: The Population Registration Act of 1950 classified all citizens into four groups: White, Black (Bantu), Coloured (mixed race), and Indian/Asian.

: Ongoing strikes, township revolts, and the work of the United Democratic Front (UDF) made the country nearly ungovernable.

Apartheid (meaning "apartness" in Afrikaans ) was a formal system of institutionalized racial segregation and white minority rule in South Africa that lasted from . While racial discrimination existed in South Africa for centuries under Dutch and British colonial rule, the 1948 election of the National Party (NP) codified these practices into rigid, all-encompassing laws. The Rise of Apartheid (1948–1960s)

: The Group Areas Act (1950) mandated separate residential areas, leading to the forced removal of millions of non-white South Africans from their homes.

: Nelson Mandela and other top ANC leaders were sentenced to life in prison in 1964.

: The government created ten "homelands" (Bantustans) for Black South Africans, stripping them of their South African citizenship and forcing them into impoverished, semi-independent territories. The Struggle and Resistance