A Brief History of Apartheid in South Africa Apartheid is not a new thing. Since the Dutch settlers landed in 1652, “blacks” and “whites” have lived separately in South Africa. Officially begun in 1948, when the Afrikaner nationalist party came to power, apartheid is a system of racial laws designed to "preserve and promote the white majority in a black majority territory." It has a lot of opposition and for this reason has led to a international boycott of South Africa. When the Dutch first landed and established a strong colony there, they got along relatively peacefully with the natives. Then the English and French landed. They were attracted by the prospect of all the gold and diamonds of which the mines of South Africa were much more greedy and repelled the native blacks, who were powerless against the invader's weapons. Over the years the races became even more segregated, having isolated territories they felt far superior to blacks in every respect. They took slaves from black communities and dominated the race entirely. This shameful treatment was not without opposition within the white race itself. These few people fought (unsuccessfully) for black rights. Eventually, this led to interracial relationships. The children born from these relationships were known as "colored" and were shamefully regarded as little better than blacks themselves. They were especially struggling because they were never truly accepted into black or white communities. The Indians, brought by the English from their colonies, found themselves in a similar situation. These were just treated with a little more... paper halves... the ties were all separate. beaches, hospitals, toilets, schools, everything. Black men were allowed to enter white churches to clean them but not to pray inside them. Under no circumstances were blacks allowed to use the services of whites, even if a black child was hit by a truck and the nearest black hospital was an hour's drive away while the white hospital was just around the corner , the child would not have been hospitalized. The human rights of blacks were obviously not recognized at all. Imprisonment without trial was not uncommon, the right to speak publicly and write for publication was absolutely forbidden. Because of his anti-apartheid activism, Nelson Mandela was imprisoned. Blacks were forced to endure this regime for a total of 46 years before the end of Apatheid, but racism still continues to exist..