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South Africa, 1948–94: From Apartheid State to ‘Rainbow Nation’

Domestic challenges to National Party power, 1974–83

  • 3 things to know
  • Paper 2

Overview

Recall questions on continuous unrest, the failure of the Bantustans, the legalisation of African unions and COSATU, Botha's reforms, and the Conservative Party split.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

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Key term

What weakened the National Party in the later 1970s?

Key term

What political unrest developed after 1974?

Key term

What problems arose in the Bantustans?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    What weakened the National Party in the later 1970s?

    Model answer

    Scandal (the 'Information Scandal'), economic pressure and rising defence costs.

  2. 2

    What political unrest developed after 1974?

    Model answer

    Continuous strikes, school boycotts, rent protests and township violence, so that the state faced permanent low-level insurrection rather than occasional crises.

  3. 3

    What problems arose in the Bantustans?

    Model answer

    Corruption, poverty and dependence on subsidies, so the homelands failed to absorb population or provide legitimacy and became a visible admission of failure.

  4. 4

    How did the trade unions grow after 1979?

    Model answer

    African unions were legalised, membership grew rapidly, and COSATU, founded in 1985, became a powerful political as well as industrial force.

  5. 5

    Why was legalising African unions such a risk?

    Model answer

    It gave the black majority an organised, legal instrument capable of shutting down the economy, which became central to the pressure on the regime.

  6. 6

    What were Botha's reforms?

    Model answer

    The removal of some petty apartheid, recognition of unions, and the tricameral constitution of 1983, whose parliament first sat in 1984, giving coloureds and Indians separate chambers while excluding Africans.

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