The Anti-Apartheid Struggle in South Africa (1912-1992)

Abstract

The iconic struggle between the apartheid regime of South Africa and those who resisted it illustrates the complexity of some cases of civil resistance. The decades of struggle saw the ebb and flow of a wide variety of strategic actions within the anti-apartheid movement. American theologian Walter Wink (1987: 4) suggests the movement was “probably the largest grassroots eruption of diverse nonviolent strategies in a single struggle in human history.”

Full text

*Lester R. Kurtz is a Professor at the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at George Mason University.
The Anti-Apartheid Struggle in South
Africa (1912–1992)
Lester R. Kurtz, Ph.D*
June 2010
Summary of events related to the use or impact of civil resistance
©2010 International Center on Nonviolent Conflict
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Conflict Summary:
The iconic struggle between the apartheid regime of South Africa and those who resisted it
illustrates the complexity of some cases of civil resistance. Originally the use of civil resistance
against apartheid was based on Gandhian ideas, which originated in South Africa in 1906 where
Gandhi was a lawyer working for an Indian trading firm. Soon the African National Congress
(ANC), founded in 1912, became the major force opposing the apartheid system’s oppression of
the 80% non-European population of the country. Using mostly legal tactics of protest during its
first four decades, the ANC became more militant in the early 1950s and began using nonviolent
direct action.
White South Africans (Afrikaners) monopolized control over the state and the economy,
including rich natural resources such as a third of the world’s known gold reserves. The
Afrikaners developed an explicit theology and philosophy of white racial superiority and a legal
and economic system enforced by a modern military and police force that deliberately excluded
nonwhites from economic and political power. Nevertheless, the system became increasingly
reliant upon nonwhite labor and isolated from international diplomacy and trade.
Discouraged about the lack of results from their nonviolent campaign, Nelson Mandela and
others called for an armed uprising, creating the Umkhonto We Sizwe (“Spear of the Nation”) that
paralleled the nonviolent resistance. That, too, failed to tear down the apartheid system, and in
the end a concerted grassroots nonviolent civil resistance movement in coalition with
international support and sanctions forced the white government to negotiate.
On 17 March 1992 two-thirds of South Africa’s white voters approved a negotiated end of the
minority regime and the apartheid system. Nelson Mandela was elected as the President of the
new South Africa in the first free elections by the entire population.
The decades of struggle saw the ebb and flow of a wide variety of strategic actions within the
anti-apartheid movement. American theologian Walter Wink (1987: 4) suggests the movement
was “probably the largest grassroots eruption of diverse nonviolent strategies in a single struggle
in human history.”
Political History:
The timeline of this conflict begins with the founding of Cape Town in 1652 by the Dutch East
India Company as a way station between the Netherlands and the East Indies. As it developed
into a settlement, it was populated by the European ancestors of the Afrikaners, who eventually
were the white minority comprising less than 20 percent of the population but who had nearly
complete control of the nation’s government and economy. As resistance to the system

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increased, increasingly-restrictive legislation was passed; nonwhites were forcibly removed from
their homes and relocated to segregated neighborhoods, and any hint of dissidence was
repressed, from the banning of individuals and organizations from public life to the imposition of
martial law.
After decades of resistance to the explicitly-racist system, questions and even defections from the
white power elite emerged in the 1980s as business leaders, aware of the need for a high-quality
work force and in an effort to build up a small sector of the black population, began to despair of
the failure of modest reforms and increased repression. Questions even began to emerge within
the Dutch-Reformed Church, which fashioned the apartheid theology that had legitimated the
regime (see Kuperus 1999).
In the end, it was the paradox of the regime’s being both extraordinarily powerful and highly
vulnerable that gave nonviolent resistance its power (Zunes 1999). Despite its powerful security
forces, mineral wealth and industrial capacity, apartheid South Africa was dependent on its
nonwhite labor force, southern African neighbors, and international ties with the industrial West.
As these pillars withdrew their support the regime became unsustainable.
Strategic Actions1:
The ANC, created in 1912, was the major institutional vehicle of the resistance, at first
emphasizing legal forms of protest and shifting to a more militant nonviolent direct action
campaign in the early 1950s and then advocating violent resistance, along with its revival Pan
Africanist Congress (PAC), founded in 1959. The violent resistance was limited to occasional
bombings of government facilities and avoidance of civilian deaths. As Zunes (1999) correctly
observes, the armed struggle may have harmed the movement, weakening the nonviolent
campaigns (successfully linked to the nonviolent movement) and justifying the repression of all
resistance efforts. Armed resistance against the continent’s most powerful military and a highly
armed white citizenry fearing a racial war was never a serious threat.
In the 1970s, increased labor militancy and community support for opposition forces, along with
the successful 1973 strikes in Durban, demonstrated the regime’s vulnerability: brick and tile
workers walked off the job one January morning, prompting first transport workers and then
industrial and municipal labor to follow suit. By early February, 30,000 workers were on strike
in Durban. The apartheid regime relied on black labor to keep the economy going and the strikes
showed that widespread discontent could be mobilized to disrupt the work that kept the regime in
power. Durban’s labor activism in turn helped to inspire strikes elsewhere and then a student
uprising that included a 1976 Soweto march that the police responded to by shooting a thirteen-
year-old boy. In what became known as the “Soweto Uprising”, young people escalated by
smashing windows and setting fire to schools and government buildings, to which the police

