Anti-apartheid and the emergence of a global civil society

Håkan Thörn looks at anti-apartheid as part of the history of present global politics.

He provides the first comparative analysis of different sections of the transnational anti-apartheid movement.

A highly organized system of repression such as apartheid demanded organized resistance: from the late 1950s to the 1990s the anti-apartheid movement performed increasingly well-organized transnational collective action, based on a collective identity, an imagined community of solidarity activists, uniting people across large distances.

Analyzing a part of 20th century post-war history mainly from a sociological perspective this book also highlights dimensions of globalization in an era in which we still live; the power of the media; and the power of collective action.