BOOK REVIEWSEducation and Social Control in Southern Rhodesia, By T.J.S. Kumbula.Palo Alto CA, R. & E. Research Associates, 1979, vi, 168 pp., US$7.00.Independence without Freedom: The Political Economy of Colonial EducationIn Southern Africa.Edited byA.T. Mugomba andM. Nyaggah. Oxford, ABC-Clio, 1980, x, 289 pp., £14.65.Since the publication of M.F.D. Young's influential article, 'Knowledge andControl', more than a decade ago, an increasing volume of research into the historyand sociology of education has been directed to the apparent relationships betweeneducational policy and the interests of dominant socio-economic groups in manycountries. Against this background, Kumbula's studyŠwhich is based on asuccessful submission for a higher degreeŠrepresents a significant attempt toanalyse the socio-political factors which determined the provision of secondaryand higher education for Blacks in the former Colony of Southern Rhodesia, fromthe onset of the colonial period to the mid-1970s, Similarly the collection of essaysby Mugomba and Nyaggah is timely, in two important respects. It represents asignificant addition to the still far too slender body of literature oe African responseto colonial education policy in Southern Africa. And it provides useful dataconcerning several countries which have as yet received remarkably little attentionfrom students of education, writing in the English language.Kumbula's book makes stimulating and, in large part, convincing reading.Using an extensive body of documentary material, from both official and noe-official sources, the author has built up a valuable picture of racial discrimination ioa setting whereŠas he puts itŠ'Blacks ... perceived education as one sure way ofspeeding their emergence from their deprived status' and 'whites used education tokeep blacks subordinate to them and to ensure continued white domination' (p.155). There is painstaking and, in places, incisive discussion of official Whiteattitudes and of factors underlying Rhodesian educational policy, set against thewider background of British imperial educational policy in Africa, The author isparticularly skilful in his treatment of developments during the post-Federationperiod, where he provides a convincing demonstration of the dichotomy betweenofficial protestations of* meritocracy' and 'non-racialism' and the reality of racialdiscrimination in virtually every aspect of the public life of the Colony, As he pointsout, there was indeed little prospect of meritocracy in a situation where governmentspent on average more than eleven times as much money on the education of aWhite child than on that of a Black child, and where the expansion of secondaryschool facilities for Blacks was far from sufficient to keep pace with increases in theprimary school population.A rather striking weakness, nevertheless, is the absence of an attempt toanalyse the various elements of White Rhodesian opinion, and to estimate theextent to which they influenced educational policy. Missionaries, farmers,businessmen, administrators and political leaders all had distinctive interests andattitudes, and these sometimes clashed in the determination of policy. Importantconflicts in White opinion, which Kumbula does not consider, were the disagree-ment between missionaries and government, concerning the first governmentschools for Africans at Domboshawa and Tjolotjo, and the resignation of HaroldJowitt from Ms post as Director of Native Education because of disagreement with7778BOOK REVIEWShis colleagues concerning his policy of community development. Indeed, the mainprinciples of Jowitt's immensely influential work, and the motives which mighthave determined them, are not discussed at all in the study, although there is onebrief mention of Jowitt's helper, Henry Alvord, whose teaching of agriculture toBlacks met with opposition from. White farmers.Like Young, and other writers of the New Sociology group, Kumbula seessocio-economic and political factors as the only significant determinants ofeducational policy. Some will dispute, accordingly, Ms assertion that amongAfrican educational systems, that of South Africa came closest to matchingSouthern Rhodesia 'In form, substance, philosophy, curricula content, andobjectives' (p. 21). Although there were, undoubtedly, close relationships betweenSouth African and Southern Rhodesian education (perhaps notably in theimporting of policies of community development by Jowitt from his mentor, L.G.Loram, in Natal) it is also pertinent to consider a movement away from SouthAfrican and towards English educational practice by Southern Rhodesianadministrators from the 1920s on.. This movement was apparently due in part atleast to a belief among White Rhodesians that the South African curriculum wasinsufficiently challenging, and did not provide the degree of moral and intellectualtraining needed by young people in a rapidly developing society. Again, some willregret that no qualification is added to Kumbula's