tag:theconversation.com,2011:/uk/topics/fees-must-fall-29860/articlesFees must fall – The Conversation2021-04-25T08:33:21Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1595612021-04-25T08:33:21Z2021-04-25T08:33:21ZSouth Africa remains a nation of insiders and outsiders, 27 years after democracy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396849/original/file-20210423-21-99d5c0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Skyscraper buildings in the Sandton area stand on the skyline beyond residential housing in the Alexandra township in Johannesburg.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photographer: Waldo Swiegers/Bloomberg via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Twenty seven years <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/04597239308460952?journalCode=tssu20">into democracy</a>, South African politics is still for the few. And those who complain the most have the least to grumble about. </p>
<p>Since South Africa is <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/southafrica/overview">highly unequal</a> and remains divided into <a href="https://www.academia.edu/29610338/ARCHIPELAGOS_OF_DOMINANCE_Party_Fiefdoms_and_South_African_Democracy">insiders and outsiders</a> – those who benefit from the market economy and those who can’t – we might expect its politics to be a loud battle between those who have and those who don’t. Most commentators believe it is.</p>
<p>Within the governing African National Congress (ANC), <a href="https://theconversation.com/precarious-power-tilts-towards-ramaphosa-in-battle-inside-south-africas-governing-party-158251">a battle rages between</a> the <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2021-03-14-carl-niehaus-tables-radical-economic-transformation-plan-ahead-of-ace-magashules-campaign-for-anc-president/">“radical economic transformation forces”</a>, who purport to champion the interests of the poor majority, and their <a href="https://theconversation.com/precarious-power-tilts-towards-ramaphosa-in-battle-inside-south-africas-governing-party-158251">market-friendly opponents</a>.</p>
<p>Outside it, the third biggest party, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), some in the <a href="https://omalley.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv02424/04lv02730/05lv03161.htm">ANC alliance</a> and the advocates of <a href="https://socialsurveys.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/AZAPO-2019-Manifesto.pdf">black consciousness </a> and <a href="http://www.pac.org.za/wp-content/uploads/PAC-Manifesto-2019.pdf">pan-Africanism</a> are assumed to speak for those who live in poverty.</p>
<p>There is much radical talk which creates this impression. The left-wing tradition in South Africa goes back over a century – it was injected into the mainstream of anti-apartheid politics by the alliance between the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03057079208708304?journalCode=cjss20">ANC and the Communist Party</a>. But, while it is common for political activists to use left language, all politics is still, as it was before 1994, <a href="https://www.academia.edu/29610338/ARCHIPELAGOS_OF_DOMINANCE_Party_Fiefdoms_and_South_African_Democracy">insider politics</a>. Then the insiders were whites – now they are the minority who receive an income from the formal economy each week or month.</p>
<p>In the country’s insider politics, the majority who try to survive outside the formal economy are talked about, but are never heard. The “radical economic transformation forces” are people trying to gain a bigger share of what the few enjoy, not to share it with the many. The EFF’s chief concern is to challenge white privilege in the insider economy, not to open it to the outsiders. According to one <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2018-12-12-as-its-ratings-fall-precipitously-the-eff-goes-post-truth-in-the-opinion-polls/">survey</a>, EFF members have, on average, higher incomes and qualifications than ANC members.</p>
<h2>Insiders and outsiders</h2>
<p>Over the past few years, the country has witnessed a furious debate over whether the government should be able to <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-politics-behind-south-africas-property-clause-amendment-131575">expropriate land without compensation</a>. Only one group has been ignored – the millions of <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2021-02-02-land-activists-without-the-voices-of-communities-the-expropriation-bill-will-not-go-very-far/">landless people</a> who have the greatest stake in the outcome.</p>
<p>Since insider politics is often about insisting that you speak for the poor when you have consulted no-one who lives in poverty, both sides of the debate did their best to show that the landless were on their side. Those who wanted expropriation found a few landless people to take to official hearings. Their opponents in the media interviewed just as few landless people who were reported to not want expropriation. But no-one spoke for the people without land.</p>
<p>During the first year of COVID-19, a debate raged over whether lockdown measures were needed. The official opposition, the Democratic Alliance, echoed the global right-wing by demanding that <a href="https://www.capetownetc.com/news/da-opposes-curfews-and-lockdown-phasing/">all activity be allowed</a>. The EFF insisted that <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/malema-economy-is-secondary-hard-lockdown-should-continue-until-scientific-solution-found-48627807">nothing should be opened</a>. The ANC claimed to adopt a “scientific” <a href="https://www.sabcnews.com/sabcnews/government-will-be-guided-by-scientific-evidence-before-easing-lockdown-ramaphosa/">approach</a> in which public health and the economy’s needs were balanced.</p>
<p>None of them spoke for – and to – the majority who were <a href="https://www.businessinsider.co.za/minibus-taxis-may-now-be-100-full-2020-7">forced to travel on taxis</a> which they knew might spread the virus, to earn incomes in ways which might infect them, and whose need was to find a way to feed their families without falling ill.</p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-2019-poll-showed-dangerous-signs-of-insiders-and-outsiders-121758">South Africa's 2019 poll showed dangerous signs of 'insiders' and 'outsiders'</a>
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<p>Insider politics also shapes another conflict which divides “left” and “right” – the demand for <a href="https://theconversation.com/fees-must-fall-but-not-at-the-expense-of-quality-higher-education-62520">free higher education</a>. This is a rallying cry of the left which is denounced by opponents as a Marxist assault on the market economy. But the “left” demand boils down to insisting that the children of the corporate and professional elite should be <a href="https://theconversation.com/history-explains-why-south-africans-on-the-left-argue-for-free-passes-for-the-rich-88345">educated at public expense</a>. This, would, of course, mean that less money would be available to address the needs of people living in poverty. </p>
<p>There are many other examples which underline a reality in which no-one speaks for the outsiders except some local organisations which are ignored by the mainstream debate. It is why policies aimed at ending the exclusion of the outsiders – or at least at helping them to survive – usually fail. They are products of what insider politics think the majority need, not what the outsiders want.</p>
<h2>Suburbs versus townships</h2>
<p>There is a perverse side of insider politics: it ensures that the government is routinely denounced by those whom democracy has benefited while those whom it has largely left out remain silent.</p>
<p>The gap between insiders and outsiders is also that between suburbs on the one hand, low-income <a href="https://ccs.ukzn.ac.za/files/Bond%20Townships.pdf">townships</a> – the (almost) exclusively black urban residential areas – and shack settlements on the other. The suburbs are inhabited by the more affluent insiders. Not only does the ANC enjoy little support in these areas – it and the government are targets of deep contempt there. No-one wins respect in the suburbs by saying anything good about the government.</p>
<p>But suburban residents enjoy full economic and political freedom. They can also ensure that they receive much higher standards of public service than others: if the power or water supply is interrupted, suburbanites quickly begin demanding that the problem is fixed. They don’t always get what they want, but their problems are addressed more quickly than the rest of the country’s. And they can rely on privately provided services to make up the slack.</p>
<p>In the townships and shack settlements, the ANC, despite some setbacks, still tends to <a href="https://www.politicsweb.co.za/documents/results-of-the-municipal-byelections-held-on-21-ap">win elections handily</a>. It is often so dominant that the important conflicts happen within it. It is not uncommon for ANC activists to mobilise protest against an <a href="https://www.enca.com/news/umngeni-municipality-anc-members-protest-against-corruption">ANC mayor or councillor</a>.</p>
<p>But people aren’t free since local power holders don’t like competition and are often able, working at times with the police, <a href="https://theconversation.com/below-the-radar-south-africa-is-limiting-the-right-to-protest-60943">to suppress</a> people who speak and act independently. The best-known example is the shack dweller organisation <a href="https://abahlali.org/">Abahlali base mjondolo</a>, which has endured sustained violence because it threatens local power holders.</p>
<p>Outsiders must also make do with officials and politicians who ignore them. While suburbanites must sometimes make do without services for hours or a few days, outsiders must at times go without for weeks or months.</p>
<h2>Great irony</h2>
<p>The great irony, of course, is that the areas which denounce the government can better influence it than those which support it. This speaks to an important reality: that the majority does not yet rule, even though the constitution says it should.</p>
<p>This ensures that South African democracy is vigorous – but only for a minority of the population. The insiders use their freedoms to engage in heated contest while the majority is forced to accept whatever they decide. Until this changes, South Africa will not deal effectively with poverty and inequality because those who need change most will remain unheard.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/159561/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Friedman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In the country’s insider politics, the majority who try to survive outside the formal economy are talked about, but are never heard.Steven Friedman, Professor of Political Studies, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1372802020-07-15T14:49:02Z2020-07-15T14:49:02ZOn decolonising teaching practices, not just the syllabus<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336491/original/file-20200520-152298-1o0kfsg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Student protests dubbed #FeesMustFall in 2016 in Pretoria.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Cornel van Heerden/Foto24/Gallo Images/Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In South Africa, <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-south-africa-students-protest-tuition-hikes-49620">student calls</a> for free, quality, decolonised higher education have coincided with demands for the transformation of canons, curricula and pedagogies. </p>
<p>At the height of the protests assembled around the <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-african-student-protests-are-about-much-more-than-just-feesmustfall-49776">#FeesMustFall</a> movement since 2014, some students at the University of the Witwatersrand formed their own reading groups, attempting to develop their own curricula. </p>
<p>They presented memorandums demanding that their disciplines decolonise the universals they base their assumptions upon. Assumptions like the very non-secular secularism that shapes all aspects of what the practice of knowledge is; the separation of nature and culture; and the primacy of Western canons as universal and not particular. Students wanted the university to better reflect their experiences and contexts. </p>
<p>Danai Mupotsa’s paper <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0038026119892403">Knowing from Loss</a> considers the practice of teaching in the light of these student protests. Aretha Phiri spoke with her. </p>
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<p><strong>Aretha Phiri:</strong> You paper is primarily situated in the Fees Must Fall ‘moment’. How did the student protests help shape your teaching?</p>
