This edited collection examines how Western European countries have responded and been influenced by the apartheid system in South Africa. The debate surrounding apartheid in South Africa underwent a shift in the second half of the 20th century, with long held positive, racist European opinions of white South Africans slowly declining since decolonisation in the 1960s, and the increase in the importance of human rights in international politics. While previous studies have approached this question in the context of national histories, more or less detached from each other, this edited collection offers a broader insight into the transnational and entangled histories of Western European and South African societies. The contributors use exemplary case studies to trace the change of perception, covering a plurality of reactions in different societies and spheres: from the political and social, to the economic and cultural. At the same time, the collection emphasizes the interconnections of those reactions to what has been called the last 'overtly racist regime' (George Frederickson) of the twentieth century.

Knud Andresen is Senior Researcher at the Research Centre for Contemporary History in Hamburg and Adjunct Professor at the University of Hamburg, Germany. Sebastian Justke is a historian and research assistant at the Research Centre for Contemporary History in Hamburg, Germany. Detlef Siegfried is Professor of Modern German and European History at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark.