The influence of apartheid in South African foreign policy on human rights

South Africa has suffered drastic transformation throughout its history. At the end of the eighteenth century, this African area became a British colony, after passed through the hands of the Portuguese and then the Dutch, when the Britons defeated Afrikaners. Eventually, in 1910 the Union of South Africa was founded as a dominion of the British Empire. After the World War II and influenced by the German Nazism, the South African government set up apartheid rules making legal segregation. This harsh regimen provoked clandestine opposition under the leadership of Nelson Mandela’s ANC. The social and even international pressure produced the beginning of apartheid’s dismantling, the first multiracial general elections took place in 1994 (won by the ANC party) and therefore a constitution was adopted in 1996 as a result of this process of democratization and equality. The apartheid system sharply determined the coming post-apartheid governments, especially in human rights field. This essay analyzes how the apartheid experience has currently affected the viewpoint of the human rights’ political challenges in the South African foreign policy.

Due to rulers’ aim to transform the organization of the South African State based on racial discrimination into a democratic one, not only affected domestic policy as well as foreign policy. However this goal was not exempt from controversy, true inner and international threats intimidated white South Africans while increasing black population’s hopes hence radical security measures were boosted, such as in the Sharpeville Massacre, the origin of South Africa’s human rights day. Regarding the international scene, a political isolation and an economic boycott were established against apartheid government. Once apartheid was abolished, De Klerk established democratic polities to reintegrate South Africa on the international (and regional) scene. (Lechini, 1992.)

In 1994, when the first post-apartheid government was arranged, South Africa’s foreign policy underwent a transition led by Nelson Mandela, who became a worldwide symbol of the fight against discrimination, social equality, poverty and peace. The constitution of 1996 was created to establish human rights as one or even the most relevant points. Mandela’s fight to human rights consists on using diplomacy to assist in mediating incidents. As when he showed his opposition to the Nigerian Sani Abacha’s violent regime but also in Asia and Europe, looking for peace in nations like Burundi or in Northern Ireland situation, although his foreign policy was focused on the African continent and South Africa displayed as a leader and supporter for African nations. Mandela became a hero for the South African society and inspired others, as he was able to transfer his ideas and restlessness as an activism to his role as a ruler. Nevertheless, he was also criticized for not answering African states’ interest in some occasions or for having relationship with human right abusers as Muammar al-Qaddafi or Fidel Castro, much reprehended by Western rulers. (Firsing, 2013.) Thabo Mbeki followed in the footsteps of Mandela but prioritized Africa due to rising nationalism. According to Firsing (2013), growth and improvement in the rest of Africa would benefit South Africa, the country would have nothing to do without the whole African country hence Mbeki developed a Pan-Africanism foreign policy, well-known as the rebirth of Africa but was criticized for his behavior by the AIDS epidemic. In its role as a non- permanent member of the UN Security Council (as in other international organizations or treaties: The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966), the Peace Council) in 2007-2008 period and again in 2011-2012, South Africa has acted as an advocate of African interest and rights as well as worked hand in hand with the UN to remove social and cultural conflicts, to promote justice and improve human and freedom rights among nations, all developed in the UNDAF.

Another factor comes into play: South Africa is an emerging country, a member of the BRICS and IBSA. Although it do not seem related, this has completely changed its performance in terms of human rights. The BRICS are formed by Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa itself. The three Asian countries are notorious for their little pro- human rights and little freedom of expression action, and South Africa as a partnership ignore it and still has connections with them, supported them, being controversial and much criticized behavior contradicting Western position. Jacob Zuma, current South Africa’s prime minister, seems to contradict himself. Playing both sides: the BRICS for economic support and the UN and Western-countries, due to its colonial-historical past with any of them, for humanitarian aspects. According to The Economist (2010):
Mr Zuma says his foreign-policy priorities are the same as those of previous ANC governments: to boost African solidarity and unity; to strengthen ties between countries in the southern hemisphere; to keep good relations with strategic trading partners in the West; to reform the UN and Bretton Woods institutions to give the poor world a stronger voice; and to promote democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights.

