Jio Jeong's List: APartheid

• from 1948 until 1991
• South African government's policy of rigid racial segregation.
• The word apartheid means separateness in Afrikaans
• apartheid classified every South African by race as either (1) black, (2) white, (3) Coloured (mixed race), or (4) Asian
• It segregated not only almost all whites from nonwhites but also major nonwhite groups from each other.
• Apartheid required segregation in housing, education, employment, public accommodations, and transportation.
• Leading opposition groups included the African National Congress (ANC). Most ANC members were black.
• Most South Africans strongly opposed apartheid.
• Between 1948 and 1991, large numbers of people protested apartheid by staging boycotts, demonstrations, and strikes. Violence often broke out, and thousands of people, most of them black, were killed.
• Many countries also opposed apartheid. As a result, South Africa grew increasingly isolated in the world community
• In 1962, the United Nations General Assembly urged its members to break diplomatic and economic ties with South Africa until apartheid was abolished.
• In response to domestic and international pressure, South Africa began repealing apartheid laws in the 1970's and 1980's. In 1990 and 1991, the government repealed most of the remaining laws that had formed the legal basis of apartheid.

• But apartheid's effects continued even after the laws were repealed. Today, many blacks and other nonwhites continue to face unofficial segregation and discrimination in South Africa.

   

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• National Party gained power in South Africa in 1948, its all-white government immediately began enforcing existing policies of racial segregation under a system of legislation that it called apartheid.
• Under apartheid, nonwhite South Africans (a majority of the population) would be forced to live in separate areas from whites and use separate public facilities, and contact between the two groups would be limited.
• Despite strong and consistent opposition to apartheid within and outside of South Africa, its laws remained in effect for the better part of 50 years.
• In 1991, the government of President F.W. de Klerk began to repeal most of the legislation that provided the basis for apartheid.
• Racial segregation and white supremacy had become central aspects of South African policy long before apartheid began.
• The controversial 1913 Land Act, passed three years after South Africa gained its independence, marked the beginning of territorial segregation by forcing black Africans to live in reserves and making it illegal for them to work as sharecroppers.
• Opponents of the Land Act formed the South African National Native Congress, which would become the African National Congress (ANC).
• ANC leader Nelson Mandela
• The Great Depression and World War II brought increasing economic woes to South Africa, and convinced the government to strengthen its policies of racial segregation. In 1948, the Afrikaner National Party won the general election under the slogan “apartheid” (literally “separateness”). Their goal was not only to separate South Africa’s white minority from its non-white majority, but also to separate non-whites from each other, and to divide black South Africans along tribal lines in order to decrease their political power.
• By 1950, the government had banned marriages between whites and people of other races, and prohibited sexual relations between black and white South Africans.
• The Population Registration Act of 1950 provided the basic framework for apartheid by classifying all South Africans by race, including Bantu (black Africans), Coloured (mixed race) and white. A fourth category, Asian (meaning Indian and Pakistani) was later added
• A series of Land Acts set aside more than 80 percent of the country’s land for the white minority, and “pass laws” required non-whites to carry documents authorizing their presence in restricted areas. In order to limit contact between the races, the government established separate public facilities for whites and non-whites, limited the activity of nonwhite labor unions and denied non-white participation in national government.
• Dr. Hendrik Verwoerd, who became prime minister in 1958, would refine apartheid policy further into a system he referred to as “separate development.”
• The Promotion of Bantu Self-Government Act of 1959 created 10 Bantu homelands known as Bantustans. Separating black South Africans from each other enabled the government to claim there was no black majority, and reduced the possibility that blacks would unify into one nationalist organization. Every black South African was designated as a citizen as one of the Bantustans, a system that supposedly gave them full political rights, but effectively removed them from the nation’s political body.
• In one of the most devastating aspects of apartheid, the government forcibly removed black South Africans from rural areas designated as “white” to the homelands, and sold their land at low prices to white farmers. From 1961 to 1994, more than 3.5 million people were forcibly removed from their homes and deposited in the Bantustans, where they were plunged into poverty and hopelessness.
• Resistance to apartheid within South Africa took many forms over the years, from non-violent demonstrations, protests and strikes to political action and eventually to armed resistance.
• Together with the South Indian National Congress, the ANC organized a mass meeting in 1952, during which attendees burned their pass books. A group calling itself the Congress of the People adopted a Freedom Charter in 1955 asserting that “South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black or white.” The government broke up the meeting and arrested 150 people, charging them with high treason.
• In 1960, at the black township of Sharpesville, the police opened fire on a group of unarmed blacks associated with the Pan-African Congress (PAC), an offshoot of the ANC. The group had arrived at the police station without passes, inviting arrest as an act of resistance. At least 67 blacks were killed and more than 180 wounded. Sharpesville convinced many anti-apartheid leaders that they could not achieve their objectives by peaceful means, and both the PAC and ANC established military wings, neither of which ever posed a serious military threat to the state. By 1961, most resistance leaders had been captured and sentenced to long prison terms or executed. Nelson Mandela, a founder of Umkhonto we Sizwe (“Spear of the Nation”), the military wing of the ANC, was incarcerated from 1963 to 1990; his imprisonment would draw international attention and help garner support for the anti-apartheid cause.
• In 1976, when thousands of black children in Soweto, a black township outside Johannesburg, demonstrated against the Afrikaans language requirement for black African students, the police opened fire with tear gas and bullets. The protests and government crackdowns that followed, combined with a national economic recession, drew more international attention to South Africa and shattered all illusions that apartheid had brought peace or prosperity to the nation
• The United Nations General Assembly had denounced apartheid in 1973, and in 1976 the UN Security Council voted to impose a mandatory embargo on the sale of arms to South Africa. In 1985, the United Kingdom and United States imposed economic sanctions on the country.
• Under pressure from the international community, the National Party government of Pieter Botha sought to institute some reforms, including abolition of the pass laws and the ban on interracial sex and marriage. The reforms fell short of any substantive change, however, and by 1989 Botha was pressured to step aside in favor of F.W. de Klerk. De Klerk’s government subsequently repealed the Population Registration Act, as well as most of the other legislation that formed the legal basis for apartheid. A new constitution, which enfranchised blacks and other racial groups, took effect in 1994, and elections that year led to a coalition government with a nonwhite majority, marking the official end of the apartheid system.

