Kathleen FitzgeraldGengenbach/OsborneJanuary 13, 2006
Apartheid’s Afrikaner Roots
When the Nationalist Party won the election of 1948, the party leaders who gainedgovernance over South Africa were those who had an “alliance with the Afrikaner Party of N.C.Havenga, which [were] essentially those who remained faithful to Hertzog’s legacy.”
This Nationalist win ushered in the beginning of a new legal age—that of apartheid (lawful‘separateness’). The apartheid age was a time in which many violent actions and oppressivelaws were forced against black Africans.
In order to truly understand the ruling class’smotivation for enacting these violent legal measures during apartheid, it is necessary to firstcomprehend the historical journey that brought the ruling party—the Afrikaners—to that point.
By following the Boer
Afrikaner
Nationalist struggles, it becomes clear that the racistideology which motivated Afrikaner hatred towards the black Africans had existed since theseventeenth century. The forefathers of Hertzog’s Afrikaner radical ideology had always beendriven by their biblically-based belief in white supremacy and God’s destined (Manifest Destiny-style) plan for his “Elect” people. But while these Afrikaner predecessors, the Boers, had never hesitated to use violence or force against the black Africans, it was only after living under Britishrule for over one hundred years that this soon-to-rule Dutch cohort truly understood the value of legal subordination—that is, they recognized how the British (whose comprised a minority of South Africa’s white population) had used laws to force the majority of dissenting whites (theAfrikaners and their sympathizers) to submit to their imperialist, political desires. Thus, the
1
Ross, p. 114.
2
Brown, p. 32. The Immorality Act of 1950 provided “imprisonment and flogging for any sexual crossing of thecolour line, [and] produce[d] so many successful prosecutions a year.”
3
Although Hertzog had differed from the hard-liner Afrikaners when it came to issues such as entering World War II onthe Nazi side, most of the emotional and legal issues the entire cohort of Afrikaners experienced were similar. Neither side really disagreed about the necessity and productivity of the apartheid system. Thus, such isolated differences are notdisruptive enough to constitute a discussion on the differences between the Hertzog-ian and more radical Afrikaners. The purpose of this paper is not to give a detailed journey of the Afrikaner ideology, but to present the few defining Afrikaner experiences that enabled them to even conceptualize a legal institution such as apartheid.
1
Afrikaners realized they too could utilize a system of laws to subjugate the black majority of South Africa to their plans.Afrikaner frustration with these laws quickly turned to angry rage after the concentrationcamp atrocities of the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902), from which the Afrikaner people took horrific images and stories to support their claims against the ‘bullying’ British. These long-standing feelings of persecution added to the base racist ideology that the Afrikaners had always possessed. This anger and hatred mixed with their newfound appreciation of legal force to createthe perfect motivating palate for the 1948 Afrikaner-dominated South African government toratify a violent, legalized form of racial insubordination—a form of government known as“apartheid.”From the very beginning of Dutch colonization in South Africa, the Boer/Afrikaner interpretation of the Bible led them to believe they were a part of God’s “Elect” or chosen people, and as such, that God expected them to ensure His plan for their dominance at any cost.By 1690, agricultural and political frustrations with the Cape rule drove settler farmers across themountains and onto land that was previously that of the Khoikhoi peoples.
These Dutch farmersimmediately identified themselves with the Israelites, as both were distinctly identified as “God’s people,” who suffered in the wilderness, but were actively guided through a history of hardships by God.
These Afrikaner predecessors “had confidence that they had a special mandate fromGod to possess the land, and that God was protecting their faith as well as testing it.”
For the“Elect,” the first of these so-called “tests” had recently come in the form of the indigenous black African.
4
Ross, p. 25.
5
Moodie, Intro., ix.Templin, p. 7 Even much later, in Rev. Coenraad Spoelstra’s 1897 sermond, he says: “Brothers & Sisters, there arerepeated instances of the noteworthy similarities which exist between Israel’s history and the history of our land and people.” Obviously this emotion continued to resonate amongst the Afrikaners for centuries.
6
Templin, p. 19
2
The black Khoikhoi peoples had first tested “God’s plan” by refusing to supply the Capecolony with sufficient cattle in the earliest days of the Dutch colony. Within one decade of settlement, it became clear “that even under duress the Khoikhoi were unable or unwilling tosupply the meat demanded by several thousand.”
For the Dutch ancestors of the Afrikaner, thiswas not only intolerable to them, it was also most unacceptable in the eyes of the Almighty.After all, to them, the Bible seemed to support the white Elect’s claim that blacks should aidGod’s chosen people as a subservient labor force. The Dutch viewed their Elect status as aguarantee that their culture would remain dominant in South Africa.
Since the black Africanswere obviously not a part of the chosen people’s culture—due to dissimilarities in skin color,religion, etc.—then God must have intended for blacks to subserviently assist the “Elect” on their journey towards fulfillment of His Will. Consequently, the Boers saw the black African as a Sonof Ham, “destined to be a hewer of wood and drawer of water for his white compatriot.”
Whenthe black Khoikhoi, however, refused to satisfy this intended role, the more radical of the Boers(who were also the predecessors of the Afrikaners) started to see the black Africans as a threat toGod’s plan and their very own way of life. “Because of the divine election of Afrikanerdom,anything threatening [the] Afrikaner…became demonic.”
Thus, the more radical members of The Elect began to develop a fearful disdain for their unfriendly African neighbors.
This disdain quickly manifested itself into anti-black violence. The VOC “frequently,and with great brutality, would maintain the authority of the free over the [black] slaves.”
Andlater, after the Dutch Boers had forcibly stripped the Khoikhoi of their land in order to make
7
Ross, p. 22.
8
Templin, p. 9. Understanding themselves to be God’s Elect people caused them to see cultural destiny as one whichshould dominate. Because black Africans did not possess the same European culture, it was obvious to the whites that the blacks were not to dominate, according to God’s Will.
9
Moodie, p. 245.
10
Ibid., p. 15.
11
Ibid., p. 15. This disdain soon became fear of the black man and lasted for centuries. “Fear of the black man was ever- present in Afrikaner consciousness.”
12
Ross, p. 23.
3
Search History:
Result 00 of 00
00 results for result for
p.
Apartheid's Afrikaner Roots: South African History Paper
4.2K
Reads
5
Readcasts
12
Embed Views
Recommended
More From This User
Notes
Load more
