Afrikaner nationalism in the context of "Great Trek"

The Dutch Reformed Church (Dutch: Nederlandse Hervormde Kerk, pronounced [ˈneːdərlɑntsə ɦɛrˈvɔr(ə)mdə ˈkɛr(ə)k], abbreviated NHK [ˌɛnɦaːˈkaː]) was the largest Christian denomination in the Netherlands from the onset of the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century until 1930. It was the traditional denomination of the Dutch royal family and the foremost Protestant denomination until 2004, the year it helped found and merged into the Protestant Church in the Netherlands (the largest Protestant and second largest Christian communion in the Netherlands). It was the larger of the two major Reformed denominations, after the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (Gereformeerde kerk) was founded in 1892. It spread to the United States, South Africa, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Suriname, Brazil, and various other world regions through Dutch colonization. Allegiance to the Dutch Reformed Church was a common feature among Dutch immigrant communities around the world and became a crucial part of Afrikaner nationalism in South Africa.

The Dutch Reformed Church was founded in 1571 during the Protestant Reformation in the Calvinist tradition, being shaped theologically by John Calvin, but also other major Reformed theologians. The church was influenced by various theological developments and controversies during its history, including Arminianism, the Nadere Reformatie, and a number of splits in the 19th century that greatly diversified Dutch Calvinism. The church functioned until 2004, the year it merged with the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands to form the Protestant Church in the Netherlands (PKN), a united church of both Reformed and Evangelical Lutheran theological orientations. At the time of the merger, the Church had 2 million members organised in 1,350 congregations. A minority of members of the church chose not to participate in the merger and instead formed the Restored Reformed Church (HHK).

The National Party (Afrikaans: Nasionale Party, NP), also known as the Nationalist Party, was a political party in South Africa from 1914 to 1997, which was responsible for the implementation of apartheid rule. The party was an Afrikaner ethnic nationalist party, which initially promoted the interests of Afrikaners but later became a stalwart promoter and enactor of white supremacy, for which it is best known. It first became the governing party of the country in 1924. It merged with its rival, the South African Party (SAP), during the 1929-1939 Great Depression, and a splinter faction, the Re-United National Party became the official opposition during World War II and won power in 1948. With the National Party governing South Africa from 4 June 1948 until 9 May 1994, the country for the bulk of this time was only a de jure or partial democracy, as from 1958 onwards non-white people were barred from voting. In 1990, it began to style itself as simply a South African civic nationalist party, and after the fall of apartheid in 1994, attempted to become a moderate conservative one. The party's reputation was damaged irreparably by perpetrating apartheid, and it rebranded itself as the New National Party in 1997 before eventually dissolving in 2005.

Following the 1948 general election, the party as the governing party of South Africa began implementing its policy of racial segregation, known as apartheid (the Afrikaans term for "separateness"). Although White-minority rule and racial segregation were already in existence in South Africa with non-Whites not having voting rights and efforts made to encourage segregation, apartheid intensified the segregation with stern penalties for non-Whites entering into areas designated for Whites-only without having a pass to permit them to do so (known as the pass laws), interracial marriage and sexual relationships were illegal and punishable offences. Black people faced significant restrictions on property rights. After South Africa was condemned by the British Commonwealth for its policies of apartheid, the NP-led government had South Africa leave the Commonwealth, abandon its monarchy led by the British monarch and become an independent republic. The party's system of apartheid was officially labelled a crime against humanity by the United Nations General Assembly on 16 December 1966.

Afrikaner Calvinism (Afrikaans: Afrikaner Calvinisme) is a cultural and religious development among Afrikaners that combined elements of seventeenth-century Calvinist doctrine with a "chosen people" ideology based in the Bible. It had origins in ideas espoused in the Old Testament of the Jews as the chosen people.

A number of modern studies have argued that Boers gathered for the Great Trek inspired by this concept, and they used it to legitimise their subordination of other South African ethnic groups. It is thought to have contributed the religious basis for modern Afrikaner nationalism. Dissenting scholars have asserted that Calvinism did not play a significant role in Afrikaner society until after they suffered the trauma of the Second Boer War. Early settlers dwelt in isolated frontier conditions and lived much closer to pseudo-Christian animist beliefs than organised religion.

The Herenigde Nasionale Party (English: Reunited National Party; HNP) was an Afrikaner nationalist and conservative political party in South Africa. It was founded in 1940 from the merger of the Purified National Party (Gesuiwerde Nasionale Party, GNP) led by future prime minister D. F. Malan and a faction of the United Party (UP) led by J. B. M. Hertzog, who split from the party and resigned as prime minister of South Africa in opposition to the country's support for the Allies during World War II. The HNP won a plurality of seats at the 1948 general election despite losing the popular vote to the UP and formed a coalition government with the Afrikaner Party (AP), which it merged with to form the National Party (NP) in 1951; the NP name had previously been used by the party Hertzog merged into the UP.