<p><strong>Danai Mupotsa:</strong> This paper has <a href="https://brill.com/view/book/edcoll/9789004356368/B9789004356368_003.xml">had</a> and will likely have a number of afterlives. I started my first full time teaching position in 2015 and I was excited and energetic and certainly thinking about what teaching as a practice means. Being confronted with questions of what the <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-46176-2_3">classroom is</a>, what it is for, how people learn in that context, was acutely present. </p>
<p>In my paper, I give the example of the student in a second-year course on post-independence Africa, who, once we were reading Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani’s <a href="https://www.jamesmurua.com/a-review-of-adaobi-tricia-nwaubanis-i-do-not-come-to-you-by-chance/"><em>I Do Not Come to You by Chance</em></a>, was a bit teary. The story is told around Kingsley, who places his hopes in education. Kingsley graduates as an engineer, but education is no longer the language of success in Nigeria. After reading this novel, the student felt that perhaps getting an education might not promise the freedom he imagined – also realising the cost of this education to his family – and he could not reconcile with the narrative and what it might represent. </p>
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<p>It made me think about the responsibility that we bear as teachers in contexts of rare optimism. A day later, the university was <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2015-10-26-wits-to-stay-shut-as-feesmustfall-protests-continue/">shut down</a> because of #FeesMustFall protests. I had to think about the spaces that I occupy. </p>
<p><strong>Aretha Phiri:</strong> Your paper title, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0038026119892403">Knowing from Loss</a>, specifically references the work of US poet, critic and theorist <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/persons-of-interest/fred-motens-radical-critique-of-the-present">Fred Moten</a>. Are you attempting to apply his analyses of blackness (in America) to the current ‘decolonial’ South African moment?</p>
<p><strong>Danai Mupotsa:</strong> My turn to <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/23128740">Moten</a> came out of a workshop on literary traditions in the face of <a href="https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://scholar.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=6024&context=lkcsb_research">decolonisation</a>. There were people in the room who were broadly dismissive of students who were turning to <a href="http://muse.jhu.edu/article/685969">Afropessimism</a> as a line of thought or to Blackness as the condition that oriented their political vocabulary.</p>
<p>Some of the statements from colleagues, I just found reactionary. But there were also those who were dismissive because of their non-expertise in Black intellectual traditions such as Moten’s, which thinks through the space between Black and Blackness, experience and our knowledge of that experience.</p>
<p>In my writing, my questions often begin with experience – with intimacy, with relation. I use the tools and methods at my disposal to write embodied ‘love letters’. What feminist critic <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/1354255">Barbara Christian</a> asks us to think about when we use the word ‘theory’. When theory is removed from the context of its emergence, it works to exclude Black people, queer people and womxn among others from the work of theory. Christian’s reminder is that theory is in the practice of culture, of Black social life. </p>
<p><strong>Aretha Phiri:</strong> In discussions arising from your paper, you describe your deliberate deployment of ‘embodied teaching’. Could you explain how that might contribute to quality decolonised education? Or be useful for women and queer bodies in higher education in particular?</p>
<p><strong>Danai Mupotsa:</strong> <a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/cecb/0a74a48bf4db6343cf055bfd9b1c077aa87c.pdf">Peace Kiguwa</a> has done substantial work on what it means to be a queer Black person in the classroom and how one mobilises this position to <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-46176-2_6">engage students</a> on important questions. I find this work instructive. Being embodied, for me, is about dealing with myself, and participants in a classroom, as living, whole creatures. </p>
<p>So it might be a small thing like, it’s 8am on a Monday and we are a bit tired, so we start with a laughing meditation. People will laugh. Perhaps it’s ridiculous. But even if they’re laughing at me, we are now engaged with each other – we are in conversation. It means that what you bring to the classroom in the way of experience matters. It is part of what informs your judgements long before language helps ‘explain’ it. I ask people to be attentive to the pull of the stomach. To the moment when the hair on the skin rises. This expands the terrain and capacity of ‘intellectual’ engagement.</p>
<p><strong>Aretha Phiri:</strong> Your analysis also offers ways in which embodied teaching and learning can disrupt Black Atlantic studies and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/14/arts/paul-gilroy-holberg-prize.html">Paul Gilroy’s</a>
1993 text <a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674076068">The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness</a>. What do you predict as the future of Black Diaspora Studies?</p>
<p><strong>Danai Mupotsa:</strong> I think Black Diaspora studies exist in multiple lives, temporalities, futures, presents and pasts. It is the way that Black people make/ think/ do life. It is the mundane, the ordinary, the radical, the intimate, the erotic, the poetic, the relational. It’s a fundamentally dense knot but equally exciting promise.</p>
<p><em>This article is part of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/africa/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=%23BlackAtlanticsSeries">series</a> called Decolonising the Black Atlantic in which black and queer women literary academics rethink and disrupt traditional Black Atlantic studies. The series is based on papers delivered at the <a href="https://stias.ac.za/events/revising-the-black-atlantic-african-diaspora-perspectives/">Revising the Black Atlantic: African Diaspora Perspectives</a> colloquium at the <a href="https://stias.ac.za">Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/137280/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Aretha Phiri is an NRF rated researcher and has been a fellow at the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study (STIAS).
</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Danai Mupotsa receives funding from the EDIT: Equality and Democracy as Transformation
Project (University of the Witwatersrand, University of Addis Ababa and Helsinki University)
funded by the Academy of Finland (nr. 320863, 2019-2022). </span></em></p>An African literature lecturer shares how embodied teaching can help students feel that their lives and stories matter.Aretha Phiri, Senior lecturer, Department of Literary Studies in English, Rhodes UniversityDanai Mupotsa, Senior Lecturer in African Literature, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1310572020-05-27T14:00:11Z2020-05-27T14:00:11ZBlack and queer women invite the Black Atlantic into the 21st century<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317382/original/file-20200226-24668-pax2tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 1993 British academic <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/14/arts/paul-gilroy-holberg-prize.html">Paul Gilroy</a> published <a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674076068">The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness</a>. It has become a very important text in global blackness studies.</p>
<p>Gilroy’s book provided the inspiration for a colloquium I organised at the <a href="https://stias.ac.za/">Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study</a>. Called <a href="https://stias.ac.za/events/revising-the-black-atlantic-african-diaspora-perspectives/">Revising the Black Atlantic: African Diaspora Perspectives</a>, it was part of my ongoing efforts to re-imagine the current thinking around African decolonisation. It set out to listen to and foreground women and queer feminist academics.</p>
<p>The Atlantic world referred to by Gilroy tells the histories of Europe, Africa and the Americas, two hemispheres joined by the Atlantic ocean. The diaspora is the spread of people – in the case of our studies, black people – across continents. The <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/b/black-atlantic">Black Atlantic</a> is a term typically credited to Gilroy. </p>
<p>It tells a history, shaped by the brutality of the slave trade, that leads to the development of black consciousness in other parts of the Atlantic world. These histories then interact with one another in creative and useful ways.</p>
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<span class="caption">Paul Gilroy at home.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mjgw at English Wikipedia</span></span>
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<p>Gilroy’s text has helped to highlight the influential role and place of the black diaspora within global race studies. But it remains largely shaped by the West. In its focus on disproving the racist assumptions of Western thinking, it downplays the place of Africa and its peoples in contributing to the modern world. </p>
<p>The Black Atlantic also, unfortunately, does not acknowledge the contributions of women and queer people. A similarly narrow and unimaginative approach affects traditional and current thinking about decolonisation. It is focused largely on tackling and contradicting philosophy and thought that is centred on Western, European culture and history. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317390/original/file-20200226-24668-3eo65e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317390/original/file-20200226-24668-3eo65e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/317390/original/file-20200226-24668-3eo65e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=953&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317390/original/file-20200226-24668-3eo65e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=953&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317390/original/file-20200226-24668-3eo65e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=953&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317390/original/file-20200226-24668-3eo65e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1198&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317390/original/file-20200226-24668-3eo65e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1198&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/317390/original/file-20200226-24668-3eo65e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1198&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Paul Gilroy’s seminal text.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Verso</span></span>
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<p>Resistance to Western dominance over knowledge is understandable and necessary, considering the continent’s lingering, violent colonial past. But there’s a risk of our decolonising efforts becoming prescriptive. </p>
<p>In South African academic life, a racialised and gendered decolonising narrative is also in danger of playing into the kind of exclusionary thinking that it opposes. </p>
<p>Various commentators have highlighted the threat posed by feminism to institutionalised norms. Author <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/oct/17/chimamanda-ngozi-adichie-extract-we-should-all-be-feminists">Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie</a> observes </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Gender is not an easy conversation to have … Because thinking of changing the status quo is always uncomfortable. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Academic Jennifer C. Nash has <a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/Assets/PubMaterials/978-1-4780-0059-4_601.pdf">argued</a> that black women in particular are not normally associated with analysis. Their intellectual production, therefore, is viewed as threatening to existing social structures. </p>
<p>Our colloquium aimed to probe the limits and possibilities of both the Black Atlantic and current thinking around African decolonisation. We wanted to offer new interpretations from the perspectives of today’s African diaspora. </p>