While he is claiming the previous, he is also encouraging business relations with China, its biggest trading partner, and increasing state visits as Mbeki had already predicted: "China will emerge as one of the principal partners of South Africa...and we agreed that given the scope and depth of relations that will develop, we will establish a joint commission to incorporate all of these elements." It seems Zuma is forgetting Mandela’s postulation of human rights as the heart of international relations. He, of course, condemns crimes and genocides but meanwhile maintain contact with, for example, Equatorial Guinea's Teodoro Obiang Nguema. This situation is reminiscent of what he was criticized Mandela in his years in office but Prime Minister Zuma reaffirms his commitment to human rights. In March 2010, the Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Ms. Maite Nkoana-Mashabane declared that the SA’s foreign policy should re-approach according to the increasing expectations caused by South Africa as an emerging power. (Wilding, 2013.) Perhaps she is right, facts speak: latest United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) voting record discloses that South Africa has not supported a resolution on the right to free protest like China, Russia, Egypt or Saudi Arabia. South Africa excuses by arguing it does not support specific circumstances of each country (Kasambala, 2014.) 

Does this means that South Africa is falling behind in terms of rights and freedoms, ignoring its own history? South Africa has unstoppably evolved among the last century. In the late 90s, apartheid abolition directed both domestic and foreign policies setting an example to the world of transformation and social cooperation praised by the majority of countries being also a model for Latin America democracies. Thereupon economy growth came and South Africa became an emerged power, establishing strong relationships with countries without those recently achieved rights. South Africa faces a dilemma: supporting those fast-developing countries (overlooking human rights) or improving them and cut off BRICS’ relations. To cope with it, South Africa must change its foreign policy in a way it could adapt both positions or choose one because it cannot be a worldwide human rights defender if it cannot lead by real example. 

By Alicia Bellón

REFERENCES

Lechini de Alvarez, G. (1992). El peso del apartheid en el diseño de la política exterior sudafricana. Revista de Relaciones Internacionales de la Universidad Nacional de La Plata, 3. Retrieved from: http://sedici.unlp.edu.ar/handle/10915/437
Firsing, S. (2013, December 6). Remembering Mandela’s Foreign Policy. International Policy Digest.
Kabunda, M. (2013, December 6). Nelson Mandela: ¿qué legado para Sudáfrica, África y el mundo? The Huffington Post (Spanish version).
Unknown author. (2010, October 14). Human rights? What's that? The Economist. Retrieved from: http://www.economist.com/node/17259138
Asano, C. (Interviewer), Trajber, L. (Interviewer), Daruwala, M. (Interviewee) & Wilding, S. (Interviewee). (2013). Emerging Democracies’ Foreign Policy: What Place for Human Rights? A Look at India and South Africa. Retrieved from Sur Journal Web site: http://www.surjournal.org/eng/conteudos/getArtigo19.php?artigo=19,artigo_08.htm
Habib, A. (2009). South Africa's foreign policy: hegemonic aspirations, neoliberal orientations and global transformation. South African Journal of International Affairs, 16(2), 143-159. DOI: 10.1080/10220460903265857.
Kasambala, T. (2014, June 9). Dispatches: Can South Africa Live Up to its Human Rights Promises? Human Rights Watch. 

Marta Armero Baigorri 1º RITI Subgrupo 1

The transition from the apartheid to democracy in South Africa: political and social changes.

When one analyses a country like South Africa can see the many social differences that it still has between the social classes, and the question is: is it improving? In 1994 were held the first democratic elections of this country, making official the end of the apartheid, which was informally ended in 1992. This not only meant a change in politics, it was necessary to change the whole social structure of the country, and more important, the mindset of its people. South Africa needed to go from a country in which “a 10% of the population had it all and the 90% had nothing. (Ruiz-Jiménez, 2013)”, to a democratic country following the human rights that could stand next to the all the European countries. And this needed to be done without making all the investors and citizens with better coalification leave, because in this case the said group was formed mostly by white people, who were afraid to see their rights and resources taken away.

What this essay attempts to do is explain this change, the way the government affronted all this transformations and how effected they have been.

