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By the time most African countries achieved independence in the early 1960s, education had become a sacred cow for both the governments and the people. For the former, education represented a major tool for nation-building and development which, in those days, meant essentially rapid industrialisation; for the latter, education–especially at the post-primary levels–was the main vehicle for social mobility, primarily because it made possible the acquisition of a well-paid job in the modern sector. For a few years it looked as if there was no contradiction between the aspirations of the people and the goals of the governments, on the one hand, and the socio-economic realities, on the other. Soon the bubble burst, however: industrialisation turned out to be no panacea; the limits of Africanisation were rapidly reached in the civil service, but proved to be a protracted affair in the economy. As the ugly scourge of youth unemployment started to spread in Africa by the mid-1960s, attention was focused on educational systems which began to be perceived as 'dysfunctional'–i.e. as incompatible with the social and economic realities which were largely agricultural and rural. But more ominously, schools came also under attack as serving mainly the interests of the emerging bourgeoisies.

Genuineefforts have been made in recent years to build a more egalitarian and just society in Tanzania. A 'leadership code' forbids senior government and party officials to have a second income from business interests or rents; a steeply progressive tax system reduces income differentials from a ratio of 1/100 before independence to 1/10 in the 1970s; a period of national service is obligatory for secondaryschool and university graduates; fairly successful attempts have been made to radically reform the whole educational system; and the major financial, industrial, and commercial enterprises have been nationalised. But 13 years after its inception in 1967, it is now generally acknowledged that the policy of creatingujamaavillages has failed in terms of what they had been designed to achieve: namely, the building of a socialist society in the rural areas of Tanzania where more than 90 per cent of the population lives.

In order to grasp the magnitude and the complexity of the recent process in South Africa, the author has adopted an eclectic approach. The multitudinous facets of the South African reality are conveyed both in broad outline and in cameos of detail. There are accounts of the negotiations between government and ANC, of the author's discussions with the politican F. Van Zyl Slabbert and the ANC leader Pallo Jordan, as well as with white landowning families and business people. South Africa's social problems are portrayed in descriptions of the author's visits to the rural areas and to the squatter camps and townships of Soweto, Khayelitsha and the Port Elizabeth/Uitenhage area. (DÜI-Sch)

Überlegungen über die Ursachen, Folgen und Lösungsmöglichkeiten der afrikanischen Wirtschafts- und Verschuldungskrise. Herausarbeitung von Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschieden in der Struktur und Entwicklung einzelner afrikanischer Staaten. Diskussion der internen und externen Ursachen der Krise, der Entwicklungshilfe und IMF-Konditionalität als notwendige, aber für sich allein unzureichende Genesungsansätze. (DÜI-Hlb)