“Multinational sport participation replaces apartheid sport in South Africa - 1967 - 1978”: the role of BJ Vorster and PGJ Koornhof.
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Authors
Klee, Juan
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School for Basic Sciences, Vaal Triangle Campus, North-West University
Abstract
The sport declarations of TE Dönges as Minister of Internal Affairs in June
1956 and those of HF Verwoerd as Prime Minister in 1965 were aimed at
strengthening apartheid sport participation in South Africa. These declarations
were in reaction to increased international and local pressure on the National
Party (NP) to allow integrated sport participation. However, they contributed
to increased political and economic isolation as well as isolation on the sports
grounds. In reaction to this increasing isolation BJ Vorster and P Koornhof
formulated an evolutionary sport policy since 1967 in an effort to counteract
increased international isolation. These efforts by Vorster and Koornhof
have been interpreted by many critics and researchers as being the product
of continuous international and local pressures on the NP and its policy of
Apartheid. This article, however, argues that although the evolutionary sport
policy could be interpreted as cosmetic, tactical and strategic moves, it also
demonstrated important small changes in the normal thinking patterns of
the NP elite. The policy changes as reflected in the evolutionary sport policy
were the result of nuanced changes in the thinking of the NP regarding the
policy of apartheid. These changes in thinking were not so much the result of
external and local pressures but were merely encouraged by it. These changes
in thinking led the way for increased social integration and complemented
increased apartheid policy reforms since 1978.
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Citation
Klee, J. 2012. “Multinational sport participation replaces apartheid sport in South Africa - 1967 - 1978”: the role of BJ Vorster and PGJ Koornhof. New Contree : A journal of Historical and Human Sciences for Southern Africa. 64:155-170, Jul. [http://dspace.nwu.ac.za/handle/10394/4969]