Separate Amenities Act was passed in 1953. Under this Act, municipal grounds could be reserved for a particular race. It created, among other things, separate beaches, buses, hospitals, schools and universities. Signboards outlined things clearly with words like "whites only". These notices applied to entire buildings or parts of buildings such as government houses, hospitals, parks, restaurants, shops, beaches, post offices and all other public areas, including park benches.
Interracial contact in sport was frowned upon, but there were no segregatory sports laws. The government was able to keep sport segregated using other legislation, such as the Group Areas Act.
The government tightened existing pass laws, compelling all South Africans to carry identity documents. For the government, these identity documents became a barrier through which the migration of blacks to \'white\' South Africa could be prevented. Blacks were prohibited from living in or visiting \'white\' towns without a migration permit. For blacks, living in cities required employment. Families were excluded, thus separating wives from husbands and parents from children. Some authors, such as David Yudelman and Hermann Giliomee, argued the system of Apartheid can be traced to the labour movement in South Africa and Cape Colony policies as early as 1907.
J.G. Strijdom, Malan\'s successor as Prime Minister, moved to strip coloureds and blacks of their voting rights in the Cape Province. The previous government had first introduced the Separate Representation of Voters Bill in parliament in 1951. However, a group of four voters, G Harris, WD Franklin, WD Collins and Edgar Deane, challenged its validity in court with support from the United Party. The Cape Supreme Court upheld the act, but the Appeal Court upheld the appeal, finding the act invalid because a two-thirds majority in a joint sitting of both Houses of Parliament was needed in order to change the entrenched clauses of the Constitution. The government then introduced the High Court of Parliament Bill, which gave parliament the power to overrule decisions of the court. The Cape Supreme Court and the Appeal Court declared this invalid too. In 1955 the Strijdom government increased the number of judges in the Appeal Court from five to eleven, and appointed pro-Nationalist judges to fill the new places. In the same year they introduced the Senate Act, which increased the senate from 49 seats to 89. Adjustments were made such that the NP controlled 77 of these seats. The parliament met in a joint sitting and passed the Separate Representation of Voters act in 1956, which removed coloureds from the common voters\' roll in the Cape, and established a separate voters\' roll for them.
| Apartheid legislation in South Africa |
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Precursors |
From the 1950s onwards, various repressive and racist laws were passed. The principal "apartheid laws" were as follows:Alistair Boddy-Evans. African History: Apartheid Legislation in South Africa, About.Com. Accessed June 5 2007.
To oversee the apartheid legislation, the bureaucracy expanded, and, by 1977, there were more than half a million white state employees. The purpose of these laws was to keep the races apart and any resistance in check. The essential thinking behind apartheid was straightforward: although South Africa was a unitary country, the Nationalists argued that the people did not comprise a single nation but, rather, were made up of four distinct racial groups, namely white, black, Coloured and Indian. These races were split further into thirteen \'nations\' or racial federations. White people encompassed the English and Afrikaans language groups; the black populace was divided into ten such groups. This had the result of making the white race the prevalent one. Whites were seen as the most sophisticated and, in nature, entitled to rule South Africa.
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This section does not cite any references or sources. (January 2008) Please improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. |
Before South Africa became a republic, white politics was typified by the division between the chiefly-Afrikaans pro-republicans and the largely English anti-republicans, with the legacy of the Boer War still a factor for some people. Once republican status was attained, Verwoerd called for improved relations and greater accord between the English and Afrikaners. He claimed that the only difference now was between those who supported apartheid and those in opposition to it. The ethnic divide would no longer be between Afrikaans and English, but rather white and black. Most Afrikaners supported the notion of white unanimity to ensure their safety. English whites were divided. Many had voted in opposition to a republic, especially in Natal, where most votes said "No". Later, however, some of them recognised the perceived need for white unity, convinced by the growing trend of decolonisation elsewhere in Africa, which left them apprehensive. Harold Macmillan\'s "Winds of Change" pronouncement left the English faction feeling that Britain had ditched them. The more conservative English-speakers gave support to Verwoerd; others were troubled by the severing of ties with Britain and remained loyal to the Crown. They were acutely displeased at the choice between British and South African nationality. Although Verwoerd tried to bond these different blocs, the subsequent ballot illustrated only a minor swell of support, proving that a great many English speakers remained apathetic and that Verwoerd had not succeeded in uniting the white populace.
