A culture of censorship : secrecy and intellectual repression in South Africa /

Merrett's survey of state-sponsored censorship in South Africa, focusing principally on the period from 1950 to 1990, details a pernicious legacy of secrecy and repression. As Merrett demonstrates, South African censorship has engendered silence through formal as well as informal means; far-reaching security legislation, beginning with the Suppression of Communism Act of 1950 and culminating in the Internal Security Act of 1982, as well as more subtle forms of intimidation, including detention without trial, torture, and general harassment. Merrett examines the foundations and development of South Africa's security state in the 1950s and '60s, explores resistance and repression between 1974 and 1985, and analyzes the states of emergency after 1985, during which the government bridled the media, thwarted the antiapartheid opposition, and lifted curbs on police conduct. Throughout, the author investigates South African censorship in all its various forms--press restrictions, banning, banishment, deportation, murder, house arrest, political trials, arson, bombing, and burglary. He concludes that South Africans must not forget their "culture of inherited repression" if they are to achieve a "culture of freedom of association, thought and communication." Upper-division undergraduates and above. J. O. Gump; University of San Diego