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About South Africa
South Africa has a strong culture of human rights. Its constitution, its history of successful struggle against apartheid, and its search for transitional justice have endowed it with a global leadership role in human rights theory and practice. Nonetheless, it faces many on-going human rights challenges, from righting the wrongs of apartheid to confronting such pressing issues as the HIV/AIDs pandemic, widespread economic inequality, and protecting the rights of women, children, migrants, among others. As such, it is an ideal and exciting place to study the historical achievements of and present-day threats to human rights.
Located at the southern tip of the African continent, South Africa borders Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and Swaziland. Lesotho is an independent enclave entirely surrounded by South African territory.
South Africa has experienced a significantly different evolution from other nations in Africa as a result of two facts. First, immigration from Europe reached levels not experienced in other African communities. Secondly, the strategic importance of the Cape Sea Route, as emphasized by the closure of the Suez Canal during the Six Day War, and mineral wealth made the country extremely important to Western interests, particularly during the Cold War.
Racial strife between the white minority and the black majority has played a large part in the country’s history and politics, culminating in apartheid, which was instituted in 1948 by the National Party (although segregation existed prior to that date). The laws that defined apartheid began to be repealed or abolished by the National Party in 1990 after a long and sometimes violent struggle (including economic sanctions from the international community).
Two philosophies originated in South Africa: ubuntu (the belief in a universal bond of sharing that connects all humanity); and Gandhi’s notion of satyagraha (passive resistance) developed while he lived in South Africa.
Regular elections have been held for almost a century; however, black South Africans were only enfranchised in 1994. The economy of South Africa is the largest and best developed on the continent, with modern infrastructure common throughout the country.
South Africa is often referred to as the “The Rainbow Nation”, a term coined by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and later adopted by President Nelson Mandela as a metaphor to describe the country’s newly-developing multicultural diversity in the wake of segregationist apartheid ideology.
The country’s socially progressive policies are rare in Africa. For example, by 2007, the country had joined Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, and Canada in extending the right of marriage to gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people.
Students from North American institutions are encouraged to take a course on South African history prior to enrolling in the IHRE program and to learn more about human rights in South Africa, both the struggle to end apartheid and about contemporary rights issues. For a list of suggested readings, please contact us.
Many of IHRE's NGO partners regularly publish reports on the state of human rights in South Africa so reading through their websites is a great place to start.
Here are a few other links that may be of interest to you:
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