Resistance against apartheid

In this section, you can read about the resistance movement against apartheid, both nationally and internationall…

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The ANC, protests, and massacres

The African National Congress was formed in 1912 - years before apartheid - as an organisation advocating equal voting rights for black people and people of mixed ethnicity in South Africa. After apartheid was implemented from around 1950, the ANC’s primary goal became the abolition of apartheid.

At first, the ANC mainly resisted apartheid through peaceful methods s…

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Nelson Mandela

The South African lawyer Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) became a member of the ANC in 1944, just a few years before apartheid. He quickly rose to power within the organisation and played an…

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International protests

In the early years of apartheid, international protests were relatively limited. Most members of the United Nations were somewhat sceptical of the apartheid system, but ultimately believed that South Africa - as an independent nation - should be allowed to run its government as it wished. At the same time, there was a widespread fear of communism in most of the Western world at the time - and the ANC and other resistance movements in South Africa had often been associa…