The Birth of the Irish Anti-Apartheid Movement: Building a Broad Front

This chapter charts the building of the broad campaign that became the Irish Anti-Apartheid Movement (IAAM), founded in April 1964 in Dublin. It begins with the pivot of the Sharpeville Massacre in March 1960 in global anti-Apartheid terms and how this dovetailed with the local roots of the Irish situation. It assesses the key personalities of Kader and Louise Asmal, as well as leading lights in the Executive Committee that balanced Asmal’s centralizing tendencies. It addresses the early branches of the movement outside Dublin (including in Northern Ireland), and it compares the organization to the Swedish and British Anti-Apartheid Movements. It explores the IAAM’s connections to the African National Congress (ANC), identifying how closely wedded the IAAM remained to ANC strategy. The latter urged the building of a broad-based movement that brought in civil society and multiple political parties, often at the expense of political radicals and Left-wing militants (who were, nonetheless, still interacting with the movement). The chapter addresses the IAAM’s broad membership, links to other Irish bodies and organizations, and subjective interest to other anti-colonial movements in southern Africa. Asmal’s persona, as well as his impact on students at his employer, Trinity College Dublin, are interpreted as part of the social legacy of the movement in Ireland.