HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

A ban is a formal or informal prohibition of something. Bans are formed for the prohibition of activities within a certain political territory. Some bans in commerce are referred to as embargoes. ''Ban'' is also used as a verb similar in meaning to "to prohibit".


Etymology

In current English usage, ''ban'' is mostly synonymous with ''prohibition''. Historically, Old English ''(ge)bann'' is a derivation from the verb ''bannan'' "to summon, command, proclaim" from an earlier Common Germanic ''*bannan'' "to command, forbid, banish, curse". The modern sense "to prohibit" is influenced by the cognate Old Norse ''banna'' "to curse, to prohibit" and also from Old French ''ban'', ultimately a loan from Old Frankish, meaning "
outlawry An outlaw, in its original and legal meaning, is a person declared as outside the protection of the law. In pre-modern societies, all legal protection was withdrawn from the criminal, so that anyone was legally empowered to persecute or kill them ...
, banishment". The Indo-European etymology of the Germanic term is from a root ''*bha-'' meaning "to speak". Its original meaning was magical, referring to utterances that carried a power to
curse A curse (also called an imprecation, malediction, execration, malison, anathema, or commination) is any expressed wish that some form of adversity or misfortune will befall or attach to one or more persons, a place, or an object. In particular, ...
.


Banned political parties

In many countries political parties or groups are banned. Parties may be banned for many reasons, including extremism and anti-democratic ideologies, on ethnic or religious grounds, and sometimes simply because the group opposes government policies, with the ban sometimes alleging wrongdoing as the cause. Germany, for instance, has a long history behind its modern practice of banning political parties. The Nazi Party was banned in 1923; after the Nazi Party came into power in 1933 opposing parties such as the Social Democrats (SPD) and Communist Party of Germany (KPD) were banned, the Nazi Party was again banned and the ban on other parties lifted after the Nazi defeat in 1945, and the Communist Party was again banned from 1956 to 1968.


Banning marriages

There have been many bans on marriages, and sometimes other sexual liaisons, between people of different ethnic background or religion, for example between non-Jews and Jews in Nazi Germany, people classified as "white" and non-whites in
apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid wa ...
South Africa, etc. For much of the 1800s and 1900s there were bans on marriage between people of different races ( interracial marriage) in many of the United States. However, the ban on interracial marriage was overturned by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1967 in the landmark civil rights case '' Loving vs. Virginia'', in which the Court ruled Virginia's
miscegenation Miscegenation ( ) is the interbreeding of people who are considered to be members of different races. The word, now usually considered pejorative, is derived from a combination of the Latin terms ''miscere'' ("to mix") and ''genus'' ("race") ...
law an
unconstitutional Constitutionality is said to be the condition of acting in accordance with an applicable constitution; "Webster On Line" the status of a law, a procedure, or an act's accordance with the laws or set forth in the applicable constitution. When l ...
violation of the fundamental right to marriage. Historically
child marriage Child marriage is a marriage or similar union, formal or informal, between a child under a certain age – typically 18 years – and an adult or another child. * * * * The vast majority of child marriages are between a female child and a mal ...
was common, but is now banned in many countries.


Banned people


Holy Roman Empire

The
Imperial ban The imperial ban (german: Reichsacht) was a form of outlawry in the Holy Roman Empire. At different times, it could be declared by the Holy Roman Emperor, by the Imperial Diet, or by courts like the League of the Holy Court (''Vehmgericht'') or t ...
was a form of outlawry in the Holy Roman Empire. At different times, it could be declared by the Holy Roman Emperor, by courts including the
League of the Holy Court The Vehmic courts, ''Vehmgericht'', holy vehme, or simply Vehm, also spelt ''Feme'', ''Vehmegericht'', ''Fehmgericht'', are names given to a "proto-vigilante" tribunal system of Westphalia in Germany active during the later Middle Ages, based on a ...
(german: Vehmgericht, ) and the , or by the Imperial Diet. People under Imperial ban lost all their rights and possessions, and anyone had the right to rob, injure or kill such persons without legal consequences. The Imperial ban automatically followed the excommunication of a person, and extended to anyone offering help to a person under the imperial ban.


