This September I will travel to Cape Town, South Africa for the second of three “on location” intensives with Portland Seminary.  In preparation for this, I have been asked to read the book The Rise and Fall of Apartheid by David Welsh.¹

This book is highly detailed, as it should be.  The historical foundations for Apartheid (the radical segregation and dehumanization of the black majority populace), the many phases of Apartheid from 1948-1994, the resistance to Apartheid, and the details of the negotiations leading up to the 1994 election of Nelson Mandela as president are exhaustively explained.

As I poured through this book, I reflected on the final days of Apartheid, which happened during my lifetime.  Here are four unique thoughts that I had as I read through this book.

THE POWER OF POPULAR CULTURE

Growing up in small town Tennessee, I knew virtually nothing of South Africa. That changed during my freshman year at Belmont College in 1985.  I was a Music Business major and frequently watched MTV.  One video that they played on heavy rotation was “Sun City” by Artists Against Apartheid.  This song, written by Steven Van Zandt (the guitarist for Bruce Springsteen) and its “We are the World” style video was my first exposure to word “Apartheid.”

In 1987, I went to see the band U2 during their successful “Joshua Tree Tour.”  While playing the song “Silver and Gold,” Bono made an appeal for the end of Apartheid and called upon the world to listen to the ideas of Bishop Desmond Tutu.

In 1998 I was serving as a “semester missionary” in Ipswich, England.  We took the young adults from our little church to the “Greenbelt Festival,” a sort of Christian Woodstock on a large farm in central England.  During one of the many main stage concerts, there was a musical presentation of Christian artists that made the case for the release of Nelson Mandela.  I still remember the sound of tens of thousands of young Christians from all over Europe chanting together “FREEEEEEEEEEEEEE…. Nelson Mandela.”

For me, the most significant memories that I have in regard to Apartheid did not come from the press.  Rather, this awareness of Apartheid came from popular culture.  The Rise and Fall of Apartheid repeatedly addresses the importance of world pressure on the South African government to do away with Apartheid.  I saw that firsthand via MTV, U2, and the Greenbelt Festival.

THEOLOGY AFFECTS POLITICS

The most fascinating chapter in Welsh’s book was entitled “Fissures and Fractures in Afrikaner Nationalism.”  As the book earlier points out, South Africa was settled by the Dutch in the late 1600s.  Of these, many were Protestant Huguenots fleeing religious persecution.  Their extreme brand of Calvinism was combined with a view that white Protestants were God’s “chosen people.”  When it became economically expedient to suppress the large numbers of Black Africans migrating to South Africa in the 20^th century, their theology gave them a foundation to do this guilt-free.

The problem came as Anglicans, including Desmond Tutu, embraced Liberation Theology.  These beliefs, formed in South and Central America, hold the church responsible for influencing governments for the good of the people.  In South Africa in the 1980s and early 1990s, there was a conflict between the two theologies.

The book also discusses the relationship between theology and Nationalism.  Welsh quotes Afrikaner Professor C N Van Der Merwe who wrote:

As long as the Afrikaner was the underdog, Christianity and nationalism could to some extent be reconciled, because Christian morality demands charity toward those in need, and at this stage the Afrikaners found themselves to be in need.  But, later on, when the Afrikaner got what he wanted…then the tension between Christianity and nationalism grew and became almost unbearable.  (Welsh p. 176)

Clearly, when a nation embraces a certain theology, it can have a profound impact on that nation’s future.

THE VIRTUE OF COMPROMISE

In the chapter “Opening Pandora’s Box,” I was intrigued at the stalemate between Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress (ANC) and President F.W. de Klerk’s National Party (NP).  The handwriting was on the wall that a “one person one vote” democracy would throw the white ruling class out of power. The ANC wanted a swift transfer of power.  The NC was groping for some form of shared power.

In the end, it was Communist Party leader Joe Slovo who ended the stalemate with his “sunset clause” proposition (outlined on page 461 of the book).  White rule would not be done away with overnight, but it would not remain indefinitely.  Slovo’s plan allowed the NC to fade away.  Both de Klerk and Mandela eventually agreed to this compromise, which they knew was the best way to avoid a civil war.

As a church leader, there are times that decisions are made and we need to “pull the band-aid off.”  Some changes need to be made quickly.  There are other times when that would cause unnecessary stress and hurt feelings. There are situations where a beloved ministry needs to cease, or an elderly teacher/church leader needs to step down, etc.  In these cases, a “sunset approach” is probably the best course of action.

HEROES ARE NOT ALWAYS HEROIC

As I read through The Rise and Fall of Apartheid, I began doing some side research on Nelson Mandela.  My only views of him were of this happy old man with fuzzy gray hair and an amazing smile.   While Mandela is held up today in the ranks of MLK and Gandhi, the truth is more complicated.

There is no doubt that Nelson Mandela was committed to the end of Apartheid and the betterment of his people.  Many would even argue that Mandela’s wisdom and determination exhibited in the negotiations with de Klerk prevented a bloody civil war.  Mandela put others before himself time and time again.

Yet, before his imprisonment on Robben Island, Mandela grew more and more dissolutioned with non-violent resistance.  He led the ANC to conduct numerous bombings (terrorist attacks).  Welch discusses this in his final chapter (page 576).  For this reason, Amnesty International refused to list Mandela as a political prisoner when jailed for these crimes.  Were these attacks justified?  If so, why do we condemn other political leaders to using bombs to get their message across?

Another complicated figure is First Lady Winnie Mandela.  In the 1980s Mrs. Mandela embraced the brutal killing of blacks who assisted the government through what was called “necklacing” (binding a person inside a tire and setting them aflame).  In 1991, she was convicted of ordering the kidnapping and torturing of a 14-year-old boy for being a police informant.  That boy was later killed by one of her body guards.  In 1997, the New York Times ran an article personally connecting Mrs. Mandela to the murder of 18 people.²  Nelson and Winnie divorced in 1996.

As I reflect on Nelson Mandela, I am reminded that humanity is messy.  Hero worship is seldom what it is cracked up to be.  Hopefully, the acts of grace, wisdom, and forgiveness exhibited by the elder Mandela show a changed heart.  I am fascinated with the notion that while he was in prison, it appears that Nelson Mandela grew less violent while Winnie Mandela grew more violent.

¹Welsh, David. The rise and fall of apartheid. Johannesburg: Jonathan Ball Publishers, 2011.

²Daley, Suzanne. “Winnie Mandelas Ex-Bodyguard Tells of Killings She Ordered.” The New York Times. December 03, 1997. Accessed June 09, 2017. http://www.nytimes.com/1997/12/04/world/winnie-mandela-s-ex-bodyguard-tells-of-killings-she-ordered.html.