<h2>The papers</h2>
<p>An interdisciplinary approach encouraged comparative, transnational readings from the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/humanities">humanities</a> and <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/social-science">social sciences</a>. We also wanted to realign contemporary African beliefs and lived experiences.</p>
<p>Only women and queer feminist scholars were invited to present papers. </p>
<p>Michelle Wright’s paper <em>Black in Time: Diaspora, Diversity and Identity</em> challenged linear ideas of the Black Atlantic which mimic Western assumptions about history. These result in a simplified reading of race and racial belonging. She argued for tangible versions of history that allow for more inclusive and complex Black diaspora. </p>
<p>Sam Naidu’s paper <em>That Ever-Blurry Line Between us and the Criminal: Re-visioning Justice in African Noir</em> looked at the classic, Western genre of crime fiction. And then reconsidered it from the perspective of <a href="https://kweiquartey.com/african-crime-fiction/">African crime fiction</a>. She showed how this evolving genre could reflect issues of sociopolitical justice and philosophical dilemmas that affect Africans.</p>
<p>Some topics explicitly challenged the racial and gendered shortcomings of Gilroy’s text. Marzia Milazzo delivered a paper titled, <em>The Black Atlantic, the ‘New Racism,’ and the Politics of Hybridity</em>. It took to task Gilroy’s colourblind understanding of racism and his uncritical interpretation of the mixing of cultures to shape his theory of the Black Atlantic.</p>
<p>Rocío Cobo-Piñero’s paper was called <em>Queering the Black Atlantic: Transgender Spaces in Akwaeke Emezi’s <a href="https://www.akwaeke.com/freshwater">Freshwater</a> (2018)</em>. It used Emezi’s novel of Ada, a child born with a troubled and troubling spirit, to offer ways in which emerging African queer literature could disrupt traditional, heterosexist readings of <em>The Black Atlantic</em>.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/nigerias-queer-literature-offers-a-new-way-of-looking-at-blackness-133649">Nigeria's queer literature offers a new way of looking at blackness</a>
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<p>Other topics explored the possibility of embodied research and teaching methods. This is about the physical ways we know and teach. For example, Danai Mupotsa’s paper <em>Knowing From Loss</em> referenced the <a href="https://theconversation.com/feesmustfall-the-poster-child-for-new-forms-of-struggle-in-south-africa-68773">#FeesMustFall</a> movement. Her aim was to highlight (marginalised) experiences and contexts in students’ ongoing calls for a decolonised, transformed higher education. </p>
<p>Uhuru Phalafala’s paper <em>Encountering the M(other) in black radical traditions</em> focused on celebrated South African poet <a href="https://africasacountry.com/2018/03/keorapetse-kgositsile-was-a-feminist">Keorapetse Kgositsile</a>. It examined the unacknowledged influence of the oral Setswana maternal lineage on his transnational black radical poetry and politics.</p>
<p>Our discussions were rigorous and robust and we weren’t necessarily always in agreement. But all the participants were committed to one thing: rethinking the dominant thinking around decolonisation and the Black Atlantic.</p>
<p>The colloquium demonstrated the crucial significance of nonconformist, disruptive research and teaching methods. And while I am excited about the prospects for queer African feminist scholarship, gender equity is an aspiration yet to be realised. </p>
<p><em>This article is part of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/africa/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=%23BlackAtlanticsSeries">series</a> called Decolonising the Black Atlantic in which black and queer women literary academics rethink and disrupt traditional Black Atlantic studies. The series is based on papers delivered at the <a href="https://stias.ac.za/events/revising-the-black-atlantic-african-diaspora-perspectives/">Revising the Black Atlantic: African Diaspora Perspectives</a> colloquium at the <a href="https://stias.ac.za">Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/131057/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Aretha Phiri is an NRF rated researcher. She is affiliated with the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study.</span></em></p>A group of leading black, queer and feminist academics held a colloquium to reconsider a seminal blackness studies text – offering new ways of thinking about the decolonial project.Aretha Phiri, Senior lecturer, Department of Literary Studies in English, Rhodes UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1365872020-04-21T14:23:46Z2020-04-21T14:23:46ZNumbers can kill: politicians should handle South Africa’s coronavirus data with care<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329400/original/file-20200421-82677-1e5mv8f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The reporting of South Africa's first COVID-19 case sparked a racialised discourse that persists. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GettyImages</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Numbers tell stories. Usually, stories of people – often happy stories, like births, marriages, finishing school, getting a degree, getting a job. Even paying taxes. Sometimes they tell sad stories – death, divorce, disease, liquidations.</p>
<p>Statistics do not provide a cold or inanimate way of dealing with the world – they are one key part of the world, waiting for someone to spin the tale they tell. </p>
<p>At a time of heightened fear such as the world is currently living through, ensuring statistics of death and disease are handled with sensitivity should be self-evident, most particularly to politicians.</p>
<p>It appears not.</p>
<p>No one controls who talks to data once they’re in the public domain. No one stops journalists or students or politicians from analysing official stats as they see fit, thus creating their own narrative. That is why there are clear ethical and legal protocols in place. </p>
<p>The most basic of these is never to release data that may allow respondents to be identified. </p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-five-criteria-low-income-countries-must-have-in-place-for-lockdowns-to-work-136263">The five criteria low income countries must have in place for lockdowns to work</a>
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<p>In the case of South Africa this means that, in practice, Statistics South Africa <a href="http://www.statssa.gov.za/">(Stats SA)</a>, the country’s national statistical service, anonymises data it does release and has legal rules for the “level” at which data can be made available. This refers to both individuals and small, identifiable communities. </p>
<p>This is appropriate. It prevents the potential violation of confidentiality – the ability to point accusatory fingers because you choose to read (or misread, exaggerate, over-state) numbers in a particular way.</p>
<p>But is this basic protocol being adhered to during the COVID-19 pandemic?</p>
<p>Sadly not. An early case in point is the Western Cape, where premier Alan Winde <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/premier-alan-winde-update-coronavirus-covid-19-20-apr-2020-0000">released remarkably detailed figures</a> on the local level sites of COVID-19 infection in the province. </p>
<p>As Winde <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2020-03-29-western-capes-310-covid-19-cases-broken-down-by-area/">put it</a>, </p>
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<p>Today (March 29) we have started providing sub-district information across the Western Cape, including in the city of Cape Town. The stats show us that this virus is spreading, reaching communities across our province. Each and every one of these cases, from Khayelitsha and Mitchells Plain to Mossel Bay — is of very serious concern for my government.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>He went on to give detailed data for the Cape. Winde’s example has since been followed by other premiers, mayors and many others. This is not a party political point-scoring piece.</p>
<p>The obvious question is: why tell us, at such granular level? </p>
<p>Winde was no doubt acting from good intentions, one most people would share, which is that the more information people have, the more they may appreciate risk, and the better they may respond to the constraints of the <a href="https://www.gov.za/speeches/president-cyril-ramaphosa-extension-coronavirus-covid-19-lockdown-end-april-9-apr-2020-0000">COVID-19 lockdown</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329476/original/file-20200421-82650-s8n0gy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329476/original/file-20200421-82650-s8n0gy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329476/original/file-20200421-82650-s8n0gy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329476/original/file-20200421-82650-s8n0gy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329476/original/file-20200421-82650-s8n0gy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329476/original/file-20200421-82650-s8n0gy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329476/original/file-20200421-82650-s8n0gy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Police monitor compliance with COVID-19 regulations in the Diepsloot informal settlement, Johannesburg.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Michele Spatari/AFP/GettyImages</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>And, quite rightly, he was trying to put out the flames of potential stigma – as every politician subsequently repeats as they intone the nightly death toll. He and others have tried to say the disease knows no race or age or class. It can get anyone. </p>
<p>But the path to hell, as we know, is paved with good intentions.</p>
<h2>The politics of death</h2>
<p>When the first South African COVID-19 infection was reported <a href="https://www.nicd.ac.za/first-case-of-covid-19-coronavirus-reported-in-sa/">on 5 March</a>, almost immediately a video was circulated by some political figures that made it clear this was a rich white problem. Who else visits Italy in March?</p>
<p>It pointed to the immediate racialisation of the first South African infection. This was a disease of white globe-trotters. This was a problem for rich whites, not for “us” (mainly poor black people). It fed on the political discourse that marked the 2019 election – <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-democratic-alliance-plays-populist-immigration-card-105222">“protect our borders”</a> (from “them”), take back “our” land and jobs (from a different “them”). </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/zimbabwes-shattered-economy-poses-a-serious-challenge-to-fighting-covid-19-135066">Zimbabwe's shattered economy poses a serious challenge to fighting COVID-19</a>
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<p>The same reaction greeted HIV when it debuted in the 1980s and was written off as the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1982/05/11/science/new-homosexual-disorder-worries-health-officials.html">gay-related immunodeficiency syndrome</a>. It was a disease of <a href="https://www.news.uct.ac.za/campus/communications/updates/covid-19/-article/2020-03-24-lessons-for-covid-19-from-the-hiv-and-aids-pandemic">“<em>moffies</em>” – a derogatory term used to describe gay people in South Africa</a> – a Western disease, a white disease, and a “them” disease. It was self-evidently not “our” macho, heterosexual problem. Until it was. And then it slaughtered people, and is still doing so. </p>
<p>Have people really learned absolutely nothing?</p>
<p>COVID-19 is everyone’s disease as well, as people are grudgingly accepting. But the race and class profile – of this being a problem for rich white people, that started with South Africa’s infection #1 – created a discourse that has not disappeared. It is fuelled by the country’s existing <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-pro-poor-policies-on-their-own-wont-shift-inequality-in-south-africa-117430">racialised inequality</a> and people’s genuine fear of this invisible virus. </p>
<p>The release of data showing that “rich white” suburban parts of Cape Town and Johannesburg are the epicentres in both city and province is problematic. It feeds into and amplifies South Africa’s tendency to default to race, and creates real local divisions that mirror and deepen those already hardcreted into South Africa’s cities by apartheid spatial engineering.</p>
<h2>Controlling the narrative</h2>
<p>But why did stigma exist (and why so early)? </p>