The republic arrangement brought about greater harmony between English and Afrikaans white South Africans but intensified the split between those who supported and those who opposed apartheid. Black resistance adopted a more drastic approach, as blacks became conscious of the fact that they were damned by the apartheid republic.
Blacks had no say in the construction of a South African republic. They had gone up against it, realising that it would cut them off from international security. Under a republic, white South Africans had absolute autonomy and the power to entrench apartheid even more. Nevertheless, condemnation by the Commonwealth and United Nations Organisation (UNO) encouraged them with the knowledge that exterior support for the liberation effort was not lost. The NP regime had outlawed the ANC and PAC after anti-pass protests and the carnage in the Sharpeville and Langa townships. Resistance organisations went underground. In May 1961 an assembly representing the banned ANC called for negotiations between the members of the different ethnic groupings. They cautioned the Government that, if it disregarded their appeal, demonstrations would be held during the republic\'s inauguration. When the government overlooked them, the strikers carried out their threats. The government countered swiftly and clinically, giving police the authority to arrest people for up to twelve days. Many resistance directors were detained and numerous cases of police brutality were reported. Defeated, the protesters called off their strike. The ANC then chose to add armaments to the struggle and launched a martial wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), which would perform acts of sabotage on tactical state structures. Its first sabotage plans were set to be carried out on 16 December 1961, the anniversary of the Battle of Blood River.
The apartheid system is often classified into "grand apartheid" and "petty apartheid". Grand apartheid involved an attempt to partition South Africa into separate states, while petty apartheid referred to the segregationist dimension. The National Party clung to grand apartheid until the 1990s, while they abandoned petty apartheid during the 1980s.
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A rural area in Ciskei, one of the apartheid era "homelands"
When the NP came into power in 1948, its primary endeavour was to attain a white supremacist Christian National State and implement racial segregation. The key building blocks to enforcement of racial segregation were
These were to form the foundation on which the "Homelands" guidelines were developed. Territorial separation was not a new-fangled institution. There were, for example, the "reserves" created under the British government in the Nineteenth Century. Under HF Verwoerd\'s jurisdiction, however, this land was seen as a way to control the increasing movement of black people into the city. Black people would work in the cities but live in their own areas, where they would be housed, educated, and vote for their own internal governments. The ultimate plan was to create ten independent national states out of these homelands.
The state passed two laws which paved the way for "grand apartheid", which was centred on separating races on a large scale, through spatial divisions; that is, compelling people to live in separate places defined by race. The first grand apartheid law was the Population Registration Act 30 of 1950, which necessitated all citizens\' being categorised according to race and this being recorded in their identity passes. Official team or Boards were established to come to an ultimate conclusion on those people whose race was unclear. This caused much difficulty, especially for Coloured people, separating their families as members were allocated different races.
The second pillar of grand apartheid was the Group Areas Act 21 of 1950. Until then, most settlements had people of different races living side by side. This Act put an end to diverse areas and determined where one lived, how one survived and how one earned a living by virtue of racial inequality. Each race was allotted its own area, establishing the base for forced removals in later years.
The policy of separate development came into being with the accession to power of Dr HF Verwoerd in 1958. He began implementing the homeland structure as a cornerstone of separate development. Verwoerd came to believe in the granting of "independence" to these homelands. Border industries and the Bantu Investment Corporation, were established to promote economic development and the provision of employment in the homelands (to draw black people away from "white" South Africa).
The Tomlinson Commission of 1954 decided that apartheid was justifiable, but stated additional land ought to be given to the homelands, favouring the development of border industries. In 1958 the Promotion of Black Self-Government Act was passed, and proponents of apartheid began to argue that, once apartheid had been implemented, blacks would no longer be citizens of South Africa; they would instead become citizens of the independent "homelands". In terms of this model, blacks became (foreign) "guest labourers" who merely worked in South Africa as the holders of temporary work permits.
