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This article is a response to a qualitative study that examined how the indigenous African notion of "ubuntu" informs how some school teachers in a Black township in South Africa conceptualize Western-oriented narratives of democracy. While the study acknowledges important differences in how ubuntu is understood and defined, the author argues that it nonetheless tends to overlook them in order to harness ubuntu as a force for positive social change and national development. The author argues that ubuntu could potentially serve as a powerful cultural force for change, but this requires a context in which some of the moral qualities associated with ubuntu are more widely practiced and visible in communities and in the policies and practices of government at all levels. It also requires a reconceptualization of ubuntu as an inclusive and nonessentialized notion that is responsive to the practical needs of contemporary South African society. [The article is in response to "The Cultural Contours of Democracy: Indigenous Epistemologies Informing South African Citizenship." To view this article, see EJ1120063.]

Since the transition to democracy in 1994, South African education has witnessed remarkable changes. Teacher training, like all other elements of the national education system, is part of an evolving post-apartheid educational landscape. This paper describes important forces of change that have helped to shape the education landscape in South Africa and it explores the significance of these on teacher training. The complexity of change, as a process that is frequently unpredictable and contradictory, is illuminated. The author contends that change is fraught with uncertainties and challenges, yet vibrant, dynamic and full of opportunities. For the goals of transformation to be achieved, the thrust of teacher training must be towards enhanced professional status and responsibility. Central to this is the development of critically reflexive practitioners who have the capacity and the will to act as agents of change in a period of transformation.

All over the world, individuals rely on forests for food security, nutrition, and the sustenance of their livelihoods. Forests serve as a source of personal and economic consumption, where harvested products are used directly or sold for profit. Consequently, forests play a crucial role in ensuring food security and supporting the livelihoods of people worldwide. In South Africa, natural forests and woodlands hold particular significance for the well-being of rural communities. These ecosystems provide a variety of socio-economic and ecological benefits to communities residing within or near such forested areas. The Dukuduku forest is an integral part of a sensitive ecosystem at both national and continental levels. It is intricately connected to the iSimangaliso Wetland Park, contributing to the economic development and natural diversity of South Africa. Thus, discussing one area without considering the other is impossible. This paper relies on a combination of archival sources, including newspapers, research reports, and various written and oral accounts gathered from interviews with land claimants, community leaders, traditional leaders, local farmers, and residents of the area. The central argument posited is that the primary source of conflict in the Dukuduku forest arises from the state's efforts to displace forest residents whose livelihoods have historically depended on the forest. The paper aims to illustrate that the racialization of the destruction of this indigenous forest has not served the interests of either the state or environmentalists. Forest residents have employed diverse strategies to resist evictions, resulting in the substantial destruction of the forest and at least sixty percent of the flood plain along the uMfolozi River. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Tri-National Seminar on Higher Education and Diversity confronted questions of educational equity in three democracies (United States, India, and South Africa). Common issues debated in each country led to comparative approaches and possibilities for collaboration as some of the outcomes of the seminar initiative. This paper describes the seminar and introduces a collection of papers on related topics. (SM)

This article investigates the designed transformation of South African political identity and its constitutional framework as a core aspect of the democratization of South Africa. It compares the racist and exclusive identity of the apartheid state with a redesigned identity of an inclusive and open 'Rainbow Nation', a concept coined by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and spearheaded by Nelson R. Mandela along with the African National Congress. The study considers changes in the legal framework of identity politics, from the Republic of South Africa Constitution Act of 1983 (and the previous apartheid republican Constitution of 1961) through the interim democratic Constitution of 1993 to the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa of 1996. It discusses the possible significance of the 18 amendments to the act regarding South Africans' social and political identities, and establishes a complex and detailed portrayal of the republic's legal framework of identity politics. The study combines legal, political, and cultural analysis of the role of law in formatting social and political identities, using survey results to test its impact on society. In conclusion, the paper considers the effects of post-apartheid identity transformation in South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The idea of students participating in decisions that affect them as individuals, organisations and/or communities is recent and urgent. The participation of students in decision making has gained global support, yet it does not seem to be regarded as a main vehicle for promoting democracy in educational institutions. This conceptual paper aims at demonstrating the difficulties perceived to hinder student participation in educational institutions. It further proposes strategies that may favour the increased and improved involvement of students in decision making processes. The reviewed literature on student participation informing this article highlights positive outcomes from engaging students as decision makers in education.

