South Africa

Coke Money and the Public Relations of Higher Ed Divestment from Apartheid

by Amanda Joyce Hall

At Emory Univerity in the 1980s the close relationship between Coca Cola and the administration allowed Coke to leverage its financial support of the university to press the administration to suppress and coopt student movements for divestment from Apartheid South Africa. 

Excerpt: How Apartheid South Africa Tried to Create a Libertarian Utopia

by Quinn Slobodian

As pressure grew to end Apartheid, South African libertarians experimented with a deregulated zone that would be "Africa's Switzerland." It failed to become a model market utopia, but with sweatshops, environmental hazard, and stunted democracy, it was an eerie predictor of 21st century societies. 

The South African Community Destroyed for a Whites-Only Suburb

On 9 February 1955 apartheid South Africa forcibly evicted residents from Sophiatown, a multi-racial suburb in Johannesburg. 65,000 people were ‘removed’ and Sophiatown was demolished and turned into a whites-only neighbourhood called Triomf.

South Africa's Liberal Whites Face a Racial Reckoning

by Eve Fairbanks

"Sometimes I like to tell people that South Africa, very loosely, collapses hundreds of years of American history—from the antebellum period, through the end of Jim Crow, and well into our future—into about 50."

It's Impossible to Separate Politics and the Olympics

by Michelle Sikes

The Supreme Council for Sport in Africa was a collaboration of 32 nations to pressure international sporting authorities to seek to bar the white supremacist regimes of South Africa and Rhodesia from major competition, most notably through a boycott of the 1976 Montreal games. 

"It’s Apartheid," Say Former Israeli Ambassadors to South Africa

by Ilan Baruch and Alon Liel

Two former Israeli ambassadors to South Africa this week declared their view that Israel's occupation of the West Bank, now 55 years on, is a form of apartheid. 

Listen: A History of Pandemic Xenophobia and Racism

Historical examples abound of public health crises exacerbating racial tensions and exclusions. Medical historian Alexandre White discusses his work on a plague pandemic in early 20th century South Africa 

When Nature is Valued over Human Life

A review of Jacob S. T. Dlamini’s "Safari Nation: A Social History of Kruger National Park" examines how the government of South Africa used tourism promotion to justify the establishment of its apartheid regime. 

Will 2020 Place the US Alongside Apartheid South Africa in History's Hall of Shame?

by Teresa Barnes

The South African National Party won a parliamentary victory in 1948 and consolidated power quickly to institutionalize Apartheid and focus national politics on racial issues. This surprise turned into a half-century of hard right rule and stands as a warning to Americans today.

The Hidden Faces of Apartheid (Review)

A new book documents the way that the South African security forces targeted percevied opponents of apartheid for extrajudicial killing. 

Denis Goldberg, South African Freedom Fighter, Is Dead at 87

He was the only white defendant to be convicted alongside Nelson Mandela and others in 1964 for resisting apartheid. He spent 22 years in prison.

The Boer War: The Opening Act in a Violent Century

by David Carlin

There is something darkly poetic in the timing of the Boer War. It offered a grim preview of warfare and the social conditions that would shake the world during the 20th century.

South Africa: Twenty-Five Years Since Apartheid

by Zeb Larson

Twenty-five years ago, South Africa peacefully transitioned from a white-minority government to a black majority government, yet the legacy of apartheid still lingers today.

What South Africa Can Teach Us About Reparation

by Ereshnee Naidu-Silverman

Reparations can work, but only if we start telling the truth about racism and slavery.

Protesting with her Feet: The World’s Fastest Middle-Distance Woman versus Sports Governing Bodies

by Jeffrey R. Kerr-Ritchie

A deeper look into athletics, gender, and Caster Semenya. 

Quest to Solve Assassination Mystery Revives an AIDS Conspiracy Theory

“We were at war,” said the former militia member, Alexander Jones. “Black people in South Africa were the enemy.”

South Africa wants to make history compulsory at school

But can it?

Black South African scholars urged to correct white historians’ distortion

South Africa's National Heritage Council (NHC) has called on the country's black historians to make an effort to correct the distortions of history in some books by white historians.

Humanity’s strange new cousin is shockingly young — and shaking up our family tree

Homo naledi, a strange new species of human cousin found in South Africa two years ago, was unlike anything scientists had ever seen.

While We Weren't Paying Attention, South Africa Suddenly Has Become Pals with China and Russia

by Heinrich Matthee

A strange paranoia about the United States underlies the shift.