apartheid from American Jim Crow laws was the fact that the Afrikaners made no pretense concerning the development of "separate but equal" as whites in America did. Christopher quotes a Minister of Justice from 1953 who states that South Africa is to have three distinct sets of lands and amenities for their three groups of people: civilized (whites), semi civilized (mixed race or coloureds), and uncivilized (full blooded, indigenous blacks) (Christopher, 1994, 4).
The Nationalist Party began a system of three different apartheid levels. "Petty apartheid," which consisted of what Christopher calls social segregation but which may be more aptly termed 'personal segregation.' Under petty apartheid whites had separate sections of post offices and other government offices, seating sections in restaurants, theaters and on transportation, and even separate amenities such as water fountains, bathrooms, or sections of beaches. These laws were meant to separate individuals and discouraged social interaction among the races.
Christopher labels the second level of apartheid, "urban apartheid." This level originated with the Group Areas Bill of 1950 and was meant to restrict the places in which certain races were allowed to live as well as restrict their access to opportunities for commerce (Christopher, 1994, 4).
The third level of apartheid consisted of the "grand apartheid" level in which indigenous peoples were forcefully resettled on homelands (designed similarly to American Indian reservations of the 19th and 20th centuries) away from commercial zones and on land which was barely farmable. The movement of people of color on and off these homelands was strictly controlled through such methods as pass laws and physical intimidation by various levels of police enforcement.
Finally, Christopher's study looks at apartheid in much the same manner as other atlases by examining the demographics of his subject area. He notes that w...