South Africa’s Apartheid Policy

South Africa Apartheid system is considered as one of the worst racial institutions in the world. It emerged following the governing National Party’s growing support of racial discrimination. The institution was in existence between 1948 and 1994; during this time it found use in governing the nation. The term “apartheid” portrayed a violently repressive policy that was designed to ensure continued white people’s dominance o of the nation’s affairs despite their small population.

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Apartheid was engineered by Dr. D.F Malan, the, and this led the National Party to launch campaigns that focused on racist appeals to unite the white people. After winning the election, the National Party instituted a new government that attempted to keep different races in separate areas on every level of society. Some of the laws passed to facilitate this system of racial segregation included the Mixed Marriage Act of 1949, the Population Registration Act of 1950 and 1952, and the Reservation of Separate Amenities Act of 1953 (Thomson &Kaempfer, 2008).

 Following the enactment of the aforementioned acts, most of the Africans moved out from their initial areas of residence to racially segregated neighborhoods or reserves. This trend persisted even after the 1970s. Meanwhile, by 1958, the blacks had started forming movements in an attempt to resist Apartheid. The two parties that led this wave of resistance, The African National Congress and Pan-African Congress initiated their own campaigns against the rule that they saw as discriminative (Thomson &Kaempfer, 2008).

 Unfortunately, the government banned both the groups, forcing them to go underground. The resistance campaigns of the Apartheid rule intensified with a lot of violence being witnessed. Despite the interventions made in the form of reforms on the oppressive rule in the 1980s, opposition to Apartheid persisted. In October 1989, most of the opposition leaders arrested as political prisoners during this struggle, including Nelson Mandela, were released. By 1990, negotiations began to end the Apartheid rule. In 1994, they led to multiracial national elections that Nelson Mandela won, becoming South Africa’s first black president (Lowenberg&Kaempfer, 1998).

References

Lowenberg, A. D.&Kaempfer, W. H. (1998). The origins and demise of South African apartheid: A public choice analysis. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.

Thomson, A. (2008). U.S. foreign policy towards apartheid South Africa, 1948-1994: Conflict of interests. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.