Resistance to Apartheid 

Resistance to SA

Inside South Africa

  • moderate, gradual, non-confrontation, delegations
  • confrontational but still peaceful
  • armed struggle

Outside South Africa

  • Boycotts
  • Sanctions
  • Exclusions
  • Support

Early resistance

In 1912 Africa National Congress (ANC) founded

Formed to bring together all African people and defend their rights and freedoms

Congress of the People

Congress Alliance Formed - 1954

  • ANC
  • South African Indian
  • Congress of Democrats
  • Coloured People’s Organisation
  • Council of Trade Union

Freedom Charter

Formed by the Congress of the People on 26 June 1955

  • List of goals, demands and vision

The Freedom Charter became the blueprint for the new South Africa

Defiance Campaign - 1952

Deliberately breaking the law and ending up in jail in an effort to flood the country’s prisons. The aim was to draw public attention

Examples

  • Mass rallies
  • Breaking laws; going through whites-only entrances, sitting on white benches, breaking curfews, refusing to carry pass laws

Results of Campaign

  • ANC membership increased (7000- 100,000)
  • Police responded with extreme violence
  • State-imposed heavy fines and jail sentences
  • ANC eventually called off the campaign
  • No apartheid laws abolished
  • Widespread global attention to plight of South Africa

Resistance from outside

Apartheid denounced

  • Commonwealth countries decided that South Africa shouldn’t be a commonwealth country and were forced to withdraw - in 1961
  • America and UK imposed selective economic sanctions in a protest of its racial policy - 1985
  • Many countries decide not to buy South African products
  • Movie stars refused to perform in South Africa
  • South Africa was absent from international sports during Apartheid due to sanctions
  • Many teams and countries decided to refuse to compete in or against South Africa

Nelson Mandela

Banned from ANC in 1952, operated underground

Treason Trial of 1956

  • Raids into offices and homes to find out people who were involved
  • They found them too dangerous and feared that they would overthrow the government
  • 156 people were charged with high treason
  • Attack on the freedom charter
  • Evidence was manufactured and lied about
  • The trial lasted until 1961 when all defendants were found not guilty.

Soweto Student Uprising - 1976

  • Centred around the teaching of Afrikaans (students spoke English but were taught in a different language)

  • It started with class boycotts that led to the largest riots, school unrest, boycotts in South African history.

    Results and Effects

  • The plan for schooling in Afrikaans was dropped.

  • UN banned sales of weapons to South Africa

  • World outraged

  • International community imposed trade sanction on South Africa.