To begging with, it is important to explain what the apartheid is in a general way and what social differences caused in the population. The apartheid, which means apartness in Afrikaans, is the name of the system that the Afrikaans National Party instituted in South Africa in 1948 as a way to “cement their control over the economic and social system. (Stanford University, 1995)”. The basis of this system was the racial separation to create a white superiority, which lead to territory separation and the start of political and police repression in the decade of the 60’s.

This meant that the citizens had to be classified in: white, bantú, black South Africans, or colored, a mix between both races, by the Department of Home Affairs (DHA). This separation was done following criterions such as the characteristics of the person's hair, skin color, facial features, home language and especially the knowledge of Afrikaans, area where the person lives, the person's friends and acquaintances, employment, socioeconomic status and eating and drinking habits. (Posel, 2001).This separations entailed that all the rights of the people classify as bantús were taken by laws like the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act of 1949 and the Immorality Amendment Act of 1950, which prohibited inter-racial marriage and sexual activities that were punished with the imprisonment of the people involved. Another example of that is the access to health care that the black population had, which was limited and even lead “to abuses such as the refusal of emergency care treatment, falsification of medical records, denial or limitation of Blacks’ access to ongoing medical care (Afrobarometer: Round II Survey of South Africa, 2002)”.

This was supposed to end in 1994 with the election of the African National Congress, the party of Nelson Mandela, in the first democratic elections of the country, but actually left the country with big social differences and a poor economy.

One of the other things that are necessary to explain is the figure of Nelson Mandela in this period. Mandela’s political career started in 1942 when he joined the African National Congress. He joined the non-violent movement of protest against the apartheid of this party, but was called to trial after his ‘Speech on the Dock’ during the events of Rivona Trial, a trial for sabotage with other nine men. In said speech he claimed that: “the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities (…) is an ideal for which I am prepared to die. (Mandela, 1963)”. After that, he and seven of the other men who participated where taken condemned to an imprisonment in 1964. He was released after 27 years of in prison in 1990 and was elected president of the African National Congress in 1991 (Nelson Mandela Foundation, 2014). The idea that Nelson Mandela had was to make a unite country where black and white people were treated the same. This is important as it shows how Mandela’s mindset was created, making him a humble man looking for social equality. When the Mandela was elected president the black people were expecting to have a revolution, to expel the white minority and rearrange the country. But Mandela was actually looking to work with this minority, to make a ‘Rainbow Nation’, the problem came when the economy started to go down. The problem was that some aspects like health and education budgets needed to be extended, as the majority of the black population, almost the 85%, weren’t covered by them during the apartheid but needed to be included now.

That’s why in 1994, after the elections took place, the government made The Reconstruction and Development Program (RDP) and the Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR which studied all the social differences and their affects in the population, like the division of the cities in well-suburb structured townships for whites and the slum areas for blacks or the poor education and preparation of the uneducated black population. (William Bowles, 2012). The government decided that the structural changes were more urgent that the education ones, so the budgets to restructure the cities and the health care program were raised, which has led to making South Africa “the economic powerhouse of sub-Saharan Africa and the largest economy in the second largest continent in the world. (Tara Kangarlou, 2013)” but making the social gap even bigger

The problem with Mandela was that after one term as a president he abandoned the position in 1999, and the country was still in deep crisis. But not only that, following Greg Myre’s theory (2014) “the country's leaders have fallen far short of the moral example and high standards set by Mandela”. This could mean that after 20 years having the power the American National Congress has lost the values that it was created for? The problem with this party in the present is that it gives away the same image that had in 1994: an image of a fighter against the apartheid and for the black people’s rights. That’s why it won again the elections this year in May, even though the actual president was accused in a recent anti-corruption report of spending $23 million in upgrading his private home (Greg Myre, 2014).

It’s true that only 20 years is not enough time to change a whole nation, but it seems like all the political measures are starting to fade away. As the South African Demographic Health Survey made in 2011 shows, “economic growth has been at a level of about 2 percent per annum since 1994, but has been unable to address the high levels of poverty and unemployment.”  The government of South Africa needs to start focusing in the social differences as well, just because all the population has assured the basic rights in the present does not mean that they can access to them with the same ease, what should be the basis in every country.