This article explores theorisation that identifies the locus of South Africa's scorched-earth lived experiences in the fixation on scientific dogma and conceptual binaries as well as governance utopianisms, wherein the latter are derivatives of the former. It explores South African's lived experiences over the past 28 years in order to demonstrate that politicians ' reverence for governance utopianism has failed to appreciate the unity of realities, facts, values, objectivities, subjectivities, permanences, fluxes and changes, which consist of complex intricacies that are not amenable to dogmatic "incontrovertibly true" sets of authoritative principles and catchy governance utopianisms, because humanity's imagination and creative thought are experimental in nature given the diversity of spatialities and "geography differences." From desktop-based research literature survey and theorisation, the article advances a theoretical argument that if "science is one," and f reality is unitary, then fragmentary theories and models are creatures of humanity's world of imperfections. Additionally, the article analyses statistical evidence drawn from Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) in order to demonstrate that the scorched-earth metaphor is real for South Africa's 28-year democratic governance. It finds that in South Africa's twenty-eight years of democratic experiment, lived experiences resemble scorched-earth metaphor with no silver lining in sight. philosophically, the paper concludes that f what resides on God's left is on humanity's right, then the "rightness" and/or "leftness" of people consists of intractable complexities of particularity, individuality and incommunicability that have led to fragmentary science, fixation on dogma and binaries as well as politicians' reverence for governance utopianisms, simultaneously as society's lived experiences resemble normalised scorched-earth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

South Africa is a diverse nation with a rich tapestry of indigenous languages spoken across its provinces. As the country continues its democratic journey, local government plays a pivotal role in ensuring service delivery, community engagement, and development. This article explores the potential of indigenous languages as a valuable resource for enhancing the efficiency of local government operations. Indigenous languages, often marginalised, hold a wealth of cultural, historical, and contextual knowledge that can be harnessed to improve governance, communication, and community engagement at the local level. This paper investigates the multifaceted benefits of incorporating indigenous languages into various aspects of local government activities. The paper also draws upon case studies on incorporating indigenous languages in municipalities for efficient communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Like many other countries in the world, South Africa is going through a process of transformation (with a high focus on gender transformation). After existing under an oppressive apartheid regime that rendered many people as second-class citizens for decades, most South Africans are seeking ways to move forward and make meaning of their newly found democracy. One of the ways in which meaning and balance is sought is through empowerment processes that have been put in place by the government and other non-governmental agencies. With this in the background, and borrowing from Paulo Freire's pedagogy of the oppressed and Yuval-Davis's notions of citizenship, this paper seeks to look at how empowerment is understood, put into action and possible challenges that accompany it. Drawing briefly from a research project I conducted, I shall highlight how visual methodologies such as embroideries can be used as narratives that break the silence and challenge the taken for granted. I will further highlight the importance of taking seriously the effects of history in the present, and the importance of engaging the communities with which we work in our quest for meaning-making and social justice.

How do we account for the close personal bonds and deeply caring relationships forged by educators with learners in many adult educational encounters? The literature is relatively silent on the emotional and relational basis to adult educator work. This is a serious silence, given the stressful nature of adult education in developing contexts such as South Africa and the relative vulnerability of such educators. This article addresses this gap by exploring a range of theoretical and conceptual frameworks which may help navigate the relational and affective landscape of adult educator work as care work. Here the frameworks of African perspectives on learning, feminist perspectives on learning, expanded conceptions of transformative learning and Freire's pedagogy of love are considered. The second part of the article shares some findings on adult educators' emotional and relational bonds with learners from a study of the Human Rights Democracy and Development project and discusses these practices in light of the theories discussed. A summative table of the various frameworks together with a discussion of their implications for adult education practice, research and policy forms part of this latter section.