<p>In no small part, because government didn’t control the narrative from day one. As a result, every session now includes the repetition that the virus cares not a jot for race. But, though government spokespeople also reassure South Africans that it doesn’t care if you’re rich or poor, a new narrative is taking root, that “the poor” are “the problem” – that enforced proximity coupled with poverty and compromised health means the epicentre will be <a href="https://www.news24.com/Columnists/GuestColumn/opinion-covid-19-people-in-informal-settlements-continue-to-show-great-resilience-20200402">informal settlements</a>. </p>
<p>This is because we are so <a href="https://theconversation.com/pandemic-underscores-gross-inequalities-in-south-africa-and-the-need-to-fix-them-135070">fundamentally unequal</a> that this virus (like HIV before it) is going to disproportionately affect the poor. And the poor are overwhelmingly black. So the prejudice that welcomed COVID has created its own truth.</p>
<p>Statistics do tell stories. But they are understood in different contexts. So while everyone would love to know more about their neighbours – from the census, from COVID-19 data, from income and expenditure surveys, and other official data sources – they can’t. And they should not be able to – that way lies stigmatisation, racist and nationalist narratives, and worse. </p>
<p>In many countries across the world narratives of “our” jobs apparently being “taken” by others are becoming increasingly common in the wake of COVID-19. This, as has been shown in South Africa prior to the pandemic, leads to <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/09/13/south-africa-punish-xenophobic-violence">xenophobic violence and more death</a>, as happened immediately after the 2019 national elections.</p>
<p>Politicians should take heed. Good intentions do not guarantee good outcomes. Stop imagining that granular data helps – it doesn’t. Stick to the protocols – and the law. Statistics South Africa does not release this type of data, precisely to protect people from one another. Leaders need to do the same, or the country may be divided after the COVID-19 crisis than it was before it hit.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/136587/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Everatt is the chairperson of the South African Statistics Council at StatsSA.. </span></em></p>We’d all love to know more about our neighbours – from COVID-19 data, census data and other official data sources – but we shouldn’t.David Everatt, Professor of Urban Governance, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1334502020-03-11T13:19:25Z2020-03-11T13:19:25ZPasha 57: Adam Habib on higher education in South Africa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/319816/original/file-20200311-168321-16agrbg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">shutterstock</span> </figcaption></figure><p>Higher education in South Africa has undergone some tough times in recent years. There have been numerous protests over fees and affordability. One of the university leaders at the centre of the debates was Adam Habib, principal and vice-chancellor of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. </p>
<p>In today’s episode of Pasha he looks at the challenges of higher education in South Africa. He also discusses solutions and the lessons the country should take from the protests. </p>
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<p><strong>Photo:</strong>
By Novikov Aleksey. Graduation cap, books and diploma on the flag. <a href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/graduation-cap-books-diploma-on-flag-1582753180">Shutterstock</a></p>
<p><strong>Music</strong>
“Happy African Village” by John Bartmann, found on <a href="http://freemusicarchive.org/music/John_Bartmann/Public_Domain_Soundtrack_Music_Album_One/happy-african-village">FreeMusicArchive.org</a> licensed under <a href="https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/">CC0 1</a>.</p>
<p>“Music Box & Sunshine” by Daniel Birch, found on <a href="https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Daniel_Birch/Ambient_Vol3/Music_Box__Sunshine">FreeMusicArchive.org</a> licensed under <a href="https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/">CC0 1</a>.</p>
<p><strong>Sounds</strong>
“RU Fees Must Fall” by RUTV Journalism Rhodes University. found on <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nm5WLZnsByg">YouTube</a> licensed under <a href="https://www.youtube.com/t/creative_commons">CC</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/133450/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
It's important to focus on the challenges facing higher education before the reach a boiling point.Ozayr Patel, Digital EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1001802018-07-25T14:46:21Z2018-07-25T14:46:21ZLots of young South Africans aren’t going to technical colleges. What can be done<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228416/original/file-20180719-142432-1uu9ctf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Many South African students prefer universities and neglect technical colleges.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Kim Ludbrook</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Improved education is widely regarded as one of the key dimensions needed to address South Africa’s pervasive legacy of poverty, inequality and youth unemployment. Improving access to higher education and to technical colleges in particular has a special place in this debate.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.chet.org.za/books/responding-educational-needs-post-school-youth;https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/5k4c0vvbvv0q-en.pdf?expires=1531994593&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=57C1F93BAD9C1A55F149D01B24BE8F05;http://www.lmip.org.za/sites/default/files/documentfiles/HSRC%20LMIP%20Report%2023%20WEB.pdf">research</a> is clear on this. The completion of any post-schooling education substantially improves labour market prospects. Therefore increasing access is critical.</p>
<p>But much of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/africa/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=fees+must+fall">debate</a> has focused on the high costs of tertiary education and the need for fees to fall at universities. A bigger challenge is increasing the overall number of students enrolled in the technical college system known in South Africa as Technical and Vocational Education and Training.</p>
<p>Technical colleges are intended to provide vocational or mid-level skills education to school leavers with a minimum schooling level of Grade 9. They offer an important alternative to university for improving education and skills development. </p>
<p>The South African government realises the importance of these colleges and has announced a goal of having <a href="http://www.dhet.gov.za/Planning%20Monitoring%20and%20Evaluation%20Coordination/Investment%20Trends%20on%20Post-School%20Education%20and%20Training%20in%20South%20Africa%20-%202018.pdf">2.5 million</a> students enrolled in them. This is a tall order. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.dhet.gov.za/DHET%20Statistics%20Publication/Statistics%20on%20Post-School%20Education%20and%20Training%20in%20South%20Africa%202016.pdf">Latest statistics</a> show that public and private colleges together had about 780 000 students, compared to about 970 000 in public universities. That’s despite admission requirements being lower for college applicants. This indicates that technical colleges are not a first choice institution for post-secondary schooling.</p>
<p>Policymakers are therefore faced with a challenge. But how should they fix it?</p>
<p>Some answers can be found from data collected in a long-term research project – the <a href="http://www.nids.uct.ac.za">National Income Dynamics Study</a> – that assessed the changing life circumstances of 28,000 individual South Africans. It provides interesting insights. </p>
<p>The information shows that young people from poor families are the ones who aren’t signing up for any kind of tertiary education. This is a critical cohort of people in the country. But to make it possible for them to attend technical colleges – and for government to increase technical college enrolments fourfold – a number of things will have to change. </p>
<p>This includes tackling the preference for university and the limited enrolment of young people who don’t complete Grade 12 in college. Only 60% of children entering South African schools go on to write the Grade 12 exam and only a third enrol in post-secondary schooling. </p>
<p>Fixing all the problems will take a lot. To broaden access, attention needs to focus on the group that’s not currently participating in any form of post-secondary education. </p>
<h2>Why young people drop out</h2>
<p>One of the key aims of the study was to determine the factors influencing when, why and how South Africans move in and out of income poverty. The study has data on the circumstances of young people at the point when they are in matric (Grade 12 - the final year of school). Therefore it presents a unique opportunity to examine post-schooling enrolment across the entire system.</p>
<p>The data is illuminating. While there are a number of factors that combine to hinder further access to education after leaving school, three rise above others: academic merit (as measured by numeracy scores); household income; and level of parental education.</p>
<p>It shows that academically able young people from high income and low income households are more likely to enrol at university. High income households because they can afford university fees. Low income students because educational grants and scholarships come to their rescue. </p>
<p>Academically eligible youth from middle-income households, tend rather to enrol in technical colleges even though their scores suggest they may qualify to study at university. It is likely that this is due to short-term funding constraints.</p>
<p>The data also shows that while technical college students are more socio-economically similar to those not enrolled in any post-secondary schooling, they tend to have noticeably higher scores on their numeracy tests, marginally higher household incomes during Grade 12, and mothers who are more educated.</p>
<p>Young people with lower scholastic ability in low- and middle-income houses therefore appear to be the most at risk for not progressing to post-schooling training. This finding should make them a prime target for policy intervention.</p>
<h2>Funding reform, and more</h2>
<p>These insights have a valuable contribution to make to the current debate around free university education and what a new funding model for higher education should look like if post-secondary schooling numbers are going to improve.</p>
<p>Based on the insights from the data, it’s clear that funding should be directed at a number of key groups. The first is middle-income students with scholastic ability who qualify to study at university but who end up at technical colleges due to financial constraints. </p>
<p>But to maximise impact, funding must also be used to increase enrolments and broaden the base of students, particularly those with lower levels of scholastic ability, in post-secondary schooling. Enabling young people who would not otherwise have studied, the opportunity to gain a skill and hence a foothold in the labour market, must be a priority.</p>
<p>Challenges over and above funding also need to be addressed if the target for expanded access to technical colleges is to be met.</p>
<p>The problems afflicting technical colleges must be addressed. They are often perceived as second-rate institutions compared to universities. This may reflect institutional challenges – including poor management – as well as a disconnect between course content and the skills needed in the labour market. Understanding these underlying reasons and taking steps to ensure that they become institutions of choice will be necessary to broaden access.</p>
<p><em>This article is based on <a href="http://www.nids.uct.ac.za/images/papers/2016_09_NIDSW4.pdf">work</a> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2bI6UzP1Lo&t=6s">and a study</a> that forms part of the Siyaphambili Project, a hub for post-schooling information and research in South Africa</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/100180/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicola Branson receives funding from the Kresge Foundation. The study on which the article is based was conducted as part of the Labour Market Intelligence Partnership, research consortium headed by the Human Sciences Research Council (South Africa) and funded by the Department of Higher Education and Training (South Africa).
