ABSTRACT
Studies of US policy toward South Africa often refer to the Sharpeville massacre as the crisis moment that brought apartheid to the attention of the American public and served as a catalyst for the anti-apartheid movement. The State Department immediately condemned the violence at Sharpeville but encouraged Africans to maintain a commitment to non-violent protest. South African business associations publicly acknowledged Sharpeville as a product of the legitimate grievances of African laborers and called for immediate government reforms to ease racial tensions. The political uncertainty surrounding the Sharpeville massacre touched off minor debates among policymakers that outwardly presented a favorable climate for organizing American opposition to apartheid. Anti-apartheid activists witnessed little concrete improvement in the prospects for meaningfully influencing South African-American relations during most of the 1960s. The Sharpeville massacre represented one of the most significant actionable issues, or crisis situations, that forced policymakers to defend or explain their response in the early postwar era of US-South African relations.