The South African government attempted to divide South Africa into a number of separate states. Some thirteen per cent of the land was reserved for black homelands -- representing fifty per cent of South Africa\'s arable land (Davenport, 1977: p. 268). That thirteen per cent was divided into ten black "homelands" amongst eight ethnic units. Four of these were given independence, although this was never recognised by any other country. Each homeland was supposed to develop into a separate-nation state within which the eight black ethnic groups were to find and grow their separate national identity, culture and language; Transkei -- Xhosa (given "independence"), Ciskei -- Xhosa (given "independence" in 1981), Bophuthatswana -- Tswana (given "independence"), Venda -- Venda (given "independence"); KwaZulu -- Zulu, Lebowa -- Pedi, Kangwane -- Swazi, QwaQwa -- Sotho, Gazankulu -- Tsonga, and KwaNdebele -- Ndebele. Each homeland controlled its own education and health system.
Once a homeland was granted its "independence," its designated citizens had their South African citizenship revoked, replaced with citizenship in their homeland. These people were then issued passports instead of passbooks. Citizens of the supposedly "autonomous" homelands also had their South African citizenship circumscribed, and so became less than South African.Those who had the money to travel or emigrate were not given full passports; instead, "travel documents" were issued. The South African government attempted to draw an equivalence between their view of black "citizens" of the "homelands" and the problems which other countries faced through entry of illegal immigrants.
While other countries were dismantling their discriminatory legislation and becoming more liberal on racial issues, South Africa continued to construct a labyrinth of legislation promoting racial and ethnic separation. Many white South Africans supported apartheid because of demographics; that, is separation and partition were seen as a means of avoiding a one-person-one-vote democracy within a single unified South African state, which would render whites a politically-powerless minority. In addition, leaders of the above homelands became important defenders of apartheid, such as Kaiser Matanzima, Bantu Holomisa, Oupa Gqozo, Lucas Mangope and Mangosuthu Buthelezi.
Apartheid placed great emphasis on "self-determination" and "cultural autonomy" for different ethnic groups. For this reason, "mother-tongue" education was strongly emphasised. Thus, in addition to pouring resources into developing Afrikaans educational material, resources were also poured into developing school textbooks in black languages like Zulu, Xhosa, Sotho, Tswana, and Pedi. As a result, one of the consequences of apartheid was a South African population literate in black-African languages (a rare thing in Africa where schooling is normally carried out in colonial languages like English and French).
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This article does not cite any references or sources. (May 2007) Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. |
During the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s, the government implemented a policy of \'resettlement\', to force people to move to their designated "group areas". Some argue that over three and a half million people were forced to resettle during this period. These removals included people re-located due to slum clearance programmes, labour tenants on white-owned farms, the inhabitants of the so-called \'black spots\', areas of black-owned land surrounded by white farms, the families of workers living in townships close to the homelands, and \'surplus people\' from urban areas, including thousands of people from the Western Cape (which was declared a \'Coloured Labour Preference Area\'Western, J (June 2002), "A divided city: Cape Town", Political Geography 21 (5): 711-716) who were moved to the Transkei and Ciskei homelands. The best-publicised forced removals of the 1950s occurred in Johannesburg, when 60,000 people were moved to the new township of Soweto, an acronym for South Western Townships.From the Western Areas to Soweto: forced removals. Retrieved on 2008-01-07."Toby Street Blues", Time Magazine, 21 February 1955, <http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,892971,00.html>
Until 1955 Sophiatown had been one of the few urban areas where blacks were allowed to own land, and was slowly developing into a multiracial slum. As industry in Johannesburg grew, Sophiatown became the home of a rapidly expanding black workforce, as it was convenient and close to town. It could also boast the only swimming pool for black children in Johannesburg.Mandela, Nelson. , 179. However, one of the oldest black settlements in Johannesburg and held an almost symbolic importance for the 50,000 blacks it contained, both in terms of its sheer vibrancy and its unique culture. Despite a vigorous ANC protest campaign and worldwide publicity, the removal of Sophiatown began on 9 February 1955 under the Western Areas Removal Scheme. In the early hours, heavily armed police entered Sophiatown to force residents out of their homes and load their belongings onto government trucks. The residents were taken to a large tract of land, thirteen miles from the city centre, known as Meadowlands (that the government had purchased in 1953). Meadowlands became part of a new planned black city called Soweto. The Sophiatown slum was destroyed by bulldozers, and a new white suburb named Triomf (Triumph) was built in its place. This pattern of forced removal and destruction was to repeat itself over the next few years, and was not limited to people of African descent. Forced removals from areas like Cato Manor (Mkhumbane) in Durban, and District Six in Cape Town, where 55,000 coloured and Indian people were forced to move to new townships on the Cape Flats, were carried out under the Group Areas Act of 1950. Ultimately, nearly 600,000 coloured, Indian and Chinese people were moved in terms of the Group Areas Act. Some 40,000 white people were also forced to move when land was transferred from "white South Africa" into the black homelands. Forced removals continue in post-apartheid South Africa and are being vigorously contested by, amongst others, the shack dwellers\' movement Abahlali baseMjondolo.