Under apartheid in South Africa

During the
apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid wa ...
régime in South Africa, the National Party government issued banning orders to individuals seen to be threats to its power — often black politicians or organizations — these banning orders acted as
suppression order A gag order (also known as a gagging order or suppression order) is an order, typically a legal order by a court or government, restricting information or comment from being made public or passed onto any unauthorized third party. The phrase may ...
s. Individuals or organisations and critical medias banned by the
Suppression of Communism Act, 1950 The Suppression of Communism Act, 1950 (Act No. 44 of 1950), renamed the Internal Security Act in 1976, was legislation of the national government in apartheid South Africa which formally banned the Communist Party of South Africa and proscribe ...
(which effectively defined "Communism" as opposition to the government) could not communicate with more than one person at any time unless at home (thus preventing them from engaging in political activities), travel to outside a specific magisterial district without government approval. The order had mostly domestic effect with versatile legal formative effects. These were for example: local or supra-regional residence restrictions, the prohibition of public expression of opinion, prohibition of printed publications and prohibition of citation in journalistic or scientific contexts the writings of the affecting persons or the participation of gatherings. Measures of this kind could also be applied to groups of people, organisations (for example the Defence Aid Fund for Southern Africa, 1966) and institutions (for example the
Christian Institute The Christian Institute (CI) is a pressure group operating in the United Kingdom, promoting a fundamentalist Christian viewpoint, founded on a belief in Biblical inerrancy. The CI is a registered charity. The group does not report numbers of staf ...
, 1977). There were several laws that legalised such actions ( Riotous Assemblies Act - 1914 and later 1956, Unlawful Organisations Act - 1960, Suppression of Communism Amendment Act - 1967, Internal Security Act - 1976, 1982,
1986 The year 1986 was designated as the International Year of Peace by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 **Aruba gains increased autonomy from the Netherlands by separating from the Netherlands Antilles. ** Spain and Portugal ent ...
). The General Law Amendment Act, No. 76 of 1962 empowered the Minister of Justice to publish the banned persons in the Government Gazette.
Helen Suzman Helen Suzman, OMSG, DBE (née Gavronsky; 7 November 1917 – 1 January 2009) was a South African anti-apartheid activist and politician. She represented a series of liberal and centre-left opposition parties during her 36-year tenure in th ...
, a liberal member of the South African parliament, defended the right of free assembly and freedom of expression for all citizens in 1986 and pointed to the growing confrontation between the black population and the police. The banishment of persons, i.e. expulsion from their place of residence, was practised in smaller numbers. Between 1948 and 1967, this affected 156 people. After 1972, this measure was only applied sporadically.Muriel Horrell, SAIRR: ''Law Affecting Race Relations in South Africa''. The Natal Witness, Johannesburg, Pietermaritzburg 1978, pp. 429–431 .


Health and safety

Bans in various jurisdictions on possession of some weapons, smoking, and narcotic drugs are enacted to exert control over the
general public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...
.


See also

*
Ban (medieval) In the Middle Ages, the ban (Latin ''bannus'' or ''bannum'', German ''Bann'') or banality (French ''banalité'') was originally the power to command men in war and evolved into the general authority to order and to punish. As such, it was the basis ...
*
Censure A censure is an expression of strong disapproval or harsh criticism. In parliamentary procedure, it is a debatable main motion that could be adopted by a majority vote. Among the forms that it can take are a stern rebuke by a legislature, a spir ...
and Excommunication, which may result in a ban pursuant to religious law * Export restriction * Herem (censure), a ban pursuant to Jewish law * '' Homo sacer'' and the sovereign state of exception *
List of banned books This is an index of lists of banned books, which contain books that have been banned or censored by religious authority or government. By country * Book censorship in Canada * Book censorship in China * List of books banned in India * Book c ...
* List of banned computer and video games * List of banned films * List of banned political parties *
List of people subject to banning orders under apartheid __NOTOC__ This list of people subject to banning orders under apartheid lists a selection of people subject to a "banning order" by the apartheid-era South African government. Banning was a repressive and extrajudicial measure used by the South ...
*
List of websites blocked in China Many domain names are blocked in the People's Republic of China (mainland China) under the country's Internet censorship policy, which prevents users from accessing certain websites from within the country. This is a list of the most notable s ...
* Ostracism * Prohibition—usually referring to historical and current laws regulating prohibition of alcohol *
Shunning Shunning can be the act of social rejection, or emotional distance. In a religious context, shunning is a formal decision by a denomination or a congregation to cease interaction with an individual or a group, and follows a particular set of rule ...
practiced in the Amish community * Use of performance-enhancing drugs in sport


References


External links

* * {{cite EB1911 , wstitle=Ban , volume=3 , pages=305–306 , short=x Punishments Regulation