Transformation? Impossible if word remains undefined
A failure to define what ‘transformation’ means and how it may be measured is blocking prospects of broader change at South Africa’s public universities. In fact, the term is so “overladen with what may be called ‘surplus politics’ that it obscures, rather than clarifies, research and debate”, according to a number of the country’s leading higher education analysts and former planners.
The discourse around the concept, which was first popularised by anti-apartheid activists, has obscured the actual changes taking place within the system – such as the significant increase in the numbers of black students and academics at South Africa’s higher education institutions.