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upped the ante by shooting at students everywhere, leading to more than sixty fatalities (with two
white men killed).
In light of the apartheid regime’s military superiority, by the early 1980s, anti-apartheid forces
were virtually united around a nonviolent resistance that could achieve maximum participation
among nonwhites, divide the white community and move some toward acting on behalf of non-
whites, and bring international pressures to bear on the government (Sharp 1980: 163).
Drawing upon the Black Consciousness Movement led by dissident Steve Biko (who died due to
brutal police treatment while in custody), a mass democratic movement emerged in the 1980s
with an informal alliance between the ANC, the United Democratic Front (UDF, launched in
1983)2 and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) calling for a multiracial
democracy led by the ANC. One of the UDF’s most prominent leaders was Archbishop
Desmond Tutu, and it gained considerable support in the white community including from the
South African Council of Churches.
In 1985, nonviolent pressure continued to build, with 27 year-old Mkhuseli Jack organizing
boycotts of white-owned businesses in the city of Port Elizabeth. The boycotters presented a
series of demands: the integration of public facilities, the removal of troops from the black
townships and an end to workplace discrimination (Ackerman and DuVall 2000). The boycotts
were so powerful that the regime responded with the first declaration of a state of emergency in
23 years in an effort to stop the movement’s momentum, but with little effect. A three-day
general strike in June 1988 mobilized more than three million workers and students, paralyzing
industry, followed by an even larger general strike in August 1989.
In 1989, resisters also resurrected the 1950s Defiance of Unjust Laws Campaign3 that involved
engaging in the civil disobedience of intolerable apartheid legislation and practices such as
banning dissidents (which restricted their travel and activities and required them to report to
authorities periodically as well as prevented the press from quoting them). It encouraged
noncooperation with the tricameral legislative system, which was meant to co-opt dissidents and
to repair the apartheid government’s damaged reputation with the international community by
giving non-whites token representation in the government.4
In addition to direct confrontation with the regime, resistors also created alternative community-
based institutions—such as cooperatives, community clinics, legal resource centers, and other
organizations—that increasingly marginalized and replaced official governmental institutions.
Many black South Africans were hesitant to get politically active after the 1977 crackdown
following the Soweto Uprising, but were attracted to the organization around community
problems such as housing, escalating rents, sanitation, and other local issues (see Ackerman and
DuVall 2000). The government responded with a ban on international funding of such

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organizations, but this did not have much impact on their activities. As the decade neared its end,
the government had lost control in virtually every sphere of apartheid, with banned ANC flags
flying, public facilities renamed, government officials confronted by school children, jailed
activists holding hunger strikes, and clergy illegally marrying mixed-race couples (see Zunes
1999: 223).
The resistance culminated in the 1989 Defiance Campaign with multiracial peace marches in
Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban, and throughout the country. Even business leaders and
members of the white establishment such as the mayor of Cape Town joined the movement
(Smuts and Westcott 1991). The struggle moved to the negotiating table, with anti-apartheid
forces holding the upper hand but fashioning a democratic solution that also set the stage for a
process of reconciliation.
In total, the number of tactics used during the anti-apartheid struggle was enormous, and
included the following:
Protest and Persuasion
 Mass demonstrations, marches;
 Public declarations such as The Freedom Charter, adopted at the Congress of the People,
Kliptown, on 26 June 1955;
 Funeral marches and orations as occasions for protesting apartheid and remembering
victims of repression, especially when demonstrations were banned;
 Alternative press and advertising;
 Affidavits as a way of circumventing censorship (e.g., the South African Catholic
Bishops Conference used affidavits for a book, Police Conduct During Township Protests
in 1984);
 Memorials and anniversaries (e.g., church bells rung and vigils were held to
commemorate 1960 Sharpeville protestors shot by police, and Soweto Day was declared
to commemorate the 1976 uprising);
 Lighting candles every night during the Christmas season;
 Music was a major feature of the South African movement—singing, dancing, and
chanting freedom slogans was common;
 UN General Assembly Resolutions;
 A register of Artists, Actors and Others who have performed in South Africa was created
as part of an international cultural boycott;
 Symbolic clothing:
o Green, black and gold clothing symbolizing the banned ANC, and was worn even
in court during trials;
o Wearing ANC t-shirts;

