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Keywords

South Africa, conflicts, U.S. Economy

Abstract

The early 1970s marked the gradual end of the silent era in the antiapartheid movements in South Africa. The Black Consciousness movement along with other internal anti-apartheid movements began to gain strength and a greater voice. At the same time, the U.S. government continued to ignore, for the most part, South African affairs. This changed with the Angola Conflict in 1975 and the heightening of internal strife of South Africa, which began with the Soweto Uprisings in 1976. The conflicting economic and strategic interests of the U.S. Government led to policies, which allowed apartheid to survive in South Africa throughout the turmoil of the 1970s, and the economic downturn in the latter part of that decade. These policies included allying the U.S. with South Africa against communism, pursuance of mineral resources in South Africa, and defending capitalism by encouraging private business investment in South Africa. The Carter administration began with intimidating rhetoric, but by the end of 1977 both the administration and the U.S. Congress backed down from enforcing any real change in South Africa because of an open market economic strategy and the distraction of other world events. U.S. Congressional records and U.S. State Department documents chart the changes in U.S. foreign policy, in relation to the apartheid government from 1975-1980. The international outcry from the Soweto Uprisings, where school children were murdered while protesting, and the killing of anti-apartheid movement leader Steve Biko, coupled with the growing strength of the internal anti-apartheid movement, should have brought about the end of the Nationalist Party regime. Instead the U.S. Government generally neglected to act in a decisive manner to support the anti-Apartheid movement because of the interest they had in keeping, not only a valued trade partner, but an ally against Communism. These policies significantly contributed to the continuation of the apartheid regime into the 1980s.

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