The National Party passed a string of paltry (but nevertheless very painful) legislation which became known as petty apartheid. The first of these was the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act 55 of 1949, prohibiting matrimony between white people and people of other races. The Immorality Amendment Act 21 of 1950 (as amended in 1957 by Act 23) marched into the most personal liberties of individual expression and forbade "unlawful racial intercourse" and "any immoral or indecent act" between a white person and an African, Indian or Coloured person.
Blacks were not allowed to run businesses or professional practices in those areas designated as "white South Africa" without a permit. They were supposed to move to the black "homelands" and set up businesses and practices there. Transport and civil facilities were segregated. Black buses stopped at black bus stops and white buses at white ones. Trains were segregated. Hospitals and ambulances were segregated. Because of the smaller numbers of white patients and the fact that white doctors preferred to work in "white" hospitals, conditions in white hospitals were much better than those in often overcrowded black hospitals.Health Sector Strategic Framework 1999–2004 — Background, Department of Health, 2004, accessed 8 November 2006 Blacks were excluded from living or working in white areas, unless they had a pass — nicknamed the dompas ("dumb pass" in Afrikaans). Only blacks with "Section 10" rights (those who had migrated to the cities before World War II) were excluded from this provision. A pass was issued only to a black person with approved work. Spouses and children had to be left behind in black homelands. Many white households employed blacks as domestic workers, who lived on the premises — often in small rooms external to the family home. A pass was issued for one magisterial district (usually one town) confining the holder to that area only. Being without a valid pass made a person subject to arrest and trial for being an illegal migrant. This was often followed by deportation to the person\'s homeland and prosecution of the employer (for employing an illegal migrant). Police vans patrolled the "white" areas to round up "illegal" blacks found there without passes. Black people were not allowed to employ white people in "white South Africa".
Although trade unions for black and "coloured" (mixed race) workers had existed since the early 20th century, it was not until the 1980s reforms that a mass black trade union movement developed. In the 1970s each black child\'s education within the Bantu Education system (the black education system within "white South Africa") cost the state only a tenth of each white child\'s. Higher education was provided in separate universities and colleges after 1959. Eight black universities were created in the homelands; an Indian university built in Durban and a coloured university built in Cape Town. In addition, each black homeland controlled its own separate education, health and police system. Blacks were not allowed to buy hard liquor. They were able only to buy an African home brewed beer. (although this was relaxed later). Public beaches were racially segregated. Public swimming pools, some pedestrian bridges, drive-in cinema parking spaces, graveyards, parks, and public toilets were segregated. Cinemas and theatres in "white areas" were not allowed to admit blacks. There were practically no cinemas in black areas. Most restaurants and hotels in white areas were not allowed to admit blacks except as staff. Black Africans were prohibited from attending "white" churches under the Churches Native Laws Amendment Act of 1957. This was, however, never rigidly enforced, and churches were one of the few places races could mix without the interference of the law. Blacks earning 360 rand a year, 30 rand a month, or more had to pay taxes while the white threshold was more than twice as high, at 750 rand a year, 62.5 rand per month. On the other hand, the taxation rate for whites was considerably higher than that for blacks.
