Dr Barbara Harmel was born in December 1942 in Johannesburg. Harmel is the daughter of Ray Harmel, a trade unionist, founding member of the Garment Workers' Union and a life-long member of the South African Communist Party, and Michael Harmel who was a member of the central committee of this the South African Communist Party and the first Editor of the African Communist.

Dr Harmel joined the underground movement in 1963 and, after narrowly avoiding arrest, went into exile in 1964. Harmel graduated with a B.A. (Hons.) in Philosophy and a Masters in sub-Saharan African Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies from the University of London. While reading for a Ph.D. at the University of Essex, she was awarded a travel scholarship to do her research at Yale University. She was also an Associate Fellow of the Southern Africa Research Programme at Yale and taught several courses on the politics of South Africa. In 1984 Barbara moved to Washington D.C. where she worked for four years promoting Congressional awareness of conditions in South Africa and campaigning for U.S. sanctions against South Africa.

In 1988 she was awarded a two-year scholarship at Harvard University's Center for International Affairs where she ran a weekly seminar on South African politics presented by many speakers from South Africa. In 1990 she became the Director of the South Africa Program at the Albert Einstein Institution in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was in this capacity and under their auspices that she returned to South Africa in 1992. In 1995 Dr Harmel trained as a psychologist in London and is currently in private practice in Johannesburg.