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o A black armband worn in Parliament by Independent MP Jan van Eck mourning
40 years of National Party rule;
o Naked protest parade of 200 men and women against an exhibition of electronic
weaponry in 1982;
 “Services of witness” called by Archbishop Tutu inviting “banned” resisters to
participate;
 University students in 1987 used chairs to form a profane word large enough to be read
by a circling police helicopter (a photograph appeared in the Weekly Mail);
 Flag burning, replacing the South African flag with the ANC flag;
 Graffiti: political slogans in public places to circumvent censorship;
 Humor: protestors wearing “Stop the Call-up” t-shirts to protest conscription were
ordered to stop building a sand castle on the beach, leading to jokes about such activities
as subversive
 Religious pilgrimages and worship services;
 “Keening”—public weeping and wailing by women outside the gates of parliament;
 Kneeling—marchers fell to their knees and begged the police to withdraw from their
township; after negotiations, a woman leading the protest asked the crowd to turn back
and the commanding officer withdrew his troops;
 Motorcades (e.g., buses, vans, and cars would drive into a city center during a boycott of
white shops);
 Negotiations with political officials as pressure from international and domestic anti-
apartheid forces reached its apex.
Noncooperation
 Strikes and “stay-aways” organized by labor groups, especially the Congress of South
African Trade Unions;
 Economic boycotts such as those organized by Mkhuseli Jack and others in Port
Elizabeth;
 School boycotts;
 International sanctions, divestment, and boycotts;
 Sports and cultural boycotts;
 Rent boycotts;
 Establishment of alternative institutions – e.g.,
o The National Education Crisis Committee,
o Street committees and area committees,
o People’s courts,
o Alternative parks named after movement heroes (e.g., Nelson Mandela Park,
Steve Biko Park);
 Inter-racial bridge-building, social visits as social disobedience;

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 Civil disobedience:
o A South African Council of Churches resolution (July 1987) questioned the
government’s legitimacy and laws such as the Group Areas Act, the Education
Acts and the Separate Amenities Act
 Use of an alternative birth registration system advocated by the South African Council of
Churches defying the Population Registration Act;
 The United States Chamber of Commerce proposed a civil disobedience program for
businesses in South Africa;
 Hunger strikes by political prisoners (1989) resulting in the release of hundreds of
detainees and increased caution in detention without trial;
 Refusal to serve in the South African military (leading to arrests of conscientious
objectors);
 Informal “Unbanning” of themselves by resisters who had been banned by the regime
(which restricted their travel and activities and required them to report to authorities
periodically as well as prevented the press from quoting them);
 Clergy married couples forbidden to marry by the Prevention of Mixed Marriages Act
 School officials allowed non-white or mixed-race students to enroll in their all-white
schools
Nonviolent Intervention
 Archbishop Desmond Tutu led a protest march to a whites-only beach in the Western
Cape (1989);
 Non-whites showed up at white hospitals and medical stations for medical treatment;
 The National Union of Mineworkers promoted a lunchtime sit-in at an all-white canteen,
and had black African workers use whites-only changing rooms and toilets, buses, as part
of the 1989 Defiance Campaign;
 Marching without permits
 When “Run for Peace” joggers were ordered to disperse, they did so by running away
from the police but along the planned route (1985)
 Picnicking at the whites-only Boksburg Lake in defiance of apartheid regulations
Ensuing Events:
South Africa now has a democratic government and universal suffrage allowing all South
African citizens to vote and hold political office. Nevertheless, a large proportion of its nonwhite
population suffers grinding poverty and the hopelessness engendered by unmet high
expectations, provoking widespread violence, crime, and civil unrest.