South Africa is undergoing a rapid decline in social and political cohesion at various scales. This paper explores Cape Town's experience of socio-territorial messages and identities deployed by the City administration and the leading party, the Democratic Alliance. I focus on relational constructions of the subjectivity of the 'ratepayer' and the deserving Capetownian as constructed in the City and the DA's discourse and policy measures in juxtaposition to 'street people' and other supposedly deviant urban subjects and how, as such, the wilful ignorance of the first remains both unchallenged and in service of an exclusionary and unjust spatial order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Disparities emanating from South Africa's apartheid history still pose a number of challenges to the country, especially in education. Since the transition to democracy in 1994, the prescribed government school curriculum has undergone several revisions in an endeavour to set standards and provide instruction of a high quality. On the language education front, laws and policies have been adopted to ensure, "inter alia," the maintenance and development of the 11 official languages and the granting of parity of esteem as required by the country's constitution. Notwithstanding the fact that the objective of an equal and quality education may take considerable time to achieve, the ongoing provision of an education of an undesirable standard two decades into democracy could be seen as undermining the constitution and as a perpetuating form of injustice. This paper problematises the equalisation of educational standards against the historical background of the country and provides a critical overview of initiatives taken by education authorities to introduce a more equitable system. The conclusion reached is that policy is not translating into effective practice and that insufficient attention is being devoted to the standard of teaching and assessment of the school language subjects, placing them in a weak position for use in linguistically challenging (higher register) domains.

Education is one of the major linchpins of economic, social and political development of any nation. Recent evidence suggests that higher education can produce both public and private benefits. Thus, the role of the state in making education policy, and funding education is indeed critical, and cannot be left to be determined by market forces alone. Nevertheless, the trend of inadequate government funding for universities, loss of autonomy, infrastructural decay, falling academic standards, politicization and privatization of education, etc. appear to be a worldwide phenomenon and not just restricted to the developing world. South African higher education shows much promise with respect to knowledge production and dissemination, to contributing to social equity, economic and social development and democracy, and to the development needs of the Southern African region and the African continent. However, higher education in South Africa is under considerable stress from domestic and international trends that are redefining the nature and role of public sector post-secondary education (PSE) institutions worldwide. The paper will outline the role of PSE in the knowledge economy and the impact of the neoliberal context on the evolution of higher education in South Africa and the world. Given the significant developmental implications of investment in higher education, the authors argue that relegating this important public policy issue to the market forces is likely to promote inequality in the society, along with negative consequences for socio-political stability, economic sustainability, and knowledge generation.

The paper interrogates the misplaced belief that at the time of the framing of the South African Constitution a transition to popular democratic representation would miraculously end racism within the country. Would the first post-apartheid generation be free of the prejudices of the previous generations, or would the legacy of the old disposition be too pervasive to shake off? The author argues that the latter part of the question is more applicable since the effects of apartheid, colonialism, and imperialism are deeply entrenched in most people. He validates this argument by researching whether racism still exists in schools 20 years into democratic rule. The research, qualitative in nature, was based on interviews and questionnaires with school principals and educators in four formerly white schools. The findings indicate that racism persists, leading inductively to identifiable causes, warning signals and strategies to combat it.

This paper examines the role of democracy on poverty and intergenerational inequality in South Africa. The authors used secondary data and published literature to unpack the nexus of the problem, and to further broaden understanding of democracy, intergenerational inequality, and poverty in South Africa. The authors establish that unemployment, lack of property ownership and a poor educational system are the main contributors to poverty and intergenerational inequality in South Africa. However, we found that the government's propoor policies have not adequately addressed the problems. As recommendations, this paper submits that it is essential to increase the redistribution of assets, especially land, to allow land ownership by the poor, which will open many other economic opportunities, such as access to capital. Also, government policies need to be revisited for quality job creation, closing the unemployment gap in the market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The post-apartheid government in South Africa has provided increased opportunities for public participation at the local government level. Local party politics tend to bedevil these local participatory processes. This paper discusses ANC party politics and how they impact on public participation. It draws on a case study of five municipalities in the Cape Winelands District of the Western Cape that was conducted through semi-structured interviews and secondary data analysis. Local ANC politics has a huge impact on local government structures and their participatory processes. The ANC is a unitary structure in its policy but there is a lack of uniformity in understanding, commitment, and implementation of participatory policies at different levels of the organisation and government spheres. Some deployed public representatives work to advance themselves and their factions, at the expense of the ANC and the communities they are supposed to be leading. The findings of this study have as much significance for civil society as for the local state and its representatives. They show that it is not always the case that the state is bad and civil society is good as leaders of civil society get involved in clientelist relationships and blatant corruption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

