CASE HISTORIES

The End of Apartheid in South Africa

From 1948, 20% of South Africa’s population was white and imposed a system called apartheid on the other 80%. In the inevitable struggle for equality and inclusion, the white minority government practiced brutal repression. The white community feared and expected that the non-whites would eventually overrun the country, take all their property and drive the non-white population out of the country. This is the scenario that has played out in other African countries and could very well have occurred in South Africa. But it didn’t. In 1990, the government did something unexpected: they agreed to dismantle apartheid and replace it with a non-racial democracy. Four years later, in the first non-racial elections, non-whites won 60% of the votes. In most democracies, that would be an overwhelming majority and enough for an all non-white government. But that is not what happened. The African National Congress party (“ANC”) had agreed to something that was also unexpected. In a new constitution, they agreed that power would be shared equitably with the white minority in a Government of National Unity. The story of the two leaders who received the Nobel Peace Prize for this extraordinary transition to peace is told in the video Mandela and De Klerk.