State Coercion And The Injustice Of Apartheid

 Hutt saw apartheid as an injustice that impedes economic liberty and amounts to state coercion.

The fact that Hutt regarded the apartheid system in his country, South Africa, as an injustice is insufficient for American anti-racists because in their view it is not enough to oppose injustice if one does not specifically define that injustice as "Racism".

In Hutt's view, the injustice of apartheid consisted in what he described as "Deliberately imposed man-made barriers to equality of economic opportunity - barriers which are, I suggest, by all odds the most important ultimate cause of inequality of civil rights." Hutt depicted apartheid as "Governmental appeasement of a white proletariat," where the government segregated races in order to ensure that lower-waged black labor would not be in competition with higher-waged white labor.

In their view Hutt ought to have opposed apartheid on grounds that it is racist.

Hutt was correct to highlight that Apartheid is an injustice as it relies on state coercion to restrict participation in economic activity.

There is a further implication of Hutt's argument, namely that state coercion does not become acceptable if it is used to confer privileges on black people instead of white people.

State coercion which historically privileged whites above blacks under apartheid was unjust, and state coercion which now privileges blacks above whites under equity is also unjust. 

https://mises.org/mises-wire/state-coercion-and-injustice-apartheid