South Africa's attainment of democracy in 1994 culminated in an educational reform anchored on an outcomes-based curriculum which was initially labelled Curriculum 2005 (C2005). The reform process and ensuing policy was rooted in labour movement debates and informed by the outcomes-based education (OBE) experiences in Australia and New Zealand. The policy was soon viewed by some as an anachronistic albatross, with built-in contradictions that would eventually lead to its demise. It lasted 12 years after surviving heated contestation from a wide academic and political spectrum. This essay review concentrates on Jonathan Jansen's critique and perspectives on OBE policy and its implementation in South Africa as articulated in his various writings between 1999 and 2009. His seminal "thesis" on why OBE would fail started a public debate that would attract other South African scholars into what would become one of the most important and captivating debates in the last decades of educational reform in developing countries. Jansen engages with issues of policy, knowledge, curriculum and pedagogy in a post-conflict society. He proposes what we can refer to as an epistemology of empathy that takes seriously the experiences of both the victims and the perpetrators of apartheid (including their descendants) and proposes a post-conflict "pedagogy of reconciliation."

This paper proposes a form of Grade R pedagogy in South African schools that addresses both the diverse realities of South Africa's children and the principles underpinning a participatory democracy. The community of enquiry pedagogy we propose is based on a socio-cultural historical theoretical perspective and focuses on the nurturing of a reasonable person (both learner and teacher) in the context of a play-based Grade R (reception year). This relational pedagogy assumes the inclusion of child's voice and the participation of child as thinker, and therefore challenges teachers to take up different roles as co-enquirers, democrats, guides and listeners.

In this article I argue for higher education practitioners to take focused action to contribute to transforming their societies into open and democratically negotiated forms of living, and why they should do so. The need is especially urgent in South Africa, whose earlier revolutionary spirit led to massive social change. The kind of social transformation I have in mind is where all people are seen as equal in all domains, including capacity to do research and generate theory; especially significant given that social evolution is linked with knowledge creation. Drawing on personal stories of experience, I make a case for universities to create innovative professional pathways that will encourage the fulfilment of intellectual potential by all practitioners, not only elites, taking as a main criterion for judging the quality of practice whether one has contributed to the wellbeing of a township, however this may be construed.

This paper interrogates the currently pervasive discourse of the "net generation" finding the concept of the "digital native" especially problematic, both empirically and conceptually. We draw on a research project of South African higher education students' access to and use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to show that age is not a determining factor in students' digital lives; rather, their familiarity and experience using ICTs is more relevant. We also demonstrate that the notion of a generation of "digital natives" is inaccurate: those with such attributes are effectively a digital elite. Instead of a new net generation growing up to replace an older analogue generation, there is a deepening digital divide in South Africa characterized not by age but by access and opportunity; indeed, digital apartheid is alive and well. We suggest that the possibility for digital democracy does exist in the form of a mobile society which is not age specific, and which is ubiquitous. Finally, we propose redefining the concepts "digital", "net", "native", and "generation" in favour of reclaiming the term "digitizen".

Throughout the centuries the ownership of wealth has been used as the measure for the determination of status in a community or society. Exactly what constituted wealth differed from one period to the next. The nature and extent of power within the narrow confines of the family and the wider political context was defined on the basis of ownership of wealth. Wealth power was transmuted into the authority to influence government and social morality. "What I have" superseded "I am a human being" and was thus decisive in the determination and adjudication of justice in human relations. This experience and concept of human relations in the sphere of politics was manifest in ancient Greece. It has persisted in different forms in the evolution of Western political philosophy and is an enduring reality of our time. Concretely, it left democracy intact only in name and replaced it with timocracy, or rule by money. This replacement is politically disturbing as it is a surreptitious negation of the principle of popular sovereignty. It is also morally disturbing because it undermines the principle of justice in human as well as in international politics. Accordingly, I explore the implications of this situation for moral education. The thesis defended in this paper is that the supersession of democracy by timocracy is ethically untenable. "Feta kgomo o tshware motho"--directly translated as "go past the cow and catch the human being" is an ethical maxim in the African philosophy of "Ubuntu" among the Bantu-speaking peoples. It is a philosophy whose practice is opposed to this supersession of democracy by timocracy. (Contains 3 notes.)

At the 2010 Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association (AERA, 30 April to 4 May), the theme of re-imagining public education arose once again with the most compelling presentation from leading scholars in the field concerned with counter-hegemonic politics and democratic change. The session entitled "Re-imaging public education: Critical politics and democracy" reminded me of the important contribution made by South Africans working in higher education in consolidating and enhancing the country's 16-year old democracy. Their efforts must especially be seen in the light of serious challenges posed by some political groups and their leaders to the democratic agenda of South Africa, which many people have worked very hard to maintain. This essay highlights some of the most salient thoughts that constitute critical and democratic education and what university academics need to focus on to help build our evolving democracy.

