Major trading partners such as Britain, Germany, USA and Japan did not want to do sanctions because South Africa produced vital minerals and boycotting against the country would mean that their companies would lose investments. The argument was that sanctions against South Africa would hurt a lot of other countries too. In the 1980’s there was a down turn in the South African economy because the growth of the economy became slower and the values of exports were not so high, it was the worst it had been since the 1930’s. The trade and investment sanctions carried out by international countries really started hurting the South African economy. Sanctions between 1985-89 cost South Africa between 32-42 thousand million US dollars in lost income. Major disinvestments by Barclays chase Manhattan bank. South Africa was in a financial crisis with 35% drop in rand which forced the government to close stock exchange because of boycott on iron and steel.
All the economic sanctions affected the lives of both the Black and White South Africans. Employment became a big problem because people had no jobs to do and the people who did had a very low wage. Poverty led to internal protests against the government which put them under a lot of pressure. The government could not continue to pay for security forces against the protestors because they did not have enough money.
Business leaders arranged talks with the ANC after financial crisis and realized that the only way to improve South Africa’s economy again was to improve the international trade. At that time F.W. De Klerk was president and he was put under pressure by politicians and business leaders to change Apartheid in order to improve the South African economy. He was told by his own advisors that the economy would only get worse if Apartheid remained. A poor economy meant lower living standards for the White’s as well as the Black’s. The government would have less money to spend on security forces and if poverty kept rising then more protest would be held opposing the government.
After looking at all the problems caused by external economic pressures there is no doubt that it was a major factor which influenced De Klerk’s government to decide to undertake the CODESA negotiations and end white minority rule by 1994.
Countries gain lots of benefits by sharing their ideas with other countries. Sharing ideas with other countries also adds to their security and prosperity. The most important union of countries is the UNs and also the commonwealth is an important organization made up of the ex British Empire which helped members through trade, aid and training. In 1945 South Africa faced mounting international criticism of Apartheid from groups and individuals. They were mostly led by ex colonial countries such as India because they knew how it felt. They were some of South Africa’s leading critics. In 1965 South Africa left the commonwealth due to fierce criticism, South Africa was harshly criticized by the UN for refusing to let Namibia be independent. This caused South Africa to lose a lot of benefits from these countries. The government organized an African Unity OAU became a major critic.
There was an end of White power in Rhodesia, Angola and Mozambique which meant resistance groups now had bases from which they could raid into South Africa. The government had to make sure they defended hostile borders which would cost them more for security. This increased the practical and psychological sense in isolation. International condemnation would have been greater if the west had not needed South African support and South African resources during the Cold War.
Sports were a major part part of White as well as Black South African culture e.g. cricket, rugby and athletics. Increasingly South Africa was cut off from International sports. After South Africa left commonwealth there were no more participations in the UN, 1964 onwards and because of this South Africa was banned from the Olympics. This increased disruptions of South African teams abroad. After the 1970’s South Africa had no more sporting tours of the UK and eventually by the 1980’s virtually no UK teams went to South Africa. Middle Class/Wealthy White people in South Africa were not rich enough to not to suffer from the economic sanctions because they did feel the effects of the sporting sanctions. It is very clear that to put an end to Apartheid there would have to be sporting sanctions.
Over all we can see that external pressure helped a great deal to bring an end to Apartheid because all the actions taken against South Africa helped put pressure on the government. It was obvious that the government would have to give in at one point because the economic state of the country was getting worse by the day. South Africa was having a very big problem because of the isolation by the other countries so they had no choice but to end Apartheid. Without all the external pressure put on South Africa the government would not have been forced to end Apartheid.
