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A quarter of a century after South Africa's transition to democracy, the rhetoric of 'transformation' remains firmly ingrained in its higher education policy and discourse. In many of the reviews, reports, proposals, and frameworks on the transformation of the South African university system, one thing stands out: an oversupply of rhetoric and a dearth of empirical data. This article is a direct response to how infrequently data has been used and seeks to reveal the actual quantum of change, albeit with a focus on an admittedly singular element on the transformation spectrum but one which nevertheless preoccupies South Africans: equity (or race). The evidence presented in the paper shows that the absence of a clear articulation of transformation, accompanied by a lack of indicators and targets to track progress over time, hinders the progression of the discourse to equally important dimensions of performance such as efficiency, success and productivity-all of which are critical in determining the university's role in national development. The paper goes on to show that based on the data available, the public university system in South Africa is transforming given the increases over time in the number of black students and staff. However, without a clearly articulated idea of what constitutes change, one cannot claim a transformed system, and the political narrative of no transformation is likely to prevail., Author(s): François B. Van Schalkwyk [sup.1] , Milandré H. van Lill [sup.1] , Nico Cloete [sup.1] , Tracy G. Bailey [sup.1] Author Affiliations: (1) grid.11956.3a, 0000 0001 2214 904X, DSI-NRF [...]

This article analyses the relationship between the politics of education and language, and armed conflict and ongoing peace process in Myanmar. It discusses the state education system, which since the military coup of 1962 has promoted the idea of the country based on the language and culture of the Bamar (Burman) majority community, and the school systems developed by ethnic armed groups which oppose the military government. Ethnic opposition education regimes have developed mother tongue-based school systems. In some cases, the Mon for example, these broadly follow the government curriculum, while being locally owned and delivered in ethnic languages; in others, such as the Karen, the local education system diverges significantly from the Myanmar government curriculum, making it difficult for students to transition between the two systems. This article explores the consequences of these developments, and how reforms in Myanmar since 2011--including the peace process, which remains incomplete and contested--have opened the space for educational reform, and the possible 'convergence' of state and non-state education regimes. Ethnic nationality communities remain determined to conserve and reproduce their own languages and cultures, adopting positions in relation to language and education which reflect broader state-society relations in Myanmar, and in particular ethnic politicians' demands for a federal political settlement to decades of armed conflict. The article concludes that sustainable resolution to Myanmar's protracted state-society conflict is unlikely to be achieved until elites can negotiate agreement on ethnic language and teaching policies. Keywords: Myanmar/Burma, education, conflict, mother tongue-based education, language rights., This article explores how language and education have featured in half a century of armed ethnic conflict in Burma/Myanmar, and how these issues feature in the ongoing peace process. The [...]

There have been reform committees of fifty, of sixty, of seventy, of one hundred and all sorts of numbers that started out to do up the regular political Organizations. They [...]

This research examines the relationship between courts and legislatures in a comparative perspective. Specifically, I examine how (a) the ideological composition of the bench, (b) the propensity of court involvement in a given policy area, and (c) the disposition of court decisions in a given policy area influence the ideology of bill introductions and policy enactments by state legislatures. By examining HMO regulation and education policy in the American states during the 1990s, I find evidence that judicial influence does affect legislative policymaking, in both the introduction and enactment stages, across both policy areas. Although traditional scholarship has depicted the judicial branch as having minimal effect on policy formation, and subsequently social change, the findings of this study suggest that we have overlooked an important policymaking role of the judicial branch. Furthermore, state policy research has not given adequate attention to judicial influence as an explanation for policy formation in the American states. Keywords: state courts; political ideology; state legislatures; health care regulation; education policy; judicial policymaking

It is easy to gain the impression that public education in Australia is 'under attack'. There has been a demonstrable increase in enrolments in private schools in recent years. (1) [...]

The influence of education, linguistic and citizenship policies on the development of the Moldovan identity and relations with the breakaway region of Transnistria is examined.

Politics in teacher education is becoming more conspicuous, contentious, and extensive. This is due, in part, to the growing complexity of the enterprise and to the demands of a widening [...]

Education policy, including teacher education policy, is largely grounded in political and economic arguments, arguments that have to do with power and resources. Most teacher educators I know believe that [...]

ISSUES OF MEANING Consideration of the politics of teacher education must begin by establishing what is meant by teacher education. Looking at the past five decades of teacher education, Cochran-Smith [...]

Some policy and political analysts assume that ambiguity, conflict, and competing goals are inherent in human societies. From this perspective, politics is a 'creative and valued feature of social existence' [...]