</span></em></p>South Africa needs to improve efforts to increase student numbers at technical colleges.Nicola Branson, Senior Research Fellow, SALDRU, School of Economics, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/904742018-01-24T13:53:46Z2018-01-24T13:53:46ZFree higher education in South Africa: cutting through the lies and statistics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202804/original/file-20180122-46251-1j5aock.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The fight for free university education in South Africa is entering its fourth year.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Public discussion about higher education funding in South Africa has been beset by numerous fictions and misunderstandings since the Fees Must Fall movement emerged in 2015. These have been compounded by the political opportunism of President Jacob Zuma and his advisors. </p>
<p>In mid-December 2017, with <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/national/education/2017-12-16-breaking-news-zuma-blindsided-treasury-in-free-higher-education-decision/">relatively little consultation</a> or planning, Zuma <a href="http://www.presidency.gov.za/press-statements/president%E2%80%99s-response-heher-commission-inquiry-higher-education-and-training">announced</a> that in 2018 free higher education would be provided to all new first year students from families that earn less than R350,000 per year. </p>
<p>Having participated in the <a href="http://www.che.ac.za/sites/default/files/publications/CHE_South%20African%20higher%20education%20reviewed%20-%20electronic_0.pdf">20-year review of South African higher education</a> in 2013, advised parliamentarians on different funding proposals in 2015, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/options-on-the-table-as-south-africa-wrestles-with-funding-higher-education-87688">engaged</a> with a report by the commission Zuma set up to examine fee structures, it’s become apparent to me that it is critical to debunk a number of prevalent myths around higher education funding.</p>
<p>The current public “debates” contain many myths or misconceptions about what free tertiary education would mean, ranging from the implications of free higher education proposals for poverty and inequality to the feasibility of funding such proposals. Unless these myths are unmasked the free higher education debate will remain misguided and likely lead to very different, negative outcomes.</p>
<p>In many respects, Zuma’s free higher education proposal is the worst kind of populism. It’s been sold as a radically progressive policy that can be achieved with no negative consequences. But it will actually do very little for the neediest South Africans. And it could have negative consequences for the stability and progressiveness of public expenditure. </p>
<h2>Busting myths</h2>
<p><strong>Myth 1: Spending on higher education is about helping the poor</strong></p>
<p>When the Fees Must Fall movement emerged, it insisted its fundamental demands were based on concern for poor South Africans. The movement argued that this group was effectively excluded from higher education or disadvantaged in their studies because they could not afford the fees and other costs of studying. </p>
<p>The idea that the movement for free higher education is based on a concern for poor youth is clearly absurd when you consider that <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-feesmustfall-protests-some-inconvenient-truths-67516">only 5%</a> of South Africans aged between 15 and 34 are students in universities, while 34% are unemployed. </p>
<p>A recent, comprehensive evaluation by South African and international academic economists for the World Bank, examined the effect of government spending and taxation on inequality. Using data on who pays taxes and who benefits from different kinds of public spending, it <a href="http://www.econ3x3.org/article/how-much-inequality-reduced-progressive-taxation-and-government-spending">found</a> that higher education was the least progressive of all social expenditure. It did the least to reduce inequality, since higher education benefits only a very small proportion of the population and those who do benefit tend to come from wealthier households than the vast majority of South Africans. </p>
<p><strong>Myth 2: There are no consequences for increasing taxes or increasing borrowing</strong></p>
<p>Even if higher education is not the most progressive way to use public money, some supporters of free higher education have argued that it could be more progressive than existing studies suggest – provided the money is raised from wealthier South Africans. </p>
<p>Strictly speaking, this is true. The problem is that supporters of Fees Must Fall have written about possible ways of raising revenue as if the money is effectively free. Proposals such as “double the <a href="http://www.sars.gov.za/TaxTypes/SDL/Pages/default.aspx">skills levy</a> on companies” or “increase income taxes” are empty; they fail to address the negative consequences of tax increases. </p>
<p>A higher skills levy, paid by firms to fund national training initiatives, means lower profits for firms and potentially less investment. Higher income taxes could lead to greater tax avoidance measures, shifts in how employers remunerate employees, or a reduction in people’s working hours. All these could lead to revenue decreasing. Such dynamics need to at least be taken into account when tabling such proposals. But this has not happened. </p>
<p>The result could be a reliance on taxes, <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/economy/2017-11-13-news-analysis-vat-hike-essential-to-plug-hole-in-revenue/">like VAT</a>, that are harder to avoid because they are paid by the vast majority of South Africans. There’s a perverse consequence to all this: “free higher education” could actually increase inequality.</p>
<p>This myth-making has recently been compounded by Zuma’s proposal and its advocacy by one of his advisors, Morris Masutha. </p>
<p><strong>Myth 3: Free higher education will reduce youth unemployment and save on future social spending</strong></p>
<p>Masutha claims that free higher education <a href="https://www.enca.com/south-africa/watch-free-higher-education-funds-itself-says-zuma-education-advisor">will “fund itself”</a>, primarily by reducing future social security spending on social grants and government-built houses. He insists that abolishing fees will lead to higher economic growth. </p>
<p>Given the <a href="http://resep.sun.ac.za/index.php/lmip-conference-presents-new-view-on-challenges-of-tertiary-education-in-sa/">tiny proportion</a> of poor youth who can access higher education through their basic education results, the claim about social expenditure is clearly false. </p>
<p>There is a positive relationship between higher education and economic growth. But the current proposal could only “pay for itself” if it produced dramatically more graduates and so increased their economic contribution. There is no reason to believe an effect of that scale is likely and no modelling has been provided to support such claims. </p>
<p><strong>Myth 4: Zuma’s December 2017 proposal is the best way to help poor and needy students</strong></p>
<p>Zuma’s proposal contains two extremely dishonest components: the definition of “poor and working class” students and the limiting of the policy in 2018 to new first year students.</p>
<p>It effectively proposes that in 2018 a first year student from a family earning R340,000 per year will get full government support. But a second year student from a family earning R130,000 will get no support. And a student from the R340,000/year family will get the same support as a student from a R20,000/year family. </p>
<p>This clearly doesn’t prioritise poor students. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://pmg.org.za/committee-meeting/21700/">rough costing</a> by the Department of Higher Education and Training in 2015 suggested that the threshold could be raised to R217,000 per year for all students. This would benefit more needy students and, at an estimated cost of R12.5billion, been far more feasible than what Zuma has proposed.</p>
<p><strong>Myth 5: Zuma’s proposal is feasible because it “only” costs R12billion - R15billion</strong></p>
<p>Current estimates put the cost of Zuma’s proposal in 2018 at between R12 billion and R15 billion. Some commentators have suggested this cost will remain static in future. That is almost certainly false. </p>
<p>It would only be true if such funding was either not extended to students entering universities in 2019 or was taken away from the 2018 cohort. Neither scenario makes any sense. Instead, funding is likely to be extended to second years in 2019 and third years in 2020. That will likely lead to an annual cost of <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/no-comment-sachs-says-over-masuthas-fee-free-lying-claim-20180104">R40billion</a> or more. </p>
<p>An increase of R12 to R15 billion <a href="https://www.fin24.com/Economy/fee-free-university-education-regressive-davis-tax-committee-report-20171113">may be affordable</a>. But a R40billion increase is an entirely different proposition.</p>
<h2>Critical decisions</h2>
<p>Thousands of new students are being registered at universities right now. The 2018 Budget is set to be tabled next month with public finances under extreme pressure. Given this reality, it’s critical that all the myths surrounding “free” higher education are laid to rest.</p>
<p>Only then can difficult decisions be taken in the best interests of all South Africans.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/90474/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Seán Mfundza Muller currently provides advice to civil society groups on public finance issues and is involved in a European Union-funded collaboration to increase, and improve, civil society engagement with legislatures.</span></em></p>In many respects, President Jacob Zuma’s free higher education proposal in South Africa is the worst kind of populism.Seán Mfundza Muller, Senior Lecturer in Economics and Research Associate at the Public and Environmental Economics Research Centre (PEERC), University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/883452017-12-04T13:24:40Z2017-12-04T13:24:40ZHistory explains why South Africans on the left argue for free passes for the rich<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/197288/original/file-20171201-10169-1t1v68h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Students from Wits University, in Johannesburg, during a protest for free education.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Kim Ludbrook</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In a society like South Africa in which one racial group has dominated another, poor people are ignored in economic debates by those who claim to speak for them. </p>
<p>Take the calls for <a href="https://www.fin24.com/Economy/treasury-rocked-as-budget-chief-quits-20171113">free higher education</a> which featured prominently in student protests over the past two to three years. They are back in the limelight because President Jacob Zuma’s desire to spend billions on providing free tertiary education has prompted a public controversy in which he was accused of wanting to bankrupt the Treasury for political gain. Although it later became clear that Zuma only wanted to pay for students whose household incomes were below <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-11-11-how-treasury-blocked-zumas-free-education-plan/">R350 000 a year</a>, the reports revived interest in the free education demand.</p>
<p>Outsiders might find something curious about the higher education fees debate in South Africa. The demand that no-one should pay is an article of faith among people who occupy the left in the country. The view that the well-off should continue to pay so that the poor are funded is seen as a sign of conservatism. Elsewhere in the world, it is the left which wants the rich to pay for services to the poor. </p>
<p>This is no isolated case in South Africa. Another example is <a href="https://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/gauteng/gauteng-drivers-dont-give-two-hoots-for-e-tolls-9709924">electronic tolling</a> (e tolls) in the country’s economic heartland, Gauteng. Vehicle owners, including companies, pay the toll. People who use busses and minibus taxis, the vehicles of the poor, don’t. Anyone suggesting that it’s fair to expect people who own trucks and busses to pay for roads on which poor people can ride for free is likely to be dismissed as a right-wing zealot.</p>
