Truth, Justice, Redress and Reconciliation

Mary will give a brief introduction covering the 1960s and 1970s as apartheid policies were increasingly imposed on South Africa and the growth of resistance in the latter years, marked for example by the rise in black students political action and the death in detention of Steve Biko in 1977.  The way these events impacted on the role of white people and organisations dedicated to bringing about change and the changed climate of the 1980s as apartheid policies became increasingly brutal, but also increasingly unworkable. 

 After 1990 the task of building a new society brought great challenges, as the enormous damage done in the past had to be confronted.  Optimism and dedication brought many positive changes, but in more recent years, have been followed by deep disappointment.  Reconciliation remains difficult and distant, but renewed efforts are becoming visible, even under the constraints of the COVID pandemic.