Segregation before 1948

Apartheid did not appear from nowhere. Racial segregation was already entrenched:

• The Natives Land Act (1913) reserved the great majority of land for the white minority and restricted African land ownership to small "reserves".
• Pass laws controlled where black South Africans could live, work and travel.
• Mining and industry depended on cheap black migrant labour, housed in compounds and townships.

The Second World War brought black workers into the cities and factories in large numbers — and raised expectations. White fears of that change helped the National Party, campaigning on apartheid ("separateness"), win the 1948 election under D. F. Malan.

Why did the National Party win in 1948?

Building the apartheid state, 1948–66

The National Party turned segregation into a complete legal system:

• Population Registration Act (1950) — every person classified by race.
• Group Areas Act (1950) — separate residential areas by race; forced removals followed.
• Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act (1949) and the Immorality Act — banning marriage and sex across the colour line.
• Bantu Education Act (1953) — a deliberately inferior education for black children.
• Reservation of Separate Amenities Act (1953) — "petty apartheid": separate benches, beaches, entrances.
• Suppression of Communism Act (1950) — a catch-all power to ban and detain opponents.

Grand apartheid: under Verwoerd, black South Africans were assigned to ethnic "homelands" (Bantustans) and treated as foreigners in the land of their birth — stripping them of South African citizenship rights.

What did the pass laws do?

Opposition, 1948–64

The African National Congress (ANC), energised by its Youth League (Mandela, Sisulu, Tambo), turned to mass action:

• Defiance Campaign (1952) — deliberate, non-violent breaking of apartheid laws; thousands were arrested.
• Freedom Charter (1955) — adopted at the Congress of the People: "South Africa belongs to all who live in it." Leaders were then tried for treason (1956–61) and eventually acquitted.
• Sharpeville, 21 March 1960 — police fired on an anti-pass protest, killing 69 people. A state of emergency followed; the ANC and PAC were banned.
• Armed struggle: with peaceful protest outlawed, Umkhonto we Sizwe was formed in 1961. At the Rivonia Trial (1963–64) Mandela and others were sentenced to life imprisonment.

Law, resistance or pressure?

Tap a term, then tap what kind of thing it was.

Black Consciousness and Soweto

With the ANC banned and its leaders jailed, a new movement grew in the 1970s. Steve Biko's Black Consciousness movement urged black South Africans to reject the inferiority apartheid taught them, and to organise for themselves.

• 16 June 1976 — the Soweto uprising: schoolchildren protested against being taught in Afrikaans. Police opened fire; the protests spread nationwide and hundreds were killed.
• Biko was killed in police custody in 1977, provoking international outrage.
• Images of children shot by police did enormous damage to South Africa's standing abroad and pushed thousands of young people into exile and into the ANC's armed wing.

When was the Sharpeville massacre?

The world against apartheid

External opposition grew steadily:

• Sporting and cultural boycotts — South Africa was excluded from the Olympic movement and from most international sport, wounding a sports-obsessed white public.
• The United Nations condemned apartheid and imposed a mandatory arms embargo in 1977.
• Economic sanctions and disinvestment in the 1980s: banks refused to roll over loans, foreign companies pulled out, and the economy stagnated.
• The Commonwealth and anti-apartheid campaigners kept up pressure; South Africa had left the Commonwealth in 1961.

Debate: historians argue about how decisive sanctions were. Combine external pressure with internal resistance (unions, township revolt, ungovernability) and the cost of repression to explain why the regime finally negotiated.

Match the person to the role

Tap a person on the left, then their role on the right.

Crisis, negotiation and 1994

In the 1980s P. W. Botha tried to reform apartheid without surrendering white power — the tricameral parliament (1983) gave chambers to coloured and Indian voters but excluded black South Africans entirely. It backfired: the United Democratic Front was formed in 1983, townships became ungovernable, and repeated states of emergency followed.

• February 1990: F. W. de Klerk unbanned the ANC, PAC and Communist Party; Mandela was released on 11 February 1990 after 27 years.
• Negotiations (CODESA) survived deadlock and township violence.
• April 1994: the first non-racial election. The ANC won, and Mandela became president, leading a Government of National Unity.

Why did the regime negotiate?

Explaining change over time

This depth study spans fifty years, so examiners reward a clear sense of phases:

• 1940s: segregation already entrenched; wartime change; 1948 election.
• 1948–66: apartheid built in law; non-violent protest crushed (Sharpeville, Rivonia).
• 1966–80: Bantustans; Black Consciousness; Soweto; rising external pressure.
• 1980s–94: reform attempts fail; sanctions bite; negotiation; a democratic election.

When was Mandela released?

The Freedom Charter

Soweto, 1976

The big ideas to know

That is the South Africa depth study. Press Finish to see your score.