<p>How did the interests of wealthy students and their families, or the owners of vehicles, become those of the left and <a href="https://citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/80525/tollsk/">social justice campaigners</a>? Around the world, the views of well-off groups are often presented as those of everyone. The South African oddity is that those who in other societies would be arguing against free passes for the affluent, argue for them.</p>
<p>To see why, we must look at the history of the campaign against minority rule, which I discussed in a <a href="http://ukznpress.bookslive.co.za/blog/2015/01/26/excerpt-race-class-and-power-harold-wolpe-and-the-radical-critique-of-apartheid-by-steven-friedman/">book</a> on radical thought.</p>
<h2>Economic inequality versus race</h2>
<p>The first campaigners for economic change in South Africa were socialists and trade unionists who immigrated from Britain. They took the standard left view of the time – racial divisions were created by bosses and other fat cats who hoped to hang onto their privilege by dividing the workers. Because both black and white workers were exploited, they argued, they could and should unite against their common enemy, economic exploitation.</p>
<p>Within a few years, the view that economic inequality mattered more than race was killed by <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/account-events-rand-rebellion-1922">striking white miners</a> who, in 1922, added to a banner reading “Workers of the World Unite” the words and fight for a white South Africa’. </p>
<p>Competition for jobs from black workers was one reason the miners gave for the strike. For the next seven decades, white workers made it clear that the privileges which their whiteness offered were more important to them than their supposed common interest with black workers.</p>
<p>The view that race was more important than economic inequality was shared by those who fought against apartheid. Although left-wing activists, particularly in the South African Communist Party, were active in the African National Congress, they gave up early on the idea that race could take a back seat to the fight for economic change.</p>
<h2>Racial equality versus private ownership</h2>
<p>In the late 1920s, the <a href="http://domza.blogspot.co.za/2009/09/origin-of-national-democratic.html">Communist International</a>, to which the communist party belonged, adopted the theory of “national democratic revolution”. It committed communists to fight against colonialism and racial domination in colonised countries – the battle against capitalism could wait. </p>
<p>In South Africa, this “revolution” which even today is seen by some on the right as a call to destroy the market economy, was always about fighting for racial equality, not abolishing private ownership. Those who complain that the ANC has not delivered on this “revolution” are saying it has not done enough to end <a href="https://www.enca.com/south-africa/anc-policies-serve-white-monopoly-capital-jimmy-manyi">white control</a> of the economy, not control by private owners.</p>
<p>While the ANC often used left rhetoric, <a href="http://www.armsdeal-vpo.co.za/special_items/profiles/mbeki_chief.html">black intellectuals and activists</a>, including those in the South African Communist Party, reminded white colleagues who wanted to emphasise economic inequalities that racial inequality was more important.</p>
<p>This view was shared by <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/pan-africanist-congress-pac">movements to the ANC’s left</a>. Instead of denouncing it for fixating on race rather than economic divisions, they argued that apartheid was a form of “racial capitalism” in which racial and economic exploitation was so intertwined that one could not survive without the other. While this meant that they could fight against racism while claiming they were fighting for socialism, it made race the central issue. </p>
<h2>The enemy was white minority rule</h2>
<p>The South African left may have read different books and chanted different slogans, but it endorsed the mainstream view that the key issue was racial inequality. Left-wingers earned their credentials by fighting harder against racial minority rule, not by fighting for economic equality – and they found no shortage of left-wing theories and slogans to justify this.</p>
<p>This history has shaped thinking, ensuring that there has never been a strong lobby, or an influential body of opinion, stressing the interests of the poor. If the problem is racial domination, it follows that economic differences within racial groups matter less, if at all. And so, it seems natural to demand changes which would benefit the rich by lumping them with the poor.</p>
<p>Since this prompts people to endorse policies which are biased against the poor, this analysis might seem to be a warning against racial thinking on the economy. It is not. The reason why race has always mattered more than economic inequality is that it is more important: black scholars and activists who emphasise race do so because this squares with their experience not only under apartheid, but now.</p>
<p>The point is illustrated, again, by the student protests demanding free higher education. A careful look shows that they are essentially about race – the protesters are rebelling against what they see as a failure of higher education institutions to take them seriously.</p>
<p>Two decades ago, the left-wing scholar <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/harold-wolpe">Harold Wolpe</a>– who started his academic career trying to convince the ANC and South African Communist Party that apartheid was simply a product of capitalism but who changed his position when he recognised how important race is in South Africa – wrote a <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03050069529155?needAccess=true">paper</a> on higher education change. He argued that historically white universities were expecting black students to change to fit into their culture rather than changing to meet the needs of new students as the racial make-up of their student bodies changed. It’s this failure to accommodate black student needs which prompted the student slogan “Fees Must Fall”. </p>
<p>The history described here shows why it seems almost automatic to present this demand for racial change in an economic slogan which would again send the poor to the end of the line.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88345/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Friedman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The South African oddity is that those who in other societies would be arguing against free passes for the affluent, argue for them.Steven Friedman, Professor of Political Studies, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/873952017-11-14T12:26:23Z2017-11-14T12:26:23ZWhat the hijacking of South Africa’s Treasury means for the economy<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194547/original/file-20171114-27625-1plraev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There are claims President Jacob Zuma may push through irresponsible proposals relating to higher education funding.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>South Africa has been rocked by <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2017-11-13-top-treasury-official-quits-in-row-over-free-tertiary-education/">news</a> that President Jacob Zuma has bulldozed the country’s National Treasury to adopt a fee free higher education proposal without following standard process and scrutiny. This is reportedly what’s behind the resignation of the Treasury’s respected head of budgeting, <a href="http://ewn.co.za/2017/11/13/treasury-confirms-michael-sachs-resignation">Michael Sachs</a>. The Conversation Africa’s Sibonelo Radebe asked Seán Muller to weigh up the implications.</em></p>
<p><strong>How significant is the resignation?</strong></p>
<p>Reports indicate that the resignation came as a result of interference in the budgeting process. There appears to have been an attempt to push through irresponsible proposals relating to higher education funding. From a technocratic perspective this is a serious a blow to the Treasury’s credibility.</p>
<p>What’s unfolding can be seen as a continuation of the “state capture” inspired attack on National Treasury that began in 2015 with the firing of the then finance minister <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-south-africa-should-gird-itself-for-tumultuous-times-52161">Nhlanhla Nene</a>. The attack was temporarily halted and Zuma had to reverse the appointment of trusted ally Des van Rooyen.</p>
<p>The president relented by bringing back trusted finance minister <a href="https://mg.co.za/article/2017-03-30-report-president-jacob-zuma-has-fired-finance-minister-pravin-gordhan">Pravin Gordhan</a>. But then he fired Gordhan early this year and replaced him with another ally <a href="https://www.ujuh.co.za/south-africas-new-finance-minister-tries-to-assure-the-markets/">Malusi Gigaba</a>. This was followed by the departure of the department’s director general <a href="https://www.businesslive.co.za/bd/national/2017-04-05-lungisa-fuzile-quits-will-more-senior-treasury-officials-follow/">Lungisa Fuzile</a>.</p>
<p>The head of the budget office is arguably one of the most important positions within the Treasury. The incumbent, Sachs, played a pivotal role in protecting the country’s public finances while also increasing transparency and engagement with civil society. </p>
<p>He is the son of former constitutional court judge and anti-apartheid activist Albie Sachs, and a former member of the ANC’s Economic Transformation Committee. He had unparalleled insight into both the bureaucratic and political sides of the budget process. His resignation indicates the extent to which political dysfunction has compromised responsible management of public finances.</p>
<p><strong>How does the proposal for increasing higher education funding compromise the budget process?</strong></p>
<p>One of the major achievements of post-1994 governments was to embed a thorough, bureaucratic and political process of developing the annual national budget and the medium-term budget. Within this process, any major changes to budget priorities are signalled in the medium-term budget. They are then gradually integrated into successive national budgets. </p>
<p>Any intention to dramatically change the structure of the budget – for instance, by cutting social grants in order to pay university fees – should have been contained in the medium-term budget.</p>
<p>In the current case, the <a href="https://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/sa-doesnt-have-money-for-free-higher-education-heher-commission-20171113">Heher Commission</a>, under retired Judge Jonathan Heher was established to investigate higher education funding. It <a href="http://www.presidency.gov.za/press-statements/release-report-commission-inquiry-feasibility-making-high-education-and-training">handed its report to the president on the 30th of August</a>, before the presentation of the 2017 medium-term budget policy statement. Its findings should have been released earlier and any decision reflected in the medium-term budget. That would have provided a basis for Parliament to facilitate democratic oversight of the proposals and alerted citizens and stakeholders to government’s intention.</p>
<p>What’s more worrying are reports that the president has ignored the Heher Commision’s recommendations. Given the extensive consultation by this commission, it would arguably be irrational and irresponsible to ignore its findings and implement an ill-conceived, “populist” removal of university fees. </p>
<p>Regardless of the merits of such proposals, to try and ram them through in the period between the medium term budget, in October, and the national budget in February is reckless. It will undermine the credibility of South Africa’s public finance management and carries negative implications for investment, credit ratings and economic growth.</p>
<p><strong>What is your view on the call for free university education?</strong></p>