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• • Dutch Settlers (Boers) abuse Africans for their own profit
• · 1651: Dutch settlers arrive in South Africa. In 1756, they import   slaves from West Africa, Malaysia, and India, establishing the dominance   of whites over non-whites in the region.
• migrate across land inhabited by Bantu and Khoi peoples.    Armed with shotguns, the Boers seize land used by the tribes for cattle    and sheep grazing -- the basis of their economy. Without land, the tribes    must work on Boer farms to support themselves.
• · 1700s: Riding on horseback and covered wagons, Dutch farmers
• · 1810s: British missionaries arrive and criticize the racist practises    of the Boers. They urge the Boers to treat the Africans more fairly. Boers    justify their practises in the belief that they are superior to Africans.   
  
• · 1867: Diamond mining begins in South Africa. Africans are given    the most dangerous jobs, are paid far less than white workers, and are    housed in fenced, patrolled barracks. Oppressive conditions and constant    surveillance keep Africans from organizing for better wages and working    conditions.
• • ex) South Africa Act & The Native Lands Act

  • limitations on African freedom
    
• · 1908: A constitutional convention is held to establish South   African independence from Britain. The all-white government decides that   non-whites can vote but cannot hold office. A few people in the new government   object, believing that South Africa would be more stable if Africans were   treated better.
• · 1910: The South Africa Act takes away all political rights of   Africans in three of the country's four states.
• 1912: The African National Congress is formed. This political   party aims to organize Africans in the struggle for civil rights.
• · 1913: The Native Lands Act gives 7.3% of the country's land to   Africans, who make up 80% of the population. Africans are prohibited from   owning land outside their region. Africans are allowed to be on white   land only if they are working for whites.
• • Whites have better education, jobs, and wages
• · 1920s: Blacks are fired from jobs which are given to whites.
• ·

  1910s-1930s: Africans educated at missionary schools attempt   to organize to resist white rule and gain political power. Their efforts   are weakened because fe

  w Africans are literate, communication is poor,   and access to money or other resources is limited.
• w Africans are literate, communication is poor,   and access to money or other resources is limited.
• · By 1939, fewer than 30% of Africans are receiving any formal   education, and whites are earning over five times as much as Africans.

