Written by Edie Christian
The literal translation of apartheid into ‘separateness’ encapsulates South Africa in the late twentieth century as a state of institutionalised racial segregation. This physical disconnection is epitomised by the implementation of Bantustans – black home territories designated by the white-dominated National Party administration – which became known as the areas for ‘surplus people’. Whilst the education, facilities, and work opportunities were promised to be of similar quality, this was a fabrication; the Bantustans instead represented a population that suffered mass displacement due to systemic racism, the legacies of which still permeate throughout South African society today.
During apartheid, the white minority of South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) gained complete political, economic, and social control through the marginalising of the majority black population. This minoritarian system was justified through the baaskap (white supremacist) factions of the National Party (NP), and descended into a system of social stratification – this was further consolidated by the disenfranchisement of non-white people. There was a distinction made between ‘grand apartheid’ – in which people were forcibly separated through housing and jobs – and ‘petty apartheid’, in which public facilities and social occasions were segregated. Following the lift of the ban on the leading anti-apartheid organisation, the African National Congress (ANC), they became crucial in the bilateral negotiations to end segregation and implement majority rule. On the 17th June 1991, apartheid legislation was repealed and the first modern multiracial elections were held in 1994.
In the 1950s the government relabelled and built upon existing native ‘reserves’, creating ten self-governed territories dubbed Bantustans. These were crucial in the physical separation of the black population in South Africa, as well as their exclusion from politics and the economy – furthermore, their characterisation as tribal homelands went some way towards legitimising their existence. Four territories – Transkei, Bophuthatswana, Venda, and Ciskei – gained nominal independence during the 1970s and early 1980s, whereas the others – Gazankulu, KawZulu, Lebowa, KwaNdebele, KaNgwane, and Qwaqwa – never did so. Prior to their formal implementation, the 1913 and 1936 Land Acts designated a number of areas as ‘native reserves’ for black people, and the 1959 Promotion of Bantu Self-Government Act nominated them as ‘homelands’. It was only with the 1970 Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act that black people were effectively stripped of their South African citizenship. Whilst they were legally entitled to operate independent police forces and educational institutions, the Bantustans were so deprived of resources that the notion of ‘separate but equal’ – which is used as justification in segregationist policies – is intentionally deceptive. It was instead employed as a ‘cynical attempt to try [to] sell the segregationist project to the black population’. Indeed, Phillips convincingly argues the true goal of the Bantustans projects was to ‘weaken and fragment black South Africans and to obscure the huge majority they had over their white neighbours’.
Although the Bantustans were dissolved with the repeal of apartheid, worrying legacies remain. The displacement of roughly 3.5 million of the majority black population from 1960-80 resulted in Bantustan lands suffering from severe soil erosion as a result of oversettling and overgrazing. Giannecchini, Twine, and Vogel demonstrate through historical analysis that in three rural South African villages following apartheid, the ‘livelihoods are highly diversified and potentially insecure due to socio-ecological erosion’. As well as this, the ANC were faced with the arduous task of reincorporation of the former Bantustans into the new state; the redistribution of land made this both practically difficult and politically contentious. Moreover, Treiman concluded in 2007 that the median income of white men was equal to the 91st percentile of the entire male population, thereby highlighting the continuing economic disparity in post-apartheid South Africa.
Interestingly, it has been reported that some of the black African population feel ‘nostalgic’ – not necessarily for the Bantustans, but for their leaders. Lucas Mangope had been president of Bophuthatswana from 1977-94, and was known for his ‘violent reign, his social conservatism, and his ethnic chauvinism’. Upon his death, there was ‘unexpected fondness’, and this nostalgia is apparent for other Bantustan leaders. It is true that some of these leaders – such as Enos Mabuza of KaNgwane – were significantly more liberal than others, but many of these regimes were autocratic and a reflection of apartheid. These arguably romantic views of the past can easily be dismissed as erroneous, but this would ignore the complexities of the issue. Following the repeal of apartheid, the ANC brought many of the Bantustan leaders into their government in order to prevent disorder and conflict. Furthermore, not only did the Bantustans provide a strong sense of belonging and ethnic nationalism, but they appear preferable to some who are disaffected in present South Africa. Phillips highlights that, while the Bantustans were defined by ‘repressive and patriarchal law and order’, many feel that this approach would benefit the growing criminality seen today.
The establishment of the Bantustans in apartheid South Africa was the principal tool of depriving the non-white population of their civil and political rights through mass displacement. Despite their dissolution in 1994, troubling legacies of agricultural, economic, and social disparities still resonate today, fostering a sense of racial acrimony. There are, however, many who view the order with which the Bantustans were run as desirable in comparison to the recent rise in crime; this phenomenon of ‘Bantustan nostalgia’ reflects the complexity with which the issue of apartheid and its legacies are framed in the South African personal and collective memory.
Bibliography
King, Brian H., and Brent McCusker. “Environment and Development in the Former South African Bantustans.” The Geographical Journal 173, no. 1 (2007): 6–12. http://www.jstor.org/stable/30113489.
Phillips, Laura. “The Peculiar Nostalgia for the Former Bantustans in South Africa.” africasacountry.com, February 8, 2014. https://africasacountry.com/2018/03/the-peculiar-nostalgia-for-the-former-bantustans-in-south-africa.
Swift, Robert. “Legacy of South African Bantustans Hangs over Trump Deal.” +972 Magazine, February 9, 2020. https://www.972mag.com/apartheid-bantustans-palestinian-statehood/.
Treiman, Donald J. “The Legacy of Apartheid: Racial Inequalities in the New South Africa.” British Academy EBooks, October 25, 2007. https://doi.org/10.5871/bacad/9780197263860.003.0010.
Featured image credit: “Johannesburg CBD From M2 Highway, South Africa” by Paul Saad is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
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