<p>We should start with the widely accepted principle that no student who is suitably qualified for university education should be prevented from pursuing it. Given this principle we then need to ask the following questions:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>How many students does the basic education system adequately prepare for higher education?</p></li>
<li><p>How many of those need financial support and to what extent?</p></li>
<li><p>What are the total cost implications of providing all such students with the necessary support, whether in grants or loans? </p></li>
<li><p>Can the country afford to do this for all such students immediately?</p></li>
<li><p>Even if we can afford it, is it the most equitable use of such funds?</p></li>
</ul>
<p>I have <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-feesmustfall-protests-some-inconvenient-truths-67516">argued previously</a> that too many students are being admitted into the higher education system. Many are ill-prepared given the poor quality in the schooling system.</p>
<p>Evidence on the household incomes of students in higher education indicates that – relatively – they are much <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-feesmustfall-protests-some-inconvenient-truths-67516">better off than the majority of South African youth</a>. Youth outside the further education system get little, if any, direct support from government. And so a large increase in funding for university students is not the best way to assist poor youth.</p>
<p><strong>What are the implications beyond education?</strong></p>
<p>There are two major implications.</p>
<p>Firstly, it increases the chances of a downgrade of the country’s debt that’s held in local currency. Even before these recent events I <a href="https://theconversation.com/latest-budget-underscores-desperate-state-of-south-africas-finances-86362">argued</a> this was almost inevitable. My view then was mainly informed by the revenue shortfalls indicated in the medium term budget, poor economic growth forecasts and the government abandoning its policy of fiscal consolidation (stabilising government debt).</p>
<p>The resignation of the head of the Treasury’s budget office makes the situation even more dire. The interference that induced it constitutes an unprecedented subversion of the country’s national budget process and National Treasury’s mandate to ensure stability and sustainability of public finances. </p>
<p>Secondly, the way in which the president intends to unilaterally ram through his favoured approach to higher education funding signals that a similar approach could be taken with a decision to pursue nuclear power. At the time of the medium-term budget, Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba <a href="https://www.fin24.com/Budget/gigaba-sa-cant-afford-nuclear-yet-20171025">indicated</a> that government cannot afford nuclear. But <a href="https://theconversation.com/zumas-allies-are-once-again-gung-ho-about-nuclear-will-they-get-their-way-87022">shortly afterwards</a> the new minister of energy, David Mahlobo, and Zuma both suggested that they are preparing to push it through. If that happened, it would further compromise South Africa’s public finances and economic growth.</p>
<p>There was some hope that a <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/business/2017-09-14-ramaphosa-leads-anc-leadership-race-analysts/">victory</a> in December for the anti-state capture grouping in the governing African National Congress’s elective conference might be able to stabilise governance and public finances. But it now appears that a great deal more damage could still be done by the president before then.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87395/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Seán Mfundza Muller has received support from the Heinrich Boell Foundation to participate in parliamentary oversight processes relating to the 2017 medium-term budget policy statement, and is actively involved in providing technical support and advice to a number of civil society organisations on a range of public finance matters.</span></em></p>The imposition of the fee free higher education proposal on South Africa’s National Treasury without due consideration represents an escalation of the state capture led by President Jacob Zuma.Seán Mfundza Muller, Senior Lecturer in Economics, University of JohannesburgLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/863672017-10-26T17:46:48Z2017-10-26T17:46:48ZSouth Africa’s finance minister fails to come up with the goods<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192112/original/file-20171026-13378-1284fyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Stringer</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Given the gloomy political and economic environment in South Africa a great deal was expected from Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba’s first <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.za/documents/MTBPS/2017/">budgetary statement</a>. The Conversation’s Sibonelo Radebe asked Owen Skae to rate the medium term budget statement</em></p>
<p><strong>What are your general impressions of the speech?</strong></p>
<p>The minister’s opening remarks were encouraging but in the final analysis, nothing profound came out of his speech. </p>
<p>The reference to a famous line Ben Okri’s poem was inspiring: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>You can’t remake the world without remaking yourself. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>By quoting the line the minister gave the impression that he and his team have been through a thorough introspection which is sorely needed given the <a href="https://theconversation.com/britains-labour-party-and-south-africas-anc-why-the-stark-contrast-of-fortunes-85000">state and direction</a> of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) and the country. Corruption is steadily and surely eating away the future of South Africa.</p>
<p>Some say the minister did do some <a href="https://theconversation.com/gigaba-lays-bare-south-africas-economic-woes-will-it-be-enough-to-trigger-change-86374">introspection</a>. But his speech was vague and lacked the critical elements of taking responsibility and offering solutions. He offered little detail about how the country will get on the path to the kind of sustainable economic growth it so sorely needs.</p>
<p><strong>What are the biggest challenges facing the country coming out of the speech?</strong></p>
<p>South Africa’s problems are well known. Economic exclusion and unemployment tops the list. They can only be solved by significantly growing the economy. But I couldn’t find any detail about how the country is going to address these critical areas.</p>
<p>Growth prospects remain gloomy as captured in the minister’s own words. He revised 2017 economic growth downwards from 1.3% to 0.7%. And his projection shows growth remaining below the 2% mark over the next three years. This is far below the required growth of about 6% for the country to push back poverty and unemployment.</p>
<p>Poor economic performance is obviously symptomatic of deeper issues. But he didn’t tackle them. For example, there was a lack of urgency to deal with allegations of state capture, which has involved attempts by powerful individuals and groups to shape South Africa’s political and economic landscape through corrupt relationships and deals to benefit their own private interests. He also resurfaced the nuclear power deal. This will just make the rating agencies nervous.</p>
<p>His rhetoric around state owned enterprises is not convincing. We’ve heard it before. I’m afraid the old mantra ‘seeing is believing’ will guide many when it comes to his promise of fixing these troubled enterprises.</p>
<p>The minister did speak of a Youth Employment Service and a R1.5 billion small to medium enterprise development fund. But frankly speaking this doesn’t even begin to touch sides of what needs to be done. </p>
<p>He also faces the dual problem of declining revenue and increasing expenditure. This medium term budget projected a R50.8 billion tax revenue shortfall for the 2017/18 period which was described as “the largest downward revision since the 2009 recession”.</p>
<p>And he’s already dipped into the contingency reserves to recapitalise troubled state owned enterprises, South African Airways and the South African Post Office. And he faces an ever increasing demands for social expenditure.</p>
<p>So, there is talk of the disposal of assets. But why partially sell the crown jewels of Telkom and leave the problematic entities like power utility Eskom and South African Airways to further burden the taxpayer. That just fuels the view of cynics who believe government isn’t really committed to making the tough decisions the minister alluded to.</p>
<p><strong>What do you think of the handling of educational funding matters?</strong> </p>
<p>I was half expecting the minister to announce something significant around the funding of education given the developments of the past few years. But he said almost nothing that will change the destructive course that the country’s education system finds itself in.</p>
<p>There was the routine statement about how allocation to the education sector is “the fastest growing element of expenditure over the medium term”. The allocation moves from R77 billion this year to R97 billion for the 2020/21 financial year. This increase looks significant but it doesn’t even begin to address the problems at hand – in particular the funding of higher education against a mass of students who can’t afford to pay their fees. </p>
<p>The problem has escalated because of a <a href="https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2017-10-24-two-years-and-counting-university-fees-frustration-mounts/">lack of leadership</a> with government pussy footing around the issue. One can only conclude that government has no way of handling this hot political potato and has resorted to the poor tactic of kicking the can down the road.</p>
<p>All the minister said was that further announcements would be made in the 2018 Budget.</p>
<p>But this is no comfort for higher education institutions. They now have to approach next year with no idea about how they’re going to address the growing gaps in their financial forecasts. </p>
<p>In my view this should be South Africa’s greatest priority, especially as the student voices are being raised about this. I’m not getting the sense that government appreciates the gravity of the situation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86367/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Owen Skae does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>South Africa’s finance minister Malusi Gigaba failed to impress when presenting the eagerly awaited 2017 medium term budget.Owen Skae, Associate Professor and Director of Rhodes Business School, Rhodes UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/632332016-08-04T19:39:23Z2016-08-04T19:39:23ZHigher education in South Africa hangs in the balance. Here are four scenarios<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132503/original/image-20160729-25624-9ce37i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Higher education in South Africa is at another crossroads. Students have put pressure on the state to offer “fee-free” education to all following their success last year in securing <a href="http://www.timeslive.co.za/politics/2015/10/23/Zuma-announces-a-0-increase-in-tertiary-education-fees-for-2016">a zero increase in fees for 2015</a>. But the battle over what fee structure is appropriate for the country is far from over.</p>
<p>In the wake of protests, and government’s concession on increases for this year, a presidential fees <a href="http://www.justice.gov.za/commissions/FeesHET/docs.html">commission of inquiry</a> was set up. It is due to release its report by the end of the year. In the meantime universities are braced for student action when government announces its plans for fees in 2016. </p>
<p>All this is happening against the backdrop of an economy that is expected to grow by <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africa-can-expect-zero-growth-its-problems-are-largely-homemade-62943">zero percent this year</a>. This means that the government is unlikely to provide substantial additional funding for higher education. This will exacerbate <a href="http://www.rdm.co.za/politics/2016/07/25/plan-to-tax-university-graduates-to-pay-for-higher-education">the financial distress</a> already being felt by institutions.