In this article, I shall evaluate critically the democratic citizenship education project in South Africa to ascertain whether the patriotic sentiments expressed in the "Manifesto on Values, Education and Democracy" (2001) are in conflict with the achievement of reconciliation and nation building (specifically peace and friendship) after decades of apartheid rule. My first argument is that, although it seems as if the teaching of patriotism through the Department of Education's democratic citizenship agenda in South African schools is a laudable initiative that can contribute toward establishing a definitive break with our apartheid past, the expression of blind patriotic sentiments (such as pledging allegiance to one's country and its citizens only) as articulated in the "Manifesto" can potentially marginalise others (immigrant communities) as the country endeavours to build its fledgling democracy. My second argument is that the intended democratic form of patriotism of the Department of Education can possibly be undermined by cultivating a culture of "safe expression", which could slow down the country's quest for reconciliation and nation building.

Following the first democratic election in South Africa in 1994, there has been a strong drive towards democratising education at all levels, primary, secondary and tertiary. The present paper examines some of the key ideas in the debate around transformation in higher education in South Africa, namely the notions of an African essence, culture and identity, as well as African knowledge systems. It contends that neither the idea of the "essence of Africa" nor an emphasis on "African culture and identity" constitutes an appropriate theoretical framework for conceptualising change in higher educational thought and practice in South Africa, the major problems turning on issues around essentialism and cultural relativism. Similarly, the post-colonialist and anti-discrimination discourse underpinning "African ways of knowing" is unfortunately riddled with problems, logical and epistemological. While the present contribution is sympathetic to the basic concerns articulated in the respective debates, especially around the significance of indigenous languages, it offers both conceptual clarification as well as a critical (re-)evaluation of the pertinent issues. Thus, "African knowledge" is argued to be a misnomer that raises more problems than it can conceivably solve. What its proponents hope to achieve is arguably better achieved by an emphasis on restorative justice that locates the principle of reconciliation within a basic framework of human rights. (Contains 6 notes.)

In this article I consider whether there is a process of repression occurring in definitions of citizenship and frameworks of citizenship education, which involves a forgetting of history. By focusing on recently troubled countries I identify how the force of history comes to play, and from that I consider how, in relatively stable liberal democracies such as England, the repression of history is more complete. I suggest that this repression leads to an impoverished definition of citizenship in terms of values and ethical considerations, resulting in an antiseptic curriculum which fails to address some of the sharper issues that lie deep in the complexity of experience and identity, issues that should be addressed in the pursuit of being-together in a pluralist society.

Education for Global Citizenship (E4GC) offers many opportunities to explore spirituality and a sense of how one fits into the world at a range of levels. Beyond the Curriculum Boundaries is a project that enables student teachers to consider E4GC alongside issues of multiculturalism, antiracism and democracy education, with a strong focus on religious education and geography. This paper outlines the ethos behind the project, identifies key elements and themes, appraises student responses, and evaluates key learning points. Student teachers respond to the module in a variety of ways that inform their learning and teaching, and development takes place on both personal and professional levels: as the project has developed the awareness of children's worldviews and the sense of interconnectedness with others has grown, adding an increasingly spiritual dimension to learning. This article argues that E4GC provides an effective vehicle for supporting the often-overlooked spiritual dimension of children development. (Contains 1 note.)

Critics of school governing bodies (SGBs)--both on the left and on the right--tend to rely upon arguments that ignore significant portions of the act that created SGBs--the South African Schools Act (SASA)--the exact nature of the changes to SGBs wrought by amendments to the act and the manner in which the courts, in interpreting the act, have both reinforced the autonomy of SGBs at the same time as they have set limits on those powers. The authors' reading takes seriously all of the provisions of SASA, its amendments and various court constructions of SASA's provisions. This close reading of the South African Constitution, SASA, SASA's amendments and the case law reveals the lineaments of a fourth level of democratic government. Even with their uneven success as a fourth tier of democratic government, SGBs reflect, in many respects, the most important interactions that citizens have with the state. The authors contend that SGBs provide a vehicle for popular political participation that is quite real, and that participation is made no less real by the strictures imposed upon them by South Africa's constitutional and regulatory order. Despite concerns about their lack of capacity, SGBs enjoy popular acceptance and participation across class and language divides. The legal status of SGBs does not merely enhance various forms of local democracy, SGBs also maintain and create effective social networks that generate new stores of social capital. The ability to provide new forms of democratic participation and to create new stores of social capital suggests that SGBs have the makings of a great, new and rather unique "South African" political institution. (Contains 70 notes.)