Blacks could never acquire land in white areas. In the homelands, much of the land belonged to a \'tribe\', where the local chieftain would decide how the land had to be utilized. This resulted in white people owning almost all the industrial and agricultural lands and much of the prized residential land. Most blacks were stripped of their South African citizenship when the "homelands" became "independent". Thus, they were no longer able to apply for South African passports. Eligibility requirements for a passport had been difficult for blacks to meet, the government contending that a passport was a privilege, not a right. As such, the government did not grant many passports to blacks. Apartheid pervaded South African culture, as well as the law. This was reinforced in many media, and the lack of opportunities for the races to mix in a social setting entrenched social distance between people.
The population was classified into four groups: Black, White, Indian, and Coloured. (These terms are capitalized to denote their legal definitions in South African law). The Coloured group included people of mixed Bantu, Khoisan, and European descent (with some Malay ancestry, especially in the Western Cape). The Apartheid bureaucracy devised complex (and often arbitrary) criteria at the time that the Population Registration Act was implemented to determine who was Coloured. Minor officials would administer tests to determine if someone should be categorised either Coloured or Black, or if another person should be categorised either Coloured or White. Different members of the same family found themselves in different race groups. Further tests determined membership of the various sub-racial groups of the Coloureds. Many of those who formerly belonged to this racial group are opposed to the continuing use of the term "coloured" in the post-apartheid era, though the term no longer signifies any legal meaning. The expressions \'so-called Coloured\' (Afrikaans sogenaamde Kleurlinge) and \'brown people\' (bruin mense) acquired a wide usage in the 1980s.
Discriminated against by apartheid, Coloureds were as a matter of state policy forced to live in separate townships — in some cases leaving homes their families had occupied for generations — and received an inferior education, though better than that provided to Black South Africans. They played an important role in the struggle against apartheid: for example the African Political Organisation established in 1902 had an exclusively coloured membership.
Voting rights were denied to Coloureds in the same way that they were denied to blacks from 1950 to 1983. However, in 1977 the NP caucus approved proposals to bring coloured and Indians into central government. In 1982, final constitutional proposals produced a referendum among white voters, and the Tricameral Parliament was approved. The Constitution was reformed the following year to allow the Coloured and Asian minorities participation in separate Houses in a Tricameral Parliament, and Botha became the first Executive State President. The theory was that the Coloured minority could be granted voting rights, but the Black majority were to become citizens of independent homelands. These separate arrangements continued until the abolition of apartheid. The Tricameral reforms led to the formation of the (anti-apartheid) UDF as a vehicle to try and prevent the co-option of coloureds and Indians into an alliance with white South Africans. The subsequent battles between the UDF and the NP government from 1983 to 1989 were to became the most intense period of struggle between left-wing and right-wing South Africans.
Colonialism and apartheid had a major impact on women since they suffered both racial and gender discrimination. Oppression against African women was different from discrimination against men. Indeed, they had very few or no legal rights, no access to education and no right to own property.ANC/FSAW official website, Women\'s Charter. Adopted at the Founding Conference of the Federation of South African Women. Johannesburg, 17 April 1954 Jobs were often hard to find but many African women worked as agricultural or domestic workers though wages were extremely lowLapchick, Richard E.; Stephanie Urdang (1982). Oppression and Resistance: The Struggle of Women in Southern Africa. Greenwood Press, 48 and 52. if not non-existent. Children suffered from diseases caused by malnutrition and sanitary problems, and mortality rates were therefore high. The controlled movement of African workers within the country through the Natives Urban Areas Act of 1923 and the pass-laws, separated family members from one another as men usually worked in urban centers, while women were forced to stay in rural areas. Marriage law and birthsBernstein, Hilda (1985). For their Triumphs and for their Tears: Women in Apartheid South Africa. International Defense and Aid Fund for Southern Africa, 48. were also controlled by the government and the pro-apartheid Dutch Reformed Church, who tried to restrict African birth rates.
