Avery Sun Week #11 Apartheid
Avery Sun
Week 11
Apartheid
In America, with over 70% of the population being white, racism runs rampant as minorities are often ridiculed and treated unfairly. So then, how did South Africa allow itself to be governed by strict, segregational policies for nearly fifty years by its white minority?
Beginning in 1948, the country of South Africa was ruled by a system called “apartheid,” or “apartness.” A series of legislations were enacted separating not only whites from non-white Africans, but also non-whites into 3 subcategories: Black, Coloured (mixed), and Asian. Laws were passed making it illegal to marry a South African of another race. Land Acts were passed leaving 4/5ths of the land in South Africa for the white minority and the rest were forcibly relocated, similar to the Native Americans in our country. These reservations were overcrowded and the soil wasn’t fertile, leaving the people living there no choice but to work for the white people as cheap labor.
The government set aside 10 different Bantustan territories, splitting up the black population into different tribes to technically declare that there was no black majority. This made it difficult for the black population to band together and resist white rule, but it also tore apart families. Families with backgrounds from different tribes were separated, mixed children were separated from their parents, and everyone descended into poverty.
At the beginning of the establishment of apartheid, the African National Congress was formed to fight apartheid by merely breaking laws. The ANC was rather unsuccessful as it was outlawed in 1960 and many members were arrested, including the iconic Nelson Mandela. A lot of the remaining members of the ANC fled the country, but resistance remained within South Africa.
It took violence, unfortunately, for the United Nations to notice the strife in South Africa. In 1960, 69 Africans were killed and over 100 were injured when the white police opened fire on protestors. Then, in 1976, during the Soweto Uprising, 176 died and over 1000 were injured when police fired on children protesting Afrikaans as the required language of instruction. This event made other countries realize that apartheid was not bringing “peace or prosperity to the nation.”
However, the time period of apartheid coincided with the Cold War, and the world was caught up the that conflict. Additionally, the apartheid government announced their stance in the war as against communism, causing world leaders like Ronald Reagan to criticize the ANC, calling them “terrorists.”
Luckily, as soon as the Cold War ended, many anti-communists lost their excuse to support apartheid.
Around this time, many international countries imposed sanctions on South Africa, economically pressuring the country.
Finally, in 1989, Prime Minister Botha resigned, and his successor, de Klerk, removed the ban on the ANC and freed Mandela. Negotiations finally began, and in 1994, Mandela was elected as the president of a racially integrated South Africa.
Ironically, without the help of other predominantly white countries, South Africa may still be struggling with apartheid today.
image: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Bantustan
Hello Avery, that was a very good blog post. It sucks to see that apartheid is a system that has existed for so long. It is abnormal for such institutions to stay in place for as long as they are. Most of the time, if a racist system is put in place, it simply gets replaced by another. However in the case of the ANC, it has stayed in place for a really long time.
ReplyDeleteHi Avery! The mere mentioning of the South American ruling system of the methodology named “apartheid” or “apartness” itself is leaving me astonished to think about how frightning it could have been to be treated unequally for so many years. As they were seen as a minority by the Whites due to the racism prevalent during this time period, they were forced to relocate to conservation camps since the dominating officials wanted to make use of them for cheap labor. The fact that there were strict segregation policies that took reign for almost fifty years in running from wanting to prevent the black population from banding together and protesting puts me in a really shocked state because the people ruling looked so deeply to guess that this might occur. A question that came to my mind from this occurrence is if the government was seeing everyone descend into poverty and saw that most of the people were not benefitting from this act whatsoever, why did they continue to pursue such actions? However; I loved reading your blog and hope to read more in the future!
ReplyDeleteHi Avery, I absolutely love the point you make in the first sentence about how even with a white minority, oppression can still exist. It goes to show our perception of race is very limited to the idea of the racial system in America. But to answer the question, I definitely think that oppression existed because South Africa was living in a post-colonial world. The idea of white supremacy and black inferiority still lingered amongst the other effects of British imperialism. Unfortunately, this is the same for many African countries, some that still reel from the effects to this day. I do think, though, that we shouldn't think of South Africa gaining freedom from Apartheid as work done by white countries, but instead honor the hard work and determination of figures like Nelson Mandela and the ANC.
ReplyDeleteHi Avery! The only knowledge I had before reading this about the apartheid in South Africa was what I heard from Trevor Noah, a South African comedian. Apparently, the apartheid had broken up his family because he was from a mixed race background, and I remember hearing him mention in a comedy routine about how he had to walk on different sides of the road from his parents because of it. It's shocking to see how a white ruling minority had such a prevalent influence in South African history, and seemingly without any good reason. Ultimately, I suppose it's for the best that the apartheid no longer has so much influence, and that other countries were able to pressure South Africa to change.
ReplyDeleteHi Avery, I really enjoyed reading your blog because I learned so much from it. To be honest, I had not heard about the Apartheid before reading your blog. Your blog instantly reminded me of the situation in Hawaii before it was annexed to the United States. The white planters, which constituted only a small percentage of the population, had a lot of power as they owned most of the land, and they successfully prevented native Hawaiaans from voting. This power led to the overthrow of Queen Liliuokalani and eventually the annexation of Hawaii into America, even though most naive Hawaiians were against this. I think both of these examples highlight how white supremacy does not depend on a white majority. It was really moving to hear about how harshly people were segregated in South Africa, and how that tore families apart. I am glad that though it took time, and unfortunately violence, the Apartheid finally ended and integration began. After reading your blog and learning about this, I am a little frustrated that such a crucial historical time period was never covered in any of my history centric classes, but I guess that just speaks to the Eurocentric focus of history in America. In any case, I will definitely educate myself more about Asian and African history.
ReplyDeleteWhat most people did not know about South Africa is that while it was in Africa, the leaders of the country were still predominantly white and the idea of racism, while not directly stated like it was back in the 1860s, was more than just alive: it was thriving. Your blog goes into detail on the fall of Apartheid, something I only had a passing understanding of. I did not know how many people died, nor how long it took for the Africans living in South Africa to finally achieve independence from the white leaders of South Africa. Apartheid was something I learned from an SAT reading section surprisingly, and while it taught me a decent amount, your blog was highly informative and useful in this regard. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteHey Avery, I had no idea about the methodology and process of "apartheid" before, so this was a very informative blog post. Despite a white minority, people of color were still oppressed in their own homes and regions, all thanks to a ruling process and methodology that made them more susceptible to being controlled and oppressed. Its obscene how this has been allowed to go on, especially since it's constructed on racist ideologies and tendencies. Thankfully, this system has slowly been dismantled, but its honestly depressing how wide-spread and internalized racism is that even ethnic groups in majorities can still be oppressed.
ReplyDeleteHey Avery! It is terrible to think that discriminatory laws like the ones related to Apartheid being in action until so recently. The 1990s were only 30 years ago after all. It’s even more surprising to see the imbalance of power between White South-Africans and Black South-Africans despite whites being the minority in South Africa. This may be due to the more recent colonization of South Africa in the 1800s. The fact that it took violence for the UN to finally notice an issue is something that has happened far too much in many instances. Not surprised Ronald Reagon would criticize the ANC for “communism” ignoring the racial injustice the South African government was forcing on citizens. It shocks me how recently in history the world woke up to the injustices of colonialism. The fact that people try to defend colonization is blatantly racist seeing how it has lead to atrocities like apartheid, slavery, and what was essentially the genocide of Indiginous populations in the US.
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