South Africa: From Pariah to Regional Cop

Abstract

South African peace missions, either within Africa or to any other part of the world, were not on the agenda in 1994 at the end of Apartheid when the Mandela government took office. The main focus, understandably, was on internal change and the task was to promote and implement the transformation of society towards becoming a democracy and to reform the armed forces and police after the long isolation of the country during the Apartheid era. The government facilitated the restructuring of the armed forces by integrating the various forces — the regular army and several groups of freedom fighters — that had previously fought each other and uniting them into one unit, the South African National Defence Forces (SANDF). The government made sure that it had the support of a majority of the population for this reform process (Cawthra 2003 and 2004).