• · 1936: Representation of Voters Act: This law weakens the political   rights for Africans in some regions and allows them to vote only for white   representatives.
   

    
• · 1946: African mine workers are paid twelve times less than their   white counterparts and are forced to do the most dangerous jobs. Over   75,000 Africans go on strike in support of higher wages. Police use violence   to force the unarmed workers back to their jobs. Over 1000 workers are   injured or killed.
  
• ·    1950: The Population Registration Act. This law classifies people    into three racial groups: white, colored (mixed race or Asian), and    native (African/black). Marriages between races are outlawed in order    to maintain racial purity.
• · 1953: The Preservation of Separate Amenities Act establishes    "separate but not necessarily equal" parks, beaches, post    offices, and other public places for whites and non-whites. At right    are signs for segregated toilets in English and Afrikaans.
• · 1951: The Group Areas Act sets aside specific communities for each   of the races (white, colored (mixed race or Indian), and native (African/black)   ). The best areas and the majority of the land are reserved for whites.   Non-whites are relocated into "reserves." Mixed-race families   are forced to live separately.
• ·    1951: The Bantu Homelands Act. Through this law, the white government    declares that the lands reserved for black Africans are independent    nations. In this way, the government strips millions of blacks of    their South African citizenship and forces them to become residents    of their new "homelands." Blacks are now considered foreigners    in white-controlled South Africa, and need passports to enter. Blacks    only enter to serve whites in menial jobs.
• ·

  The homelands are too small to support the many people in them.   In Soweto, for example, seventeen to twenty people live in a four-room   house.
• · The African National Congress (ANC), a political organization   for Africans, encourages peaceful resistance to the discriminatory laws   of apartheid. The ANC issues a Freedom Charter that states, "South   Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white, and that no government   can justly claim authority unless it is based on the will of the people."   The government reacts by arresting people and passing more repressive   laws.
• ·    1952: Abolition of Passes and Coordination of Documents Act. This    misleadingly-named law requires all Africans to carry identification    booklets with their names, addresses, fingerprints, and other information
• • Passes
• Africans are frequently stopped and harassed    for their passes. Between 1948-1973, over ten million Africans were    arrested because their passes were "not in order." Burning    pass books becomes a common form of protest.
• · 1960: A large group of blacks in the town of Sharpeville    refused to carry their passes. The government declares a state of    emergency and responds with fines, imprisonment, and whippings. In    all, 69 people die and 187 people are wounded. The African political    organizations, the African National Congress and the Pan-African Congress,    are banned.
• 1963: Nelson Mandela, head of the African National Congress,    is jailed.
• · 1953: Preservation of Separate Amenities Act. This law created   "separate but not necessarily equal" beaches, parks, post office,   and other public places for Africans (blacks), coloreds (the term used   for Asian and mixed-raced people) and whites.
• · 1953: Bantu Education Act: Through this law, the white government   supervises the education of all blacks. Schools condition blacks to accept   white domination. Non-whites cannot attend white universities.
• ·    1970s

  : Resistance to apartheid increases. Organizing by churches and    workers increases. Whites join blacks in the demonstrations.
• · 1970s: The all-black South African Students Organization,    under the leadership of Steven Biko, helps unify students through    the Black Consciousness movement
• 1976: The Soweto uprising: People in Soweto riot and demonstrate    against discrimination and instruction in Afrikaans, the language    of whites descended from the Dutch. The police react with gunfire.    575 people are killed and thousands are injured and arrested. Steven    Biko is beaten and left in jail to die from his injuries. Protesters    against apartheid link arms in a show of resistance.
• ·    1980s: People and governments around the world launch an international    campaign to boycott (not do business with) South Africa. Some countries    ban the import of South African products,
• have a crippling effect on the South African economy    and weaken the government
• ·    1980s: Hundreds of thousands of Africans who are banned from white-controlled    areas ignore the laws and pour into forbidden regions in search    of work.
• · late 1980s: Countries around the world increasingly pressure    South Africa to end its system of apartheid. As a result, some of    the segregationist laws are repealed (reversed). For example, the    laws separating whites and non-whites in public places are relaxed    or repealed.
• ·    1991: South Africa President F.W. de Klerk repeals the rest of the apartheid    laws and calls for the drafting of a new constitution.
• · 1993: A multiracial, multiparty transitional government is approved.
• 1994: Elections are held. The United Nations sends 2,120 international    observers to ensure the fairness of the elections. The African National    Congress, representing South Africa's majority black population. Nelson    Mandela, the African resistance leader who had been jailed for 27 years,    is elected President.

