Overview

#FeesMustFall, the student revolt that began in October 2015, was an uprising against lack of access to, and financial exclusion from, higher education in South Africa. More broadly, it radically questioned the socio-political dispensation resulting from the 1994 social pact between big business, the ruling elite and the liberation movement. The 2015 revolt links to national and international youth struggles of the recent past and is informed by Black Consciousness politics and social movements of the international Left. Yet, its objectives are more complex than those of earlier struggles. The student movement has challenged the hierarchical, top-down leadership system of university management and it’s ‘double speak’ of professing to act in workers’ and students’ interests yet enforce a regressive system for control and governance. University managements, while one one level amenable to change, have also co-opted students into their ranks to create co-responsibility for the highly bureaucratised university fi nancial aid that stand in the way of their social revolution. This book maps the contours of student discontent a year after the start of the #FeesMustFall revolt. Student voices dissect coloniality, improper compromises by the founders of democratic South Africa, feminism, worker rights and meaningful education. In-depth assessments by prominent scholars refl ect on the complexities of student activism, its impact on national and university governance, and offer provocative analyses of the power of the revolt.

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9781868149858

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"""This book, one of the first on the topic, gives a good sense of the excitement of the 2015 movements, their portentous language and heady ideas, and will be welcomed by those sympathetic to the students. More sober academic or technical discussions provide background to the history of student protest in Africa and the dilemmas of university funding."" -William Beinart, professor of Race Relations, African Studies Centre, St Antony's College, University of Oxford"

This book, one of the first on the topic, gives a good sense of the excitement of the 2015 movements, their portentous language and heady ideas, and will be welcomed by those sympathetic to the students. More sober academic or technical discussions provide background to the history of student protest in Africa and the dilemmas of university funding. -William Beinart, professor of Race Relations, African Studies Centre, St Antony's College, University of Oxford

Author Information

Susan Booysen Is Professor at the Wits School of Governance. She is the author of Dominance and Decline: The ANC in the Time of Zuma, The African National Congress and the Regeneration of Political Power.

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