The African Experience with Higher Education. By J. F. ADE AJAYI, LAMECK K. H. GOMA and G. AMPAH JOHNSON. Accra, London and Athens, OH: Association of African Universities in association with James Currey and Ohio University Press, 1996. Pp. xii + 276. £35 (ISBN 0-85255-734-5); £14.95, paperback (ISBN 0-85255-733-7).

Abstract

The Association of African Universities was formed at Rabat in 1967. In1972 it held a workshop in Accra which resulted in Creating the African University: Emerging Issues of the 1970s (ed. T. M. Yesufu, Ibadan: Oxford University Press, 1973). In 1992, the AAU commissioned the study under review, entrusting it to former vice-chancellors of Lagos and Zambia, and the founding rector of the Université de Bénin. The focus, on universities in tropical Africa, is narrower than the title implies, but of the eleven chapters three consider developments before 1960 and three more survey the next three decades. In part, then, this is a work of history (and certain admirably terse passages of historical summary suggest the hand of the professional historian). It does not, however, claim originality in this respect: inevitably, its earlier sections lean heavily on Ashby, and it has to be said that in general the study is based on a somewhat unsystematic selection of sources. The list of references is disfigured by errors and the index by omissions: it requires much effort to establish, for example, the substantial role of the U.S.A., not only through USAID but through such bodies as the International Council for Educational Development. Still, this is a judicious overview of a large, if depressing