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• The impact of apartheid on black education was profound. Verwoerd’s 1953 Bantu Education Act established an inferior education system for Africans based upon a curriculum intended to produce manual laborers and obedient subjects. Similar discriminatory education laws were also imposed on Coloureds, who had lost the right to vote in 1956, and Indians. The government denied funding to mission schools that rejected Bantu Education, leading to the closure of many of the best schools for Africans
• In the higher education sector, the Extension of University Education Act of 1959 prevented black students from attending "white" universities (except with government permission) and created separate and unequal institutions for Africans, Coloureds, and Indians respectively
• The apartheid government also undermined intellectual and cultural life through intense censorship of books, movies, and radio and television programs. Censorship reached absurd proportions, exemplified by the banning of the children’s book Black Beauty and the tardy introduction of television in 1976. After that date, government-controlled broadcast media regularly disseminated apartheid propaganda.

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• Economic causes for the rise of apartheid complemented political and ideological ones. The mines, factories, and farms all depended on cheap black labor. As a result, white-owned businesses accumulated huge profits by supporting a government that denied blacks the vote and paid artificially low wages. In addition to capitalist employers, white factory workers and World War II veterans voted for apartheid in 1948 to protect their economic advantages and to oppose black urbanization and social welfare. Furthermore, many white families benefited from the work of black domestic servants who provided childcare, cooking, and house car
• The 1950s can be described as the era of "petty apartheid," when the Nationalists passed many new racist laws similar to Jim Crow in the United States in order to enforce a racially separate and unequal social orde
• The 1953 Reservation of Separate Amenities Act, for instance, imposed segregation on all public facilities, including post offices, beaches, stadiums, parks, toilets, and cemeteries, and buses and trains as well
• Two pillars of apartheid became law in 1950: the Population Registration Act and the Group Areas Act. The former classified all South Africans as members of the White, African, Coloured, or Indian racial groups. Because racial identities were (and are) historically and socially constructed, the government created Racial Classification Boards to officially determine a person’s "race." The absurdity of this system is exemplified by the story of Vic Wilkinson, who was alternatively classified as Coloured, then White, and finally back to Coloured again.
• The Group Areas Act imposed strict residential racial segregation. Apartheid social engineering irreparably damaged countless families, communities, and livelihoods, as the government forcibly removed blacks to African, Coloured, or Indian "townships" (also known as "locations") on the outskirts of cities and towns. In the process of enforcing this plan, government bulldozers destroyed vibrant, racially mixed neighborhoods, such as Sophiatown in Johannesburg and District Six in Cape Town. Township residents tried to rebuild their lives despite inadequate housing, material poverty, and, for Africans, the constant danger of arrest for not carrying a pass book.

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• In 1948, the Reunited National Party, representing ethnic nationalist Afrikaners, won the national election on a platform of racism and segregation under the slogan of "apartheid"- or "apartness" in the Afrikaans language
• fundamental deterioration of the position of black people in South Africa for the next four decades.
• The rise of Afrikaner nationalism in the 1920s and 1930s was a critical factor in the electoral victory of the National Party
• (as it was renamed in 1951)
• National Party leaders D. F. Malan and Hendrik F. Verwoerd were the architects of apartheid
• Malan used the term "apartheid" from the 1930s as he distanced his party from British traditions of liberalism and the earlier policy of segregation, which he saw as too lenient towards blacks.
• erwoerd, educated in the Netherlands, the United States, and Germany, was the main ideologue of apartheid.

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• Nelson Mandela, born in 1918, was a South African political activist who campaigned, sometimes violently, to end apartheid (more on apartheid later) starting in the 1940s.
• Mandela's most important accomplishments were helping to end apartheid and then to help lead South Africa away from its deep racial divides and toward pluralistic democracy.
• live physically apart, in "homelands" and "townships,"
• Most infamously, in 1960, police opened fire on a demonstration in the township of Sharpeville, killing 69 people.

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