Apartheid South Africa (1948-1964)

In South Africa, the National Party (NP) took over in 1948. The NP was a founded on the principle of apartheid, which literally translates as “apartness”. Apartheid was an extreme form of segregation, which existed in South Africa from 1948 until 1993. The NP began by passing the Population Registration Act (1950) which classified the population of South Africa according to racial categories: Black, White, or ‘Coloured’ (mixed race). Later, Indians were added as a separate category.

Classification was done based on physical characteristics and a person could sometimes be re-classified. Subsequently, laws were passed that forced Black South Africans to carry identification documents called “passes,” which could be demanded at any time for examination by officials. Passes had to be filled out with detailed personal information as well as information about employment, and needed to be updated frequently; it was extremely difficult to maintain them without small omissions. But, even a small omission could be an excuse for an arrest.

Other laws regulated where Black South Africans could live and what facilities or “amenities” they could use. Certain beaches were designated “Whites only,” Black South Africans could only visit the zoo on certain days, and there were separate facilities such as bathrooms, drinking fountains, and even benches in parks. Laws also criminalized intermarriage and sex between the races. Apartheid discrimination is ofen divided into two categories: “petty apartheid” and “grand apartheid.”

The term “petty apartheid” is used to denote the apartheid laws that separated Black and White South Africans in their daily lives. These laws drew the anger and criticism of activists within South Africa and around the world. As a result, South African Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd created a new set of policies that are called “grand apartheid.” Grand apartheid did not replace petty apartheid, but existed along side petty apartheid and provided a racist justification for the existence of petty apartheid policies. This justification was that, in order for the Black and White races to develop fully, they must develop separately without interfering with each other.

The NP began by designating city centers as areas for Whites only in the 1950 Group Areas Act. Black South Africans lived in other areas surrounding the city called “townships” and commuted into the city to work during designated hours. An example of a township is Soweto outside Johannesburg. There was resistance to the enforcement of this law, for example in the Black neighborhood of Johannesburg called “Sophiatown.” In 1955, Sophiatown was bulldozed, and its 65,000 residents relocated. In its place, the government built a White neighborhood called “Triomf.”

The culmination of the policies of grand apartheid was the “Promotion of Bantu Self-Government Act” (1959), which designated some of the least desirable areas of South Africa as “homelands” for the different tribal groups. These homelands were supposedly independent, but in fact were controlled by tribal leaders chosen by the NP, who were often corrupt. Furthermore, these areas, also called “Bantustans,” lacked basic abilities of independent states such as the ability to have an army and set their own foreign policy.

Despite the creation of the homelands, many Black South Africans continued to work in White areas, living in the townships. However, they knew they could be deported to their homeland at any time for even a small action. The apartheid policies of the NP resulted in high infant mortality for Black South Africans, poor health care overall, high rates of imprisonment, and low rates of literacy.

The Black South Africans resisted the policies of the NP through activism, much of which was initially centered around the multi-tribal Black party, the African National Congress (ANC), as well as the South African Communist Party (SACP). The President of the ANC from 1952 to 1967 was Albert Luthuli. The first major civil rights protest against the policies of the NP was the Defiance Campaign, targeted at the 6 “unjust laws”, which included the Group Areas Act and the Pass Laws. The campaign encouraged South Africans to burn their passes and to defy laws that segregated facilities, for instance by riding in a “Whites only” train car. Protestors expected to be arrested and, when they were arrested, they were supposed to willingly go to jail. The ANC hoped that the mass arrests would overwhelm the jails and hamper the government’s functioning.

As a result of the Defiance Campaign, the ANC’s membership increased significantly and thousands were arrested, but there were outbreaks of violence, conflicting with the ANC’s goal of peaceful protest. Furthermore, none of the unjust laws were repealed. In 1955, the ANC organized the Congress of the People (COP) to broaden its support. At its meeting at Kliptown, the Freedom Charter was unveiled; it set forth the goals of the ANC, including equality for Black and White South Africans. The NP arrested leaders of the COP and put 156 on trial at the Treason Trial. All were acquitted at the end of the trial in 1961, in a victory for the ANC.

In the meantime, protests against abuses continued, for example, the 1957 Alexandra bus boycott, protesting an increase in bus fares. The bus boycott was a spontaneous protest, not controlled by the ANC, and gained the sympathy of many Whites in South Africa. It was also victorious; the fare increase was rolled back. Some South African activists felt that the ANC’s tactics were too conservative and wanted to form a more grassroots movement that could harness the power of the people. Furthermore, they felt South Africa should be governed by Black Africans.

In 1959, this disaffected group formed the Pan African Congress (PAC). The PAC and the ANC both planned to organize a protest against the Pass Laws  in 1960. The PAC’s protest at Sharpeville turned into a massacre when police fired into the crowd of demonstrators, killing at least 69 and wounding many more. The violence shocked the world, but the Verwoerd government declared a state of emergency and cracked down on political activity by Black South Africans. The ANC was unable to continue to function peacefully due to these severe restrictions. In response, Nelson Mandela, a leader of the youth wing of the ANC, persuaded the ANC to create an armed force, Umkhonto we Sizwe, the “Spear of the Nation” or MK for short. MK engaged in armed resistance to the oppression of the NP, bombing power stations, pass offices, and other government buildings.

In 1963, a safe-house at Liliesleaf Farm, a location which was used by the ANC and the SACP to plan guerilla attacks was raided. Ten defendants were put on trial for treason. At the end of this trial (the Rivonia Trial) in June of 1964, eight men, including Nelson Mandela, were found guilty and imprisoned on Robben Island. The ANC and the PAC were banned (the SACP had already been declared illegal in 1950), ANC and PAC leaders were in prison or in exile, and there was little further organized resistance to the NP until the mid 1970s.