The Mandela Brief: Sir Sydney Kentridge KC, advocate of the century, and the trials of apartheid

Speaker: Thomas Grant KC (Visiting Professor in Practice at the LSE, and author of The Mandela Brief: Sydney Kentridge and the Trials of Apartheid)

Sydney Kentridge, now aged 99, carved out a reputation as South Africa’s most prominent anti-apartheid advocate. His story is entwined with the country’s emergence from racial injustice and oppression. He is the only advocate to have acted for three winners of the Nobel Peace Prize – Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Chief Albert Lutuli. Already world-famous for his landmark cases including the Treason Trial of Nelson Mandela and the other leading members of the ANC, the inquiry into the Sharpeville massacre, and the inquest into the death of Steve Biko, Kentridge went on to become England’s premier advocate. Tracing the great set-pieces of the legal struggle against apartheid – cases which made the headlines not just in South Africa, but across the world – this lecture is a portrait of how advocacy can challenge the status quo and shape the future.