Nelson Mandela was born on this day in 1918. Read about the South African President’s release from prison—a transcendent moment in his country’s history.
The news, earlier this month, that Nelson Mandela had been released from a South African prison was about as joyous as news gets. In this season of extraordinary political drama, it felt like a grand finale. The serial implosions of tyranny in Eastern Europe and the breathtaking lurches toward democracy in the Soviet Union all seemed to reach a climax of sorts in the spectacle of Mr. Mandela’s release.
Of course, South Africa is not Eastern Europe. And Mr. Mandela’s speech after his release—his first remarks in public since his trial in 1964—made clear some crucial differences between the struggle waged for freedom in his country and its counterparts elsewhere. He saluted the South African Communist Party, and he suggested that the country’s major industries should be nationalized. He also vowed to continue the armed struggle against apartheid.
And yet, even as the countries of Eastern Europe prepare for historic elections, there are not likely to be democratic elections any time soon in South Africa. Mr. Mandela’s release did not come at the height of a popular uprising or in response to irresistible pressure; it came, if anything, during a lull. It was a transcendent moment in the South African saga, yet it was by no means the story’s climax. White rule is suffering a crisis of legitimacy, but that has been true for many years.
The whole world watches South Africa so raptly for very good reason. It is the country where the world’s most fundamental conflict—between rich and poor, white and black, the First World and the Third—is most incisively etched. This tableau clearly makes some powerful people uncomfortable. Perhaps the most self-serving international reaction to Mr. Mandela’s release was that of the British Prime Minister. Even as Mr. Mandela was calling for continued economic sanctions against South Africa, Mrs.
The deepest impression of all, however, may have been made on Mr. de Klerk’s own constituency. Many white South Africans seemed to be in a state of blissful shock. A white reporter on South African television, describing the scene of Mr. Mandela’s release, declared, “There is total jubilation, total excitement, total joy.” And there were whites who seemed to grasp the meaning of the event at its most basic level.
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