The Polokwane conference takes place amid a vexing national debate, underlined by protests at Wits and the University of Johannesburg, on whether post-apartheid education policy is effectively expanding the right of access to higher education to black students.
At the core of South Africa’s post-1994 education policy is the notion that black students from disadvantaged backgrounds are treated fairly when they are bused to white schools and universities. This conception of fairness as sameness of treatment presupposes that white schools and universities offer a benchmark by which to determine the general quality of education that ought to be provided to black students.
The fallacy in mainstream education policy discourse is that, if one group enjoys a more affluent condition of life than another, to treat both groups equally is to be fair to both.
Given the history of this country, higher education should involve more than sharing privilege. In contrast, to redefine privilege to include historically disadvantaged groups, without modifying the substantive content of privilege, is to arrive at false education transformation.
The struggle for substantive equality of access to higher education and economics is only tenable when it is able to adjust the societal values that support the hierarchical structure of white universities. This includes adjusting the primacy that mainstream society gives to socioeconomic privilege.
This is not to suggest that all government education policy interventions are inherently flawed. On the contrary, such policy is socially useful in accommodating a perspective on material and cultural difference that privilege otherwise would refute or, at least, marginalise.
While access to education is guaranteed in terms of the Constitution, the regressive and ahistorical admission policies of most universities serve as yet as another barrier for black students’ access to higher education. As result, our society suffers morally in failing to promote the recognition of an objective situation of historical, social and financial difference. It suffers functionally if future leaders of this country are precluded from accessing higher education because of historical, social and financial background.
The capacity of university bosses and education policymakers to reconcile disparate conceptions of the right of access to education hinges upon the willingness of those who enjoy privilege to share them. Most importantly, it means recognising that a privileged view of inequality of treatment is likely to perpetuate that inequality.
Mxolisi Notshulwana, a researcher at the Development Bank of Southern Africa, writes in his personal capacity