Abstract:

At an international level, the peaceful transition to democracy in South Africa has often been lauded as miraculous.  While political transformation might have been highly successful, changes in other spheres have proved to be much more problematic.  This article examines change in higher education in South Africa and, more particularly, the role played by the field of Academic or, as it tends to be known elsewhere, Educational Development in that change. In order to do so, it uses Dale’s (1989) understanding of mutual contradiction of the state’s need to foster the conditions for capitalist expansion whilst, at the same time, guaranteeing the conditions for social reproduction as providing a space for policy activity.  The role played by the South African Educational Development movement from the early 1980s onwards is then analysed within the context of this policy activity

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Boughey, Chrissie (2007). Educational development in South Africa: from social reproduction to capitalist expansion? Higher Education Policy 20(1): 5-18