The article critically reflects on the positive portrayal of mentorship as a professional development strategy for educators. We argue that the conceptualisation of classical mentorship has been informed mainly by functionalist thinking. We contend that the supposedly beneficial nature of the mentorship relationship has been given such prominence that the possibility of learning from two highly problematic assumptions occupying a central position within a functionalist conceptualisation of mentorship, that is, the conceptualisation of learning as a unidirectional transmission process and, secondly, the strong authoritarian tendency deriving from a highly hierarchal mentor-mentee relationship where an experienced older person is the mentor and an inexperienced, younger person the mentee, is largely negated. Functionalist perspectives informed the highly authoritarian education system that was essential to maintain the oppressive political dispensation in South Africa. We argue therefore that, owing to the underlying assumption of an uncritical transmission of knowledge and management skills in a strong hierarchal relationship between mentor and mentee, mentorship conceptualised within the framework of functionalism is inherently conservative and poses a potential threat to the new education system in South Africa. The conceptualisation of mentorship within a radical humanistic perspective is pursued, especially because social justice, the learner as critical co-learner, and the critical analysis of power relations occupy a central position within this perspective.

Crime has become central to any discussion about the consolidation of democracy in South Africa. Concerns about crime intensified in the years after 1994, as the country attempted to grapple with the apparent "crime wave" that accompanied the transition. A decade later crime is still a priority for government and a concern among citizens, but the clamour that characterised both state and civil society responses in the early years of democracy has receded. This may relate to the decrease in crime levels as reflected by various statistical sources. It is also possible that those whose voices were heard most loudly on the issue--the middle classes--have taken all available measures to protect their property and lives from crime. In all likelihood, South Africans have become accustomed to living in a violent society, and one in which other equally serious problems now require attention. Although the national obsession with crime has waned, the available data nevertheless indicate that the problem still affects many thousands of lives. The impact of crime--in terms of the costs of victimisation, negative perceptions and fear, and the cost of responding to crime--remains high for South African society. This paper considers how crime levels and perceptions about crime and safety have changed over the past decade, and what these trends tell us about the country 10 years into our democracy.

Durban, the busiest port and second largest industrial hub in South Africa, has a developmental vision that sees its residents living in "acceptably serviced housing" and enjoying a "generally high quality of life that can be sustained". This vision is in response to South Africa"s transitional aspirations to move from an inequitable apartheid state to a democratic society with greater socio-economic parity. Since 1998 the eThekwini Municipality, which is the local authority responsible for the city of Durban, has conducted annual surveys to monitor the changes in the quality of life of Durban's people. Structured questionnaire interviews were administered in 14 300 dwellings between 1998 and 2005. The samples drawn each year were representative of the city's demographics and covered a wide range of housing types. Results indicate that parity of life satisfaction between race groups is as far apart in 2005 as it was in 1998. The paper undertakes trend analysis, from a local government perspective, of key objective and subjective variables in the surveys. It identifies the domains that have the greatest impact on satisfaction with life, and reports the salient issues for black householders, who have the lowest level of life satisfaction.

Who are the satisfied South Africans 10 years into democracy? How do material factors contribute to their life satisfaction? These are the questions addressed in this paper. Earlier South African research has consistently found a close positive relationship between life satisfaction and material standards of living in the apartheid and post-apartheid era. Recently, a new source of information has become available to shed further light on the association between material and subjective well-being. In 2002, Statistics South Africa, the country's official source of statistical information, agreed to ask South Africans participating in the General Household Survey whether they were satisfied or dissatisfied with life. The 2002 General Household Survey (n26'000) used a measure developed for the Euromodule that allows for international comparison. The wide-ranging information contained in South Africa's official household survey offers a unique opportunity to explore what makes for satisfied and dissatisfied South Africans in relation to their material living standards. Results indicate that the improved living standards afforded to many black South Africans under democracy are associated with increases in life satisfaction. Furthermore, habituation does not appear to have diluted the positive relationship between living standards and well-being. However, political factors continue to play an important role in shaping subjective well-being. In conclusion, it is argued that material gains might also have restored the pride and dignity denied to black South Africans in the past.

