Skip Navigation


Journal of African Economies Advance Access originally published online on August 2, 2007
Journal of African Economies 2007 16(5):849-880; doi:10.1093/jae/ejm017
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
16/5/849    most recent
ejm017v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in ISI Web of Science
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by van der Berg, S.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Centre for the Study of African Economies. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Apartheid's Enduring Legacy: Inequalities in Education1

Servaas van der Berg

Department of Economics, University of Stellenbosch, South Africa

Corresponding author: Servaas van der Berg, Department of Economics, University of Stellenbosch, South Africa. E-mail: svdb{at}sun.ac.za

This paper provides a broad overview of the economic dimensions of the educational situation in South Africa a decade after the political transition. An important question is whether changes since the transition have substantially ameliorated the role of race in education. Census and survey data show that quantitative educational attainment differentials (years of education) have been substantially reduced, but qualitative differentials remain larger. Despite massive resource shifts to black schools, overall matriculation results did not improve in the post-apartheid period. Thus the school system contributes little to supporting the upward mobility of poor children in the labour market. The persistence of former racial inequalities is reflected in extremely poor pass rates in mainly black schools (the majority of schools), with high standard deviations. Regressions of matriculation pass rates from school level data show that racial composition of schools—as proxy for former school department—remains a major explanatory factor besides socio-economic background (as measured by school fees set by school governing bodies) and educational inputs (measured by teacher–pupil ratios and teacher salaries as proxy for qualifications and experience). Furthermore, remarkable differentials in performance among black schools cannot be accounted for by socio-economic background or teaching resources, pointing to the importance of school management. The malfunctioning of large parts of the school system appears largely a problem of x-inefficiency rather than allocative efficiency. This requires urgent attention to the functioning of poorly performing schools, to permit continued upward mobility of the largest part of the workforce as well as to support sustained economic growth.

JEL classification: I21


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer:
Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.