Referencies

Ruiz-Giménez, 2013: http://www.20minutos.es/noticia/1853675/0/nelson-mandela/hombre-mito/africa-sudafrica/

Stanford University 1995: http://www-cs-students.stanford.edu/~cale/cs201/apartheid.hist.html

Posel, 2001: http://www.transformation.ukzn.ac.za/index.php/transformation/article/view/841/656

Afrobarometer: Round II Survey of South Africa, 2002: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2636545/

Nelson Mandela Foundation, 2014: http://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/page/biography

William Bowles, 2012: http://www.globalresearch.ca/economic-and-social-crisis-in-post-apartheid-south-africa/32505

 Tara Kangarlou, 2013: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/11/27/business/south-africa-since-apartheid/

Greg Myre, 2014: http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2014/05/06/310095463/20-years-after-apartheid-south-africa-asks-how-are-we-doing

South African Demographic Health Survey, 2011: http://web.archive.org/web/20110726195853/http://www.doh.gov.za/facts/1998/sadhs98/chapter1.pdf

Remember Mandela

Yesterday, a year ago the world got the annoncement of Nelson Mandela's death.
Mandela was the most important icon in the beggining of the democracy in South Africa and one of the most important personalities in the fight against racism with Marthin Luther King Jr and Gandhi.



In his memoria the Douth African govenerment celebrated yesterday morning a special memorial. You can see all the pictures and how it went in it's official twitter account, which has was twitting and promoting the hashtag #RememberMandela. Get a look at it and see how was the conmemoration of one of the most important men in the history of human rights.

This is the Analytical Essay that we had to do about a specific aspect of this country.

NAME: VEGA GARCÍA MUÑOZ

COURSE: 1^ST TRANSLATION AND INTERPRETATION-Subgrupo 1

SUBJECT: METHODOLOGY OF STUDY AND ANALYSIS

DATE: 5^TH, DECEMBER, 2014

TITLE OF THE ANALYTICAL TEXT: LANGUAGES OF SOUTH AFRICA 

LANGUAGES OF SOUTH AFRICA

South Africa is a multilingual country where eleven languages are spoken: Zulu, Xhosa, Afrikaans, Sesotho sa leboa, Setswana, English, Sesotho, Tsonga, Swazi, Venda and Ndebele. (South Africa info, 2012) The most common languages spoken at home by South Africans is the Zulu (23.8 percent speak Zulu at home), followed by the Xhosa (17.6 per cent), and Afrikaans (13.3 per cent).

The aim of this paper is to study the development of the languages of South Africa as well as the disappearance of Dutch despite being the first settlement in this country. Also learn how the English in spite of being at number six in terms of spoken languages, is the “official” language of media, business and politics. Finally we will see an example of how languages affect in education at schools. The languages of South Africa are related to the history and culture of the civilizations that have passed through this country.

The first populations of South Africa were the Bantu and the Bushman. But South Africa is really known thanks to the arrival of Europeans. Around the 12th century the Bantu began to move to the South of the continent, and later, in the 17TH century, Portuguese, Dutch, French, German and English, together with the Malays, Indians and Indonesians, arrived by sea to the territory of South Africa. For many years, there were numerous fights between the Dutch and the British by the power of this region. These wars were called Anglo-Boer wars, and the British were winners and took over these lands then Dutch. (Sudáfrica en la Red, 2007). Thus was formed a very wide cultural diversity, with the corresponding issue of the situation of languages in contact.

During the next years of the war, the British failed in the attempt to reconstruct the country and the Afrikaners (who were the inhabitants of that time) were relegated to work in the field. Also failed, the British people, the establishment of its language and therefore the Afrikaan (language of Afrikaans) represented the population. (Historia de Sudáfrica, 2008-2014)

Nevertheless, the English and the Dutch were, until that moment, the official languages of the country and the Afrikaans was not set as an official language until 1925. This language derived somehow from the Dutch, used by the Boer and coloured people (Los Filólogos, 2000-2007). It was declared as an official language replacing the Dutch after the rise of nationalist movements.  After that, the English continued being the language used by the majority of white people. It was also used by black people that used it as a lingua franca to linguistic diversity.