In this response I argue that smart thinking would not necessarily engender democratic justice in our South African society. I contend that we need to cultivate responsible thinkers and that universities are favourably positioned to do so.

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

Numerous initiatives, such as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the Race and Values in Education process of the Department of Education, the government-initiated (but now civic-led) Moral Regeneration Movement and the pervasive indigenous African philosophy of "ubuntu" have, over the past twelve years since South Africa's transition to democracy, contributed materially to reforming and renewing the concepts of citizenship and morality in South Africa. Central to this debate have been issues of socio-economic justice for the vast majority of her historically disadvantaged citizens; a developing conception of the nature of citizenship in a country newly emerging from totalitarianism; a maturing understanding of the possible roles of faith within a democracy; and the struggle to define the relationship between citizenship, moral and religious education. This paper describes and critiques these initiatives and offers an analysis of the lessons each have contributed to the long road to citizenship in post-apartheid South Africa. (Contains 1 table, 1 figure and 10 notes.)

In his critique of academic writing about and public consumption of government policy and law, Jonathan Jansen uses his argument of the symbolic functions of education law and education policy as a basis for explaining the lack of progress in achieving equity and justice under "Brown v. Board of Education" (1954) in the United States and the lack of progress in achieving social goals after 12 years of freedom in South Africa. This article presents the author's response to Jansen's article. The purpose of this author is two-fold: to build on Jansen's work so as to develop further an examination of both the U.S. and South African black education experiences with respect to: (1) the curriculum taught in schools; and (2) the experiences of students and educators in desegregated schools. This chapter argues that the efficacy of education policies and laws aimed at redressing racial discrimination and attainment of equity and social justice should be judged not only on the merits of the law or policy but on what happens within the desegregated schools in a given school system. (Contains 4 notes.)

The parallels between South Africa and the United States run deep. For the United States, that moment of transition, at least as far as education is concerned, was the landmark ruling of 1954, described in the shorthand, "Brown v. Board of Education"; for South Africa, that moment came 40 years later when every citizen could, for the first time, vote on a nonracial basis under the legal frame provided by a new constitution. There are, of course, important differences between the two countries that partly explain their different historical trajectories of oppression and struggle. Despite these differences, the long relationship between the two countries reveals often unacknowledged ties of racial oppression as well as strong bonds of racial solidarity in the struggle for freedom. Against this historical backdrop of collusion and cooperation, academics and researchers from the two countries gathered in Pretoria, South Africa, in April 2004 to reflect on the meanings of the 50th anniversary of "Brown" and the 10th anniversary of South Africa's transition to democracy. In this chapter, the author contemplates the lessons that should be drawn in this context that could inspire action and instruct thought in the ongoing struggle for equal educational opportunities in the United States and South Africa. (Contains 4 notes.)

In this essay, Chaya Herman explores the interaction between two powerful global dynamics that have affected educational institutions and society at large: one is neoliberalism, with its attendant notions of marketization and managerialism; the other is the resurgence of ethnic and religious, often fundamentalist, communities in the search for identity. The essay is based on a larger research project that explores the profound effects of the ideological and managerial restructuring process in Johannesburg's Jewish community schools, the broader context for which has been South Africa's transformation to democracy. Herman suggests that these two dynamics are synergetic forces and that their accumulated effect has the power to shift the discourse of the community toward ghettoization and toward the creation of a homogenous community founded on a narrowly defined common identity.

Inclusive education in South Africa has not been promoted as simply one more option for education but as an educational strategy that can contribute to a democratic society. After the end of the Apartheid era the new democratic government committed itself to the transformation of education and key policy documents and legislation stress the principle of education as a basic human right as enshrined in the Constitution. White Paper 6: Special Needs Education, building an inclusive education and training system (2001) provides a framework for systemic change for the development of inclusive education. As a philosophy, the concept of inclusive education in the South African context embraces the democratic values of equality and human rights and the recognition of diversity. Research however indicates that multifaceted societal changes, encompassing educational reforms and contextual changes, including the management of diversity in schools, have had a negative impact on the implementation of inclusive education. After ten year of democracy, the enduring tension between changing the structure of education and changing the process of education is still influencing progress. Enhancing the recognition and acceptance of the basic rights of all South African children to be accommodated in inclusive school communities therefore remains a challenge.