Defining its East Asian population, which is a minority in South Africa but who do not physically appear to belong any of the four designated groups, was a constant dilemma for the apartheid government. Chinese South Africans who were descendants of migrant workers who came to work in the gold mines around Johannesburg in the late 19th century, were classified as "Indian" and hence "non-white", whereas immigrants from Republic of China (Taiwan), South Korea and Japan, with which South Africa maintained diplomatic relations, were considered "honorary whites" and termed "Worthy Oriental Gentlemen", thus granted the same privileges as normal whites. It should be noted that "Non-Whites" were sometimes granted an \'honorary white\' status as well, based on the government\'s belief that they were "civilised" and possessed Western values. This was frequently the case with African-Americans.
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This section does not cite any references or sources. (March 2008) Please improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. |
Internal resistance to the apartheid system in South Africa came from several sectors of society and saw the creation of organisations dedicated variously to peaceful protests, passive resistance and armed insurrection.
In 1949 the youth wing of the African National Congress (ANC) took control of the organisation and started advocating for a radical black nationalist programme that combined the tenants of Africanism with those of Marxism. The new young leaders proposed that white authority could only be overthrown through mass campaigns. In 1950 that philosophy saw the launch of the Programme of Action, a series of strikes, boycotts and civil disobedience actions that led to occasionally violent clashes with the authorities.
In 1959 a group of disenchanted ANC members formed the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC), which organised a demonstration against pass books on 21 March 1960. One of those protests was held in the township of Sharpeville, where 69 people were killed in the Sharpeville uprising.
In the wake of the Sharpeville incident the government declared a state of emergency, More than 18 000 people were arrested, including leaders of the ANC and PAC, and both organisations were banned. The resistance went underground, with some leaders in exile abroad and others engaged in campaigns of domestic sabotage and terrorism.
In the 1970s the Black Consciousness Movement was created by tertiary students influenced by the American Black Power movement. BC endorsed black pride and African customs and did much to alter the feelings of inadequacy instilled among black people by the apartheid system. The leader of the movement, Steve Biko, was taken into custody on 18 August 19778 and died in detention.
In 1976 secondary students in Soweto protested against forced tuition in Afrikaans. On June 16, in what was meant to be a peaceful protest, 23 people were killed. In the following years several student organisations were formed with the goal of protesting against apartheid, and these organisations were central to urban school boycotts in 1980 and 1983 as well as rural boycotts in 1985 and 1986.
In parallel to student protests, labour unions started protest action in 1973 and 1974. After 1976 unions and workers are considered to have played an important role in the struggle against apartheid, filling the gap left by the banning of political parties. In 1979 black trade unions were legalised and could engage in collective bargaining, although strikes were still illegal.
At roughly the same time churches and church groups also emerged as pivotal points of resistance. Church leaders were not immune to prosecution, and certain faith-based organisations were banned, but the clergy generally had more freedom to criticise the government than militant groups did.
Among the white population, some 20 percent of which did not support apartheid, resistance was largely centred in the South African Communist Party and women\'s organisation the Black Sash. Women were also notable in their involvement in trade union organisations and banned political parties.
In the after-effects of World War II, the Western world quickly moved from ideas of racial dominance and policies based on racial prejudice. Racially discriminative and segregationist principles were not novelties to the country. Since unionisation in 1910, the state had stood only for the white minority and pursued segregation. Apartheid was a certified, lawful and inflexible type of separation that was methodically entrenched through a battery of legislation. As it was not completely new to the country, and because many Western countries still exercised their own forms of prejudice in their assorted colonies, there was minimal rejoinder and indignation. Another issue, apparently graver, dwelled in the most prominent part of the Western world\'s (and, together with it, the UN\'s) agenda. The conclusion of the Second World War signified the commencement of the Cold War, and South Africa, with its anti-red stance, was considered a possible assistant in the passive battle against the Soviet Union.
The world did not, however, condone South Africa\'s discriminatory policies. At the first UN gathering in 1946, South Africa was placed on the programme. The primary subject in question was the handling of South African Indians, a great cause of divergence between South Africa and India. In 1952, apartheid was thrashed out again in the aftermath of the Defiance Campaign. The UN set up a task team to keep watch on the progress of apartheid and the racial state of affairs in South Africa. Although racial variance in South Africa was a cause for concern, most countries in the UN concurred that this was one of South Africa\'s in-house issues, which fell outside the UN\'s jurisdiction. The UN only became resolute in challenging South Africa later.