During the years of Apartheid, black South Africans, suffered the consequences of the disaffected British that were not able to occupy its territory. That´s why the formation that black population was receiving during this period (that is too important to understand the history of South Africa) was minimal and it was in English and in Afrikaans. These languages were only used in terms of teaching, so they were excluded from all social scopes.

When Nelson Mandela arrived to South Africa made several changes to rebuild the country. To do this, he created a new multicoloured flag and the national anthem, which had five of the languages that are spoken nowadays. Thus, children could learn their mother tongue and in the judicial system each person should be informed with his own language. Besides all this, they sought to recover the marginalized ones. The way towards a multilingual nation is not easy (as it is still in process). For this reason they have created a number of organizations as the PanSALB (Pan South African Language Board), which has promoted the inclusion of some African languages, at the universities.

Now the problem with the multilingualism is English and the awareness that they have of this language. On the one hand it has been considered as the language of freedom for some people and on the other hand it is the most used language in the media and the Government. This is because it is a language spoken internationally. And despite being the sixth most spoken in South Africa, it is obligatory it learning. In spite of this advantages, there are also some disadvantages like that the 30% of the population does not understand any English. (Díaz García, 2013).

Because of all this, it has been created a project for education in South Africa. It is called PRAESA (Project for the Study of Alternative Education in South Africa). They seek and develop programs of bilingualism from childhood and they try to increase the status of African languages both in the oral area and the written among other things. (PRAESA, 2012-2014)  

The problem of some families is that they speak a language and when they have children talk to them in that language at home but not at school. As it is the case of Xolisa Guzula, who bought a house in a suburb where no one spoke Xhosa (his mother tongue). She is complaining that children are forced to learn a language (English) that they only speak at the school. The problem is that many parents want to preserve their language but there are schools that offer only English and Afrikaans. As these schools have numerous activities and resources to learn other things, it creates a moral debate that parents must face.

Xolisa Guzula is a bi-literacy storyteller and author of children´s literature. She is a well known advocate and teacher trainer of bilingual Xhosa and she was one of the founders of the network of community literacy reading clubs emerging across the country. (NELSON MANDELA INSTITUTE) 

What this mother wants to say is that her child Tumi had no opportunity to learn Xhosa in the school and she just learnt English despite the efforts she put. One day he realized that the child did not want write in Xhosa, but he was not surprised because she didn´t learnt it at school. At home the two (mother and daughter) read in several languages. First in English to gain her confidence and then in Xhosa to preserve the language. Now Tumi is 6 years old and she can read and understand three languages. Now she get the feeling that I have succeeded more than the teachers with all the time and materials they have in school to teach children to read and write.

REFERENCES

South Africa info.(2012,November 6^th). Retrieved in November 22^th, 2014, from South Africa info: http://www.southafrica.info/about/people/language.htm#.VIFyGNKG-So

Sudáfrica en la Red.(2007) Retrieved in November 22^th , 2014, from Sudáfrica en la Red: http://www.sudafricaenred.com/content/guia_paises/sudfrica/datos-generales/16

Historia de Sudáfrica. (2008-2014). Retrieved in December 4^th, 2014, from Spanish Facts: http://noticias-de-hoy.es/historia_de_sud%C3%A1frica

Los Filólogos.(2000-2007). Retrievesd in November 30^th, 2014, from Los Filólogos: http://www.losfilologos.com/portal/index.php/linguistica/815-el-afrikaans-una-lengua-germanica-hablada-en-tres-paises-africanos

Díaz García,A. (2013, December 18^th). El legado ligüístico de Mandela. Retrieved in November 24^th, 2014, from El legado lingüístico de Mandela: http://makingofezine.com/2013/12/18/el-legado-linguistico-de-mandela-2/

PRAESA. (2012-2014). Retrieved in December 1^st, 2014, from PRAESA: http://www.praesa.org.za/about-praesa-2/  

NELSON MANDELA INSTITUTE. (n.d.). Retrieved on November 29^th, 2014 from NMI Senior Team: http://www.mandelainstitute.org.za/team.php