So what choices does the country have? I have prepared some scenarios that set out possibilities. </p>
<p>But first, some context.</p>
<h2>The challenge</h2>
<p>In South Africa the number of enrolments has nearly doubled from approximately half a million in 1994 to close to a million by 2014 – an increase in participation rate <a href="http://www.che.ac.za/sites/default/files/publications/Vital%20Stats%202013_web_0.pdf">from 12% to 20% in 2013</a>. This means that historically underrepresented groups now make up the <a href="http://www.che.ac.za/sites/default/files/publications/Vital%20Stats%202013_web_0.pdf">overall majority (83%)</a>. It’s good news: we have made progress towards equity of access. </p>
<p>But these gains have not translated into equity of outcomes in terms of students completing their qualifications. Roughly a third of those enrolled will have dropped out in their first or second year, and <a href="http://www.che.ac.za/sites/default/files/publications/Full_Report.pdf">between 40% and 50% will not graduate at all</a>. </p>
<p>The inequalities are starkly evident when we compare the drop-out rates for the 2008 bachelors’ <a href="http://www.dhet.gov.za/HEMIS/2000%20TO%202008%20FIRST%20TIME%20ENTERING%20UNDERGRADUATE%20COHORT%20STUDIES%20FOR%20PUBLIC%20HIGHER%20EDUCATION%20INSTITUTIONS.pdf">cohort by race</a> (using the apartheid classifications, which are still used to monitor redress): black African students (34%), coloured students (37%), Indian students (29%) and white students (21%).</p>
<p>In response to the crisis, the state is committing close to R1 billion (about US$71 million) per annum from 2017 to 2020 as “ear-marked” funding to support greater efficiency of teaching and learning. The purpose of these funds is to address the imperatives of equity and quality. </p>
<h2>Possible scenarios</h2>
<p>Scenarios are stories about how the <a href="http://monitorinstitute.com/downloads/what-we-think/what-if/What_If.pdf">future might unfold</a>. They are theoretical reductions of complex variables that are intended to provoke discussion and debate about strategic choices. The scenario thinking process selects some of the trade-offs or strategic choices that then constitute possible futures.</p>
<p>There are currently a number of strategic resource choices that the sector faces. The one is the extent to which the state increases financial aid to students. The other is the extent to which the state invests in improving the effectiveness of teaching and learning.</p>
<p>If we put these two into a matrix, we end up with four possible future scenarios. These are: </p>
<ul>
<li><p>an ideal future in which government increases financial aid to students and investment in teaching and learning effectiveness;</p></li>
<li><p>an elite future in which government decreases financial aid, but increases investment in teaching and learning;</p></li>
<li><p>a wasted future in which government freezes or cuts back on financial aid and invests little in teaching and learning; and </p></li>
<li><p>a high-waste future in which government increases financial aid but decreases investment in education.</p></li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132373/original/image-20160728-12116-1b1076v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132373/original/image-20160728-12116-1b1076v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132373/original/image-20160728-12116-1b1076v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132373/original/image-20160728-12116-1b1076v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132373/original/image-20160728-12116-1b1076v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=597&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132373/original/image-20160728-12116-1b1076v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=597&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132373/original/image-20160728-12116-1b1076v.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=597&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Future scenarios for education in South Africa.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>All scenarios involve assumptions. For this exercise it is assumed that:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>the students admitted are academically capable;</p></li>
<li><p>the state’s educational investment yields improvements in the effectiveness of teaching and learning, resulting in better retention and increased graduation rates; and</p></li>
<li><p>there is no substantial additional state funding to work with, so any increases require cutting some existing budget. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>These assumptions are debatable, as are the scenarios they produce. This is the point of scenario thinking. </p>
<h2>The ideal future</h2>
<p>In this scenario, given the state’s increase in financial assistance and investment in teaching and learning, students are admitted to university irrespective of their socioeconomic status and there is a good chance they will successfully complete their degrees.</p>
<p>From the point of view of the system, because the financial and academic obstacles have been removed, there is an increase in participation rates and equity of access and outcomes.</p>
<p>This future is, in fact, South Africa’s official future, enshrined in policy since the <a href="http://www.che.ac.za/media_and_publications/legislation/education-white-paper-3-programme-transformation-higher-education">1997 White Paper</a>, which promised increasing participation rates, equity of access and equity of outcomes in an efficient system.</p>
<h2>The elite future</h2>
<p>In this scenario, students gain formal access to higher education if they can afford it. Given the chance of a reasonably good schooling background and the state’s educational investment, they are likely to complete their studies. </p>
<p>From a system point of view, the reduced state funding for financial aid would result in a low participation rate with low equity of access and outcomes for socioeconomically disadvantaged groups.</p>
<p>Over time, given the demography of South Africa and the growth of the black upper-middle class, this system would be racially diverse with a black majority. The system would be reasonably efficient, resulting in a highly elite higher education system. </p>
<h2>Waste futures</h2>
<p>The remaining scenarios are both waste futures, given that no investment is made in improving the effectiveness of teaching and learning, which means completion rates are poor. The difference in the two scenarios is the state’s provision of financial aid. </p>
<p>In the waste scenario, the state freezes or reduces its current contribution to financial assistance. This means students gain formal access to higher education if they can afford it, but their chances of succeeding will largely be determined by the quality of schooling. There is limited equity of access, no equity of outcomes and poor efficiency. </p>
<p>In the high-waste scenario the state increases financial aid.
Students in this scenario will gain formal access irrespective of their socioeconomic status, increasing the participation rate and equity of access. But given the lack of investment in improving the effectiveness of teaching and learning, there is a high probability that they will not successfully complete their studies. This makes for a highly inefficient system. </p>
<h2>Where is South Africa now?</h2>
<p>I would propose that South Africa currently sits somewhere in the waste scenario. The state’s investment over the past 20 years has produced an expanded system with greater equity of access, but it is far from achieving equity of outcomes. The result is inequitable and inefficient. </p>
<p>If there is a significant increase in financial assistance to talented but underprepared poor students, but there is not a significant educational investment to improve completion rates, South Africa’s trajectory moves towards the high-waste scenario. </p>
<p>The state’s most pressing transformation priority needs to be investing in carefully targeted and monitored educational interventions that improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning, reduce drop-out and improve graduation rates. An example would include a revised undergraduate curriculum that is more fit-for-purpose by catering for a much greater diversity of educational preparedness. </p>
<p>What we must avoid is substantially increasing financial aid at the expense of greater efficiency – otherwise more students will get financial access to higher education but their chances of walking out with a degree are not good.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63233/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Suellen Shay receives funding from NRF and from DHET.
</span></em></p>South African universities are under enormous financial pressure. They also face a fresh round of student protests ahead of a decision on next year’s fees. Hard choices need to be made.Suellen Shay, Dean and Associate Professor, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.