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The apartheid issue aside, there was also a major quarrel between the UN and South Africa about the management of South West Africa. After World War I, all German colonies were made mandates of the League of Nations, the UN\'s forbearer. Direction of these mandates was allotted to certain countries. The Treaty of Versailles declared German West Africa a League of Nations Mandate under South African administration, and it then became known as South West Africa.
South Africa formally excluded Walvis Bay from the mandate and annexed it as an exclave. After the configuration of the UN in 1945, and the transferral of mandates from the League of Nations to the new body, the arrangement changed: former obligatory powers (vis-à-vis those in charge of ex-German colonies) were now obliged to form new concurrences with the UN over their management of the mandates. South Africa, however, refused to play ball, declining to allow the territory to move towards independence. The NP government argued that, for a quarter of a century, South-West Africa had been directed as a piece of South Africa, and the preponderance of South-West Africans wanted to become South Africans anyway. Instead, South-West Africa was treated as a de facto "fifth province" of the Union. The South African government turned this mandate arrangement into a military occupation, and extended apartheid to South-West Africa.
The UN attempted to compel South Africa to let go of the mandate, and, in 1960, Liberia and Ethiopia requested that the International Court of Justice announce that South Africa\'s management of South West Africa was illegitimate. They argued that South Africa was bringing apartheid to South-West Africa, too. South Africa was formally accused of maladministration, and the lawsuit, commencing in November 1960, lasted almost six years. The International Court\'s verdict astonished the UN: it ruled that Liberia and Ethiopia had no right to take issue with South Africa\'s deeds in South-West Africa. The Court did not, however, pass judgement on whether or not South Africa still had a mandate over the region. The UN declared that the mandate was indeed concluded, and a council of the UN was to run the state until its independence in 1968. South Africa rebuffed the resolution, but declared its ostensible intention to ready South-West Africa for independence.
Anxiety increased when the UN Council for South-West Africa was declined admission, and steepened still further when South Africa indicted 35 South-West Africans and then found them guilty of terror campaigns. The UN reproached South Africa and declared that South-West Africa would thenceforth be known as Namibia. At the New York Accords in 1988, South Africa finally signed the agreement that granted the country its independence.
South Africa\'s policies were subject to international scrutiny in 1960, when British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan criticised them during his celebrated Wind of Change speech in Cape Town. Weeks later, tensions came to a head in the Sharpeville Massacre, resulting in more international condemnation. Soon thereafter, Verwoerd announced a referendum on whether the country should sever links with the British monarchy and become a republic instead. Verwoerd lowered the voting age for whites to eighteen and included whites in South West Africa on the voter\'s roll. The referendum on 5 October that year asked whites, "Do you support a republic for the Union?", and 52 per cent voted "Yes".
As a consequence of this change of status, South Africa needed to reapply for continued membership of the Commonwealth, with which it had privileged trade links. Even though India became a republic within the Commonwealth in 1947 it became clear that African and Asian member states would oppose South Africa due to its apartheid policies. As a result, South Africa withdrew from the Commonwealth on 31 May 1961, the day that the Republic came into existence.
In 1960, the UN\'s conservative stance on apartheid changed. The Sharpeville massacre had jolted the global neighbourhood, with the apartheid regime showing that it would use violent behaviour to repress opposition to racial inequity. Many Western states began to see apartheid as a possible danger to global harmony, as the policy caused much intercontinental abrasion over human-rights violation.
In April 1960, the Security Council of the UN settled for the first time on concerted action against the apartheid regime, demanding that the NP bring an end to racial separation and discrimination; but, instead, the South African administration merely employed further suppressive instruments. The ANC and PAC were forbidden from continued existence, and political assemblies were prohibited. From then on, the UN placed the South African issue high on its list of priorities.
In 1961, UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold stopped over in South Africa and subsequently stated that he had been powerless to effect a concurrence Prime Minister Verwoerd. That same year, Verwoerd proclaimed South Africa\'s extraction from the Commonwealth as a result of its censure of his government.
| International opposition to Apartheid in South Africa |
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| Campaigns |
| Instruments and legislation |
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UN Resolution 1761 (1962) |
| Organisations |
