Women Fighting Apartheid

Drawing on new interviews and previously underused archival material, this book explores women’s anti-apartheid activism in South Africa and within broader transnational networks from 1952 to 1962 through a comparison of the Federation of South African Women (FEDSAW) and the Black Sash.

Despite differing ideologies, racial compositions, and protest strategies, both organisations played decisive roles in contesting apartheid and expanding political space for women within a male-dominated resistance movement. FEDSAW engaged deliberately with international organisations such as the Women’s International Democratic Federation and the World Peace Council, while the Black Sash became embedded in global networks such as the International Alliance of Women more ambiguously through class privilege and international visibility. By foregrounding women’s political agency and international networks and examining key events including the 1956 Women’s March and the intensification of apartheid repression following the Treason Trial, the book reshapes how anti-apartheid activism is understood within both national and global contexts.

This interdisciplinary volume will be of interest to scholars, undergraduate and postgraduate students working in South African history, women’s and gender history, African studies, political history, and transnational activism. It is also accessible to general readers seeking works on apartheid, women’s political activism, and global solidarity movements.