Apartheid in South Africa: Effects on Life and Education

The National Party gained power in South Africa in 1948, approximately 30 years after its founding. Originally, the National Party was created as a new, opposing political party to the ruling South African Party in 1913-14 by General JBM Hertzog (Carter, 1955, “Apartheid and reactions to it”, n.d.). Louis Botha, the first Prime Minister of the Union of South Africa, founded in 1910, and leader of the South African Party, was an advocate for the English-speaking white South Africans. General Hertzog contrastingly advocated for the Afrikaans, an ethnic group comprised mainly of Dutch descendants. Members of the National Party believed in political freedom from Britain, whom South Africa was directly connected to as a Union, cultural superiority of Afrikaans, and complete nationalism (“Apartheid and reactions to it”, n.d.).

General Hertzog obtained the position of Prime Minister under the National Party in 1924. Daniel F. Malan, a dedicated member of the Party, became the Minister of the Interior, Public Health, and Education and soon became a leading figure in the politics of South Africa. After the Great Depression and other events, the original differences between the South African Party and the National Party seemed to disappear as they were working toward common goals (“Apartheid and reactions to it”, n.d.). The two parties soon merged to become the United Party. Daniel F. Malan and some others, upset by this joining, left to create the Purified National Party, the same one that introduced apartheid to South Africa. (“National Party”, n.d.).

In 1948, Daniel F. Malan transitioned into Prime Minister and under his leadershipapartheid was instituted in South Africa. Literally defined, apartheid means separateness in Afrikaans (Spaull, 2013). In practice, this existed as the systematic segregation of non-white people from white people concerning everything from political and economic rights to living boundaries. Mark Saunders, author of Remembering Apartheid, described apartheid as a group of policies that slowed social and economic development (2005).Whereas former policies separated races economically and socially, apartheid “cruelly and forcibly separated people, and it had a fearsome state apparatus to punish those who fought against it” (“Apartheid and reactions to it”, n.d.). Despite increasing opposition, such resistance was internalized and occasionally dismissed due to apartheid’s harsh repercussions and segregation’s historical presence. In other words, apartheid was not much different superficially but in the way it was executed.

While apartheid was a major political and social shift, there were distinct acts that contributed to the cruelty and intensity of it, specifically for those of a non-white race. The Population Registration Act and the Group Areas Act of 1950 forced citizens to register as a specific race, either black, Indian, or coloured, so they would be treated “accordingly”, including separation and relocation based on skin color. Thousands of families were moved to “correct” areas of living. An important example is the area of District Six (“Apartheid and the reactions to it”, n.d.).

The area known as District Six was considered a slum, an impoverished area populated mainly with blacks and people of color, but its cultural community was lively and well known. During the apartheid regime, it was declared as a white only area, therefore most of the initial inhabitants were forced out. Some qualified for accommodation from the Community Development Board, but many were left without housing options. Years after the District Six population had been relocated, the area was still going unused. It was soon destroyed, leaving behind little to remember the community that once thrived (Dorsett, 1999).

In addition to a multitude of other policies, a major source of concern was the Bantu Education Act of 1953, a foundational piece of the apartheid regime. These policies separated blacks from whites in school and provided non-whites with inferior education that kept them economically and politically lower, with fewer opportunities for advancement (Spaull, 2013). Blacks were educated to meet their “cultural standards”, as established by white government officials. Thus, the curriculum was created to keep blacks poor in factories and as manual laborers under white control. The effects of this incredible discrimination are still relevant twenty years later (“Bantu Education Act No 47 of 1953”, Spaull, 2013).

How education has changed in Post-Apartheid South Africa

Even after apartheid was revoked in 1994 and the African National Congress (ANC) took power, the effects of years of segregation and inferior education remained intact. E.B. Fiske and H.F. Ladd, authors of Elusive equity: education reform in post-apartheid South Africa (2004) considered revamping the entire education system as the main way to accomplish post-apartheid success (Kanjee and Sayed, 2013, Spaull, 2013). This required protecting white education, but bringing black, Indian, and coloured schools up to par. Challenges the ANC faced included a lack of funding and an absence of centralization of the departments of education. Much of the country budget was already allocated to education, so increasing that amount would prove challenging. Additionally, there were multiple departments to oversee the different racial segments of education. Compiling them into a cohort under the Department of Education was difficult, but a necessary part of education reformation (Spaull, 2013, Kanjee and Sayed, 2013). The Policy Framework for Education and Training (1994) was developed to help the government give equal opportunities in schools, change curriculum in areas such as early childhood development and special education, and break down the barriers of cultural and racial prejudice (Fiske and Ladd, 2004). Yet still, twenty years later, the urban poor of South Africa are struggling.

Anil Kanjee and Yusuf Sayed(“Assessment policy in post-apartheid South Africa” 2013) consider the greatest challenge of the South African government to be changing the curriculum through a system of improved policies and judging one’s ability to advance to higher levels of education. The effective implementation of these new policies has been the downfall of the education reform. Although the policies of apartheid have been revoked, non-white schools still suffer from dysfunction and lack of leadership past the local level, according to Nicholas Spaull, writer of Poverty and Privilege (2013). They are informally run by communities and are constantly facing “disorder, distrust, rebellion, and lack of cooperation” due to apartheid effects on education (Spaull, 2013).