conclusion that 'The whites andblacks viewed each other as antagonists where the victory of one side would lead tothe subjugation of the other' (p. 155). A small series of achievementsŠperhapsmost notably Manfred Hodson's struggle for a multiracial University College,Basil Fletcher's blueprint for Ranche House College, and the independent schools'bursary scheme for Black pupilsŠmight have served to indicate the existence oftraditions of non-racial idealism, contrasting vividly with the dominant racialism ofcolonial society.The study is well structured, carefully documented and written in an attractivediscursive style. It makes a very useful addition to the significantly growing body ofpublications on the history of education in Zimbabwe.Most of the papers in Mugomba and Nyaggah's collection were originallypresented at an International Conference on Colonial Education and ContemporaryConflict in Southern Africa, held at the Santa Barbara campus of the University ofCalifornia in 1977, As the editors explain in their Introduction, the intention hasbeen to follow an uncompromisingly Reconstruction!st theme. Europeans, theywrite, brought to Africaa new system of education which, like the colonial model of the politicalsystem, both subordinated and relegated to a peripheral role the Africaneducational systems and the existing political, economic and socialorders. The newcomers introduced alternative theories of education andimposed a new set of educational institutions which in some casessupplemented and in most others replaced previous forms of learning.The colonial schools required students of a specific age range to attendon a full-time basis rather than allowing them to be taught in the intervalsbetween productive work, and on a lifelong basis (pp. 1-2).In consequence, African countries, on the assumption of independence, foundthemselves 'saddled with an educational system unsuited to their requirements.BOOK REVIEWS79They needed people trained for responsibilities previously reserved for the colonialadministrators. They also needed to foster a whole new spirit of self-reliance andexperimentation' (p. 2). The various 'problems and contradictions' of the colonialeducational legacy could be removed only by 'new philosophies and teachingmethods' which must emerge from the distinctive circumstances of African life:'just as the widening economic gap [between developed and developing countries!cannot be narrowed by importing solutions, the problem of basic education for themajority of Third World people cannot be solved by importing Western models (oreven Eastern ones for that matter)' (pp. 3-4).The theme of educational Reconstrucionism runs insistently through the foursections into which the papers have been grouped. In Part I, entitled 'RegionalPerspectives', there are two contributions by Zimbabwean scholars teaching in theU.S. David Chanaiwa's study, 'African humanism in Southern Africa', representsan important re-assessment of the influence of early mission-educated elites, who,he suggests, 'created a Utopian, universalist, and moralist world of their own towhich they attempted to lead both the African and settler worlds* (p, 34). Hisconclusions are largely complemented by those of Agrippah Mugomba, whosecontribution, 'African mind processing: Colonial miseducation and elite psycho-logical decolonization', delivers a rejection of evolutionary educational change inpost-colonial Africa. He considers that there is a 'desperate need to dismantlecolonial institutions and structures ie order to foster genuine political, economic,and social changes' (p. 53).Part II contains three papers under the title of'Philosophical Foundations',among which the most significant appears to be Mougo Nyaggah's study,'Apartheid and second-class education in South Africa'. In Part III, concernedwith 'Comparative Perspectives', there are five contributions, including twostudies of educational development in Mocambique, by Mario Azevedo andAgrippah Mugomba. These contributions are supported by a small but well-chosenselection of documentary material as Appendices to the volume. Chanaiwa's'Conclusion', presented as Part IV of the volume, impresses one as an able andwell-structured synthesis of historical argument in the papers which have gonebefore. Without doubt he and his fellow-contributors have provided valuable newinsight into many aspects of Southern Africa's educational history.A concluding caveat on both works, however, is that historical evidence,though valuable in other ways, is never per se a reliable foundation for thedetermination of policy. One must necessarily look elsewhere to find support forthe viability of any particular educational programme in current circumstances.The real case for Reconstructionlsm must ultimately stand or fall, less onconsideration of the 'problems and contradictions* of the colonial past, than on therealistic appraisal of needs and possibilities in the Zimbabwe of today.Un iversity of Zim hahweN.D. ATKINSON