What it did was provide voting rights as stated in the constitution but removed any clout the Black vote carried.
In addition to the law being passed that prohibited mixed marriage the government took it a step further to prevent the Blacks mixing their offspring with White blood to try and protect their children from oppression.
The government passed a law making it illegal for two people of mixed race to have sexual relations.
The laws were also changed to provide separate and different government structures for different races.
Blacks responded to Apartheid in many ways. One of the common practices that they took part in was to set up shack villages and squat in and around the White areas where they could get work and support their families while still living with them.
It was not long however, before the government took care of that as well when it provided itself with permission to destroy any shack village it found.
Another law that looked on the surface to be a positive step for the Black population actually worked in the opposite direction.
The law stated that any White employer who hired a Black employee had to provide and construct a proper house for that Black to live in as they were recognized as legal residents of the White area.
This caused many White employers to refuse to hire Black workers and it caused many currently employed Black workers to lose their positions.
It became universally illegal for Blacks to use the same public amenities that Whites used which further ingrained the division between the races.
Even given all of the rules and regulations Blacks continued to find ways to migrate to White areas. They would find Whites and gain sympathy and get positions offered to them and move there.
They would work hard and become valued and then promote the hiring of other Blacks.
To combat this effect the government then passed a law that made it illegal for Blacks to migrate to White areas for any reason.
It is easy for one to see how determined the government was to oppress the Black population at any cost in all areas of life.
To be sure the Black population would not be able to get ahead financially the government moved to pass laws allowing the discrimination against Blacks in the workforce including below poverty wages, the ability for Whites to cost Blacks their positions if they were wanted by Whites and other things that provided the ability to completely mistreat Blacks in the workplace.
Blacks employed as domestic help were allowed to live on the property of their employer but could not bring their families to live there nor could their families come to visit which meant Black workers not seeing family members for long periods of time.
If a Black was caught in a White area and did not have proper documentation on file he or she was immediately arrested provided a short trial and deported to his or her designated "home area." In addition the Black's employer was prosecuted for employing a Black without making sure the Black had the proper documentation to be in the White area each day to work.
The entire process gave pause to White employers about hiring Blacks to work for them. This meant that the only jobs really available to the Blacks in the White areas were the very menial positions that no White would take.
Even as history moved forward the plight of Blacks in South Africa continued to tighten. Black employers were not allowed to hire White workers as it would disrupt the balance of power that Whites held over Blacks.
Black police officers were not allowed to arrest White criminals regardless of the crime or charge.
The Black areas were not often provided with running water or electricity and for many years Blacks were prohibited from purchasing or consuming any alcohol.
The laws of Apartheid further destroyed the hope of Blacks. A White driver could not have a Black passenger of the opposite gender in the front seat of the vehicle lest it give the appearance that they were a couple.
Whites were required to pay a higher tax rate than Blacks had to pay, further deepening the imbalance of power Whites held over their Black counterparts.
South African Blacks were essentially stripped of any citizenship as they were classified and designated to reside in an "independent" home area.
Almost 90% of South African land was reserved for White areas with 10% being designated as the Black home areas. The areas designated as Black home area were generally substandard in every way.
As the 1960's through 1980's arrived the government took a new turn when it began to force Blacks to relocate to their designated home areas to live or face the threat of prison or death.
More than...
This was largely because the resistance was split along racial lines. For instance, the Afrikaans National Council wanted freedom from foreign oppression without taking into consideration the needs and demands of the Colored. Similarly, the Non-European Liberation League, another group that opposed the current practices, were the proponents of the issues of immediate concern to Colored but African people. This lack of unity proved decisive, taking into consideration the
Apartheid remains one of the twentieth century's biggest blunders concerning human welfare and simple decency. Apartheid is the result of two different schools of thought that existed primarily upon the oppression of others. The Afrikaner government was no better at human rights than the ides lost in colonialism. Any attempt to restrain individuals is wrong but to attempt to do in a country to the very people that live there
The End of Apartheid in South Africa. New York: Greenwood Press, 1999. As the titles suggests, this excellent work by Lindsay M. Eades, one of the most prominent South African historians writing today, explores the long and often violent history of apartheid in South Africa and offers a number of explanations as to why it collapsed in the early 1990's. Most of this book is composed of various essays that
Nelson Mandela One of the main ideas of Nelson Mandela was the ending of apartheid, which was a South African racial segregation that kept black residents from being able to have the same rights as white residents (Sampson, 2011). This was very similar to the slavery that was seen in the United States in the past, and Mandela wanted to see it stopped. His major idea was that people should be
Of course, a separation of the races meant really the preservation of white superiority at the expense of those formerly enslaved. The law mandated distinct facilities for Whites and Blacks. Everything from schools, to transportation, movie theaters, hotels, and even public restrooms were carefully segregated. Few Black only facilities approached white ones in quality or amount of money expended on their upkeep. Black public schools were notoriously inferior as
As mentioned earlier on, the new political dispensation that took off is 1994 opened the "gates of creative possibility" (Roos,2010) for the opera producers since they were therefore able to juxtapose the Western and African art scenes. This was fueled by the sense of renewed intellectual and artistic access that way created by the new political dispensation. According to Roos (2010), theoretically, the new political dispensation culminated into an
Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.
Get Started Now