{"id":139,"date":"2011-08-25T14:01:54","date_gmt":"2011-08-25T14:01:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/?p=139"},"modified":"2011-09-05T01:02:33","modified_gmt":"2011-09-05T01:02:33","slug":"resorting-to-violence-did-the-anc-have-a-choice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/2011\/08\/resorting-to-violence-did-the-anc-have-a-choice\/","title":{"rendered":"Resorting to Violence: Did the ANC have a choice?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Explain the reasons behind the creation of Umkhonto we Sizwe<\/em> (MK).\u00a0 Do you think adopting violence as a method strengthened or weakened the anti-apartheid movement?<\/p>\n

Adopting violence as the movement\u2019s revised strategy after almost fifty years of preaching nonviolent resistance was undoubtedly a complicated decision with immense ramifications.\u00a0 On one hand, the choice to use violence demonstrated to ANC supporters that nonviolence could not destroy Apartheid which is demoralizing.\u00a0 It showed that they were not strong and united enough to conquer violence without partaking in it.\u00a0 On the other hand, the ANC simply did not have a choice.\u00a0 They would not achieve their vision of a free state for all people without using more aggressive means to achieve it.\u00a0 Due to the force of the National Party, violence did strengthen the anti-apartheid movement because it gave the ANC the teeth needed to hold the attention of the Nationalists and eventually bring them to the negotiation table.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 1961, Mandela announced that nonviolence may no longer be the most effective means of achieving the ANC\u2019s goals.\u00a0 Although their boycotts, protests, and stay-at-homes showed the widespread support of the movement, these events were not eliciting a response from the National Party.\u00a0 When the anti-Apartheid movement first began, Mandela stated that \u201cWe should employ the methods demanded by the conditions\u2026In this case\u2026any attempts at violence by us would be devastatingly crushed.\u00a0 This [makes] nonviolence a practical necessity rather than an option\u201d (Mandela, 127).\u00a0 For the ANC, nonviolence was a temporary tactic.\u00a0 It worked to some extent, but it was not enough when \u201cthe government reaction [was] to crush by naked force [the] nonviolent struggle\u201d (Mandela, 270). \u00a0The ANC leaders could not stop resisting Apartheid, but at the same time, they could not continue to let their supporters be crushed by the government.\u00a0 If they wanted to one day live in a free South Africa, they saw no other option but to add a component of violence into the movement.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

MK\u2019s creation was carefully planned so that the principles of the ANC would be upheld.\u00a0 The ANC decided that sabotage would be the most effective form of violence because it targeted institutions of the National Party, not people.\u00a0 Mandela was clear that a civil war was not the answer, and it would only exacerbate the divide between races.\u00a0 Thus, the ANC tried to use violence cautiously which was a smoother transition from nonviolence, but still alerted the Nationalists.\u00a0 As the ANC hoped, the government reacted to the MK.\u00a0 Although it caused them to be more brutal in their own attacks, the ANC had effectively \u201cshown them [that they] were not going to sit back any longer\u201d (Mandela, 286).\u00a0 The MK continued their attacks until negotiations finally began in 1990.\u00a0 Even with the use of violence, it still took 30 years to begin the negotiations, thus it is hard to say if nonviolent resistance would have eventually been effective.\u00a0 But, the ANC could not wait for that day to come.\u00a0 They were being crushed, and they had to respond with force to be heard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Explain the reasons behind the creation of Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK).\u00a0 Do you think adopting violence as a method strengthened or weakened the anti-apartheid movement?
\nAdopting violence as the movement\u2019s revised strategy after almost fifty years of preaching nonviolent resistance was undoubtedly a complicated decision with immense ramifications.\u00a0 On one hand, the choice to use violence demonstrated to ANC supporters that nonviolence could not destroy Apartheid which is demoralizing.\u00a0 It showed that they were not strong and united enough to conquer violence without partaking in it.\u00a0 On the other hand, the ANC simply did not have a choice.\u00a0 They would not achieve their vision of a free state for all people without using more aggressive means to achieve it.\u00a0 Due to the force of the National Party, violence did strengthen the anti-apartheid movement because it gave the ANC the teeth needed to hold the attention of the Nationalists and eventually bring …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":853,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[34244,34209,34239,34217,34211],"class_list":["post-139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-a-long-walk-to-freedom","tag-african-national-congress-anc","tag-anna-mcginn","tag-mk","tag-nelson-mandela"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/853"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}