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Although the nonwhite population gained what former Tanzanian president Julius Nyerere called
“flag independence” by gaining the vote and electing an ANC-dominated government, the
country’s economy, civil service, and military remain largely dominated by the white minority,
forcing continued compromise and power struggles. The difficult transition was facilitated in
part by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission headed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, which
attempted to repair the gap between the races by getting the ugly truth of the apartheid regime
out into the open, enacting sentences on the worst offenders, and then seeking to find ways of
reconciling the conflicting parties.
Endnotes:
1. For more details on the anti-apartheid movement’s strategies and tactics, see Smuts and
Westcott (1991).
2. The UDF was a loose coalition of trade unions, church and youth groups, cultural
organizations and civil society organizations created in part due to the government’s
banning of the ANC and other hardline repressive measures (See A Diplomat’s
Handbook). By 1983 the UDF had become the primary instrument for mobilizing the
opposition to the apartheid regime.
3. The Defiance of Unjust Laws Campaign of 1952 had resulted in the African National
Congress mushrooming from a small organization of 7,000 to a mass movement with
100,000 members.
4. The tricameral legislature created parallel but unequal parliaments for the “coloured” and
Indian populations (in addition to the existing white legislature) but excluded the black
population altogether (see Zunes 1999).
For Further Reading:
 Ackerman, Peter, and Jack DuVall. “South Africa: Campaign against Apartheid.” In A
Force More Powerful, 335-368. New York, NY: Palgrave, 2000.
 Adam, Heribert, and Kogila Moodley. The Opening of the Apartheid Mind: Options for
the New South Africa. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.
 Adler, Glenn, and Eddie Webster. “Challenging Transition Theory: The Labor
Movement, Radical Reform, and Transition to Democracy in South Africa.” Politics
Society 23 (1995): 75-106.
 Bond, Patrick. Elite Transition: From Apartheid to Neoliberalism in South Africa.
Sterling, VA: Pluto Press, 2000.
 Council for a Community of Democracies. The Diplomat’s Handbook. Washington, DC:
Council for a Community of Democracies. Available online at
http://www.diplomatshandbook.org/.

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 Bozzoli, Belinda. Theatres of Struggle and the End of Apartheid. Athens, Ohio: Ohio
University Press, 2004.
 Geisler, Gisela. “'Parliament is Another Terrain of Struggle': Women, Men and Politics in
South Africa.” The Journal of Modern African Studies 38 (December 2000): 605-630.
 Guelke, Adrian. Rethinking the Rise and Fall of Apartheid: South Africa and World
Politics. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.
 Hanlon, Joseph, ed. South Africa: The Sanctions Report; Documents and Statistics. A
report from the Independent Expert Study Group on the Evaluation of the Application
and Impact of Sanctions against South Africa prepared for the Commonwealth
Committee of Foreign Ministers on Southern Africa. London: Heinemann, 2005.
 Harvey, Robert. The Fall of Apartheid: The Inside Story from Smuts to Mbeki. New
York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001.
 Klotz, Audie. “Norms Reconstituting Interests: Global Racial Equality and U.S.
Sanctions Against South Africa.” International Organization 49 (Summer 1995): 451-
478.
 Klotz, Audie. Norms in International Relations: The Struggle against Apartheid. Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 1995.
 Kuperus, Tracy. State, Civil Society and Apartheid in South Africa: An Examination of
Dutch Reformed Church-State Relations. Houndsmilles: Macmillan Press, 1999.
 Lowenberg, Anton D., and William H. Kaempfer. The Origins and Demise of South
African Apartheid: A Public Choice Analysis. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan
Press, 1998.
 Mandela, Nelson. Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela.
Boston; Little, Brown and Co, 1994.
 Marais, Hein. South Africa: Limits to Change; The Political Economy of Transition.
London: Zed, 1998.
 Paulson, Joshua. “School Boycotts in South Africa – 1984-1987.” In Waging Nonviolent
Struggle: 20th Century Practice and 21st Century Potential, by Gene Sharp, 233-238.
Boston: Porter Sargent Extending Horizon Books, 2005.
 Sharp, Gene. The Politics of Nonviolent Action. 3 vols. Boston: Porter Sargent, 1973.
 Sharp, Gene. Social Power and Political Freedom. Boston: Porter Sargent, 1980.
 Smuts, Dene, and Shauna Westcott, eds. The Purple Shall Govern: A South African A to
Z of Nonviolent Action. Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1980.
 Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report. 2003. Accessed online 8
June 2010 at http://www.info.gov.za/otherdocs/2003/trc/.
 Tutu, Desmond. Rainbow People of God: The Making of a Peaceful Revolution. John
Allen, ed. New York: Doubleday, 1994.
 Wilson, Richard A. The Politics of Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa:
Legitimizing the Post-apartheid State. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.

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 Wink, Walter. Jesus' Third Way: The Relevance of Nonviolence in South Africa Today.
Cape Town: Citadel Press, 1987.
 Worden, Nigel. The Making of Modern South Africa: Conquest, Segregation, and
Apartheid. 3rd edition. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2000.
 Zunes, Stephen. 1999. “The Role of Nonviolence in the Downfall of Apartheid.” In
Nonviolent Social Movements, ed. S. Zunes, L. R. Kurtz, and S. B. Asher, 203-230.
Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers.