International Higher Education, Fall 2001

The South African ‘National Plan for Higher Education’, 2001

David Cooper
David Cooper is associate professor in the Department of Sociology, at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He has been seconded part time to the University of the Western Cape to direct a new master’s program in higher education policy analysis, leadership and management, based in the Faculty of Education and linked to its Education Policy Unit. Address: Faculty of Education, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, South Africa. E-mail: <dacooper@iafrica.com>.

In February 2001, minister of education Kadar Asmal announced the National Plan for Higher Education (NPHE), without first officially passing it through his own "expert" advisory Council on Higher Education (CHE), which had made some significantly different proposals in its own discussion document in 2000. Interestingly, instead he sought, and obtained, prior approval from internal African National Congress (ANC—the ruling party) committees and the cabinet, and other "alliance" structures linked to the ANC such as the leading trade union federation and the South African Communist Party (both of which had raised political questions about his recent reforms in school education). Clearly, new processes were under way in South African higher education. Moreover, the content of the NPHE differed from a whole series of earlier policy discussion documents leading up to the higher education white paper of 1997, the definitive document prior to the NPHE.

Was the NPHE a shift in direction in terms of policy substance and process? And was it what it asserted—a real plan to transform the Apartheid-based system of higher education into a new system fulfilling the white paper goals of equity, efficiency, and social development?

Core Elements of the NPHE
The white paper of 1997 had initiated the setting up of a Branch of Higher Education within one new Department of Education, putting an end to Apartheid-fragmented governance consisting of separate branches and departments to administer universities and technikons (polytechnics) for various urban-based "race groups" and so-called black homelands in the rural areas. However, after what might be termed a few years of policy "implementation vacuum," the NPHE in 2001 confronted much more openly than previous documents the crises facing higher education in South Africa.

The NPHE listed massive problems of inefficiency and dislocation resulting largely (but not solely) from the Apartheid era. It confronted a higher education system with unnecessary duplication among historically separate institutions for "African," "white," "coloured," and "Indian," Apartheid-designated race groups—21 universities and 15 technikons, a total of 36 higher education institutions. The NPHE document spoke openly about the inefficiencies of student graduation rates and staff research output levels of most universities and technikons. It viewed with alarm the high drop-out rates of students, due in large part to lack of student financial aid, and the falling annual numbers of first-year student university enrollments, due partly to problems in the high school system. Furthermore, the uncontrolled proliferation of private higher education institutions; the fragile governing structures and even mismanagement at a few historically black, publicly funded institutions; the skewed enrollment patterns, whereby many black and female students were underrepresented in science, technology, and business fields; and the opportunistic spread of distance-learning and other modes of program development by some historically white universities—all these the NPHE viewed as having the potential to undermine the whole higher education system.

In its 100-page report, the NPHE addresses issues of access (to increase the student participation rate from 15 to 20 percent over the next 10 to 15 years); equity (with a stress on race and gender, but not class, and on inequities in the student body and especially in the academic staff); and research output (particularly for national economic development, with capacity building via master’s and doctoral degree program increases). But I would argue the thrust is located in two areas. First, there is an overarching concern by the NPHE with efficiency—particularly with respect to student outputs for the economy. For the first time, the focus is not just on student enrollments but on graduation rates as well, with financial incentives proposed to improve these. Moreover, a shift in the "shape" of the system is proposed, to change the balance of student enrollments in humanities:business-commerce:science and technology from the current ratio of 49:26:25 to 40:30:30 over the next decade.

Second, and even more importantly, the problem of institutions in the same region with overlapping programs and functions is addressed head-on. The NPHE accepts that for at least the next five years the university/technikon divide will be retained. However, a multistage process has been set up to establish institutional program concentrations in each region. Some institutional mergers and forms of regional cooperation will be required. The NPHE document does outline a few specific mergers, but the document also calls for the setting up of a National Working Group that will report to the minister by the end of the year on the recommended forms of mergers and cooperation by region (with the only NPHE proviso that there are to be no closures of sites of learning, although sites may be restructured).

The Nature of the NPHE
The NPHE must be understood alongside the proposed new National Funding Framework and the Higher Education Quality Committee of the Council on Higher Education, which emerged in 2001 and are aimed at steering the system according to plan. However, it is debatable whether the specific method laid out will lead to appropriate academic niche developments and whether the ministry and the institutions themselves have the internal capacity to plan and effect changes in these ways.

The NPHE document of 2001 has put itself forward as a far more nuanced policy strategy with respect to the 36 higher education institutions—involving what it terms a "planned differentiation of higher education institutions through negotiation and consensus"—compared to the proposals submitted by the Council on Higher Education to the minister in 2000. The council had put forward a restructuring proposal for a hierarchical system of three types: I) research institutions (extensive programs up to the Ph.D. level); II) institutions mainly up to master’s level, with some niche area doctoral programs permitted; III) "bedrock" institutions, with a focus on undergraduate education, and some programs permitted up to the master’s level. The council’s proposal unleashed a massive outcry in 2000—not least the accusation that it was a "return to Apartheid" because most of the historically black higher education institutions (universities and technikons) would fall under type III and most of the historically white universities (but not technikons) would fall under type I. Because of this controversy, the NPHE of 2001 came out with its interactive processes via program niches and three-year plans. However the National Working Group, now going round the country suggesting in some regions quite significant mergers and forms of cooperation, could end up proposing far-reaching changes to the minister. Perhaps the major thrust of change will come from this working group rather than from the NPHE’s "plans, negotiations and consensus." We shall know the results soon after the end of 2001.

The NPHE document of 2001 and the Council on Higher Education document of 2000 signify an end to what might be termed the period of "symbolic policymaking." Prior to 2000, the new democratic government’s most important policy document on higher education, the white paper of 1997, as well as key advisory documents before this, were involved primarily in symbolic policy—outlining the values, missions, and broad frameworks required to transform the higher education system but without any specifics on policy choices, implementation, or evaluation of results. In contrast, CHE 2000 and NPHE 2001 signal a shift toward what can be termed "substantive, procedural, and material policy" approaches, incorporating concrete actions, implementation procedures, and resource allocation mechanisms.

For the first time, the new approaches stress efficiency and globalization and the knowledge economy. The earlier stress found in policy documents between 1992 and 1997 on equity and redress (especially in terms of "earmarked funds" for historically black institutions) has been greatly downplayed. In this sense, South African higher education policy is coming more into line with the international higher education discourses about the "market university"—like our post-1996 national economic policies, which emphasize growth and foreign investment over economic reconstruction and basic socioeconomic needs.