Students, Apartheid and the Ecumenical Movement in South Africa, 1960–1975

This article examines ecumenical endeavour and student politics in South Africa in the 1960s and early 1970s to bring into fresh perspective sources of antiapartheid activism. The article explores Christian ecumenical developments in the twentieth century and specifically the crisis point reached in 1960 after the Sharpeville massacre. It turns to discuss the formation of two key black student leaders, Steve Biko and Barney Pityana, in the Eastern Cape and discusses their creation of the black-led South African Students' Organisation (SASO) in 1968. I explore a fraught but productive relationship between the growth of Black Consciousness and a developing commitment to social justice by student Christian organisations. A political culture of dialogue enabled the message of Black Consciousness to be quickly communicated to a broad cross section of progressive political actors in the early 1970s. A prime legacy of the ecumenical endeavour of the 1960s was its emphasis on unity and muting of strict orthodoxy, an approach that facilitated such cooperation. I argue that the theological radicalism of the ecumenical movement provided a reference point from which to understand and come to terms with the challenge of the emergent Black Consciousness movement.