Ruth First , in full Heloise Ruth First (born May 4, 1925, Johannesburg, South Africa—died August 17, 1982, Maputo, Mozambique), South African activist, scholar, and journalist known for her relentless opposition to South Africa’s discriminatory policy of apartheid. In 1982 she was assassinated while living in exile.

First was the daughter of Latvian Jewish immigrants Julius and Matilda First, who were founding members of the Communist Party of South Africa (CPSA); First herself would also become active in the party as she grew older. In 1946 she received a bachelor’s degree in social studies from the University of the Witwatersrand. While there, she organized the Federation of Progressive Students with Ismail Meer, Joe Slovo (her future husband), Yusuf Dadoo, J.N. Singh, and others, creating a radical multiracial student organization that opposed apartheid. From 1947 First worked for the progressive newspaper The Guardian, specializing in exposés of black labour conditions. In 1949 she married Slovo, and by 1954 they had three daughters.

After CPSA was banned (an apartheid-era legal action that was used to suppress organizations and publications and severely restrict the activities of a person) by the South African government in 1950, First was involved in organizing its successor, the underground South African Communist Party (SACP), which emerged in 1953. That same year she also was involved in the founding of the Congress of Democrats, the white wing of the Congress Alliance, a multiracial group of organizations that opposed apartheid. She edited the journal Fighting Talk, which supported the alliance. First also worked on drafting the alliance’s renowned Freedom Charter, which called for nonracial social democracy in South Africa, but she was unable to attend the Congress of the People gathering held in 1955, where the document was approved, because of her banning order—one of several such orders First was subjected to while living in South Africa. In 1956 First and her husband, along with Albert