Nelson Mandela in 1994. Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0.
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Nelson Mandela’s political life cannot be separated from South Africa’s apartheid system, which enforced racial classification and white minority rule. A lawyer and African National Congress activist, Mandela initially supported nonviolent resistance but later helped establish an armed wing after state repression intensified. Arrested in 1962, he was eventually sentenced to life imprisonment at the Rivonia Trial. Mandela spent 27 years in prison, much of it on Robben Island. Released in 1990 amid negotiations to dismantle apartheid, he worked with President F. W. de Klerk through a volatile transition. In 1994, South Africa held its first national election in which citizens of all races could vote, and Mandela became president. His presidency emphasised reconciliation, although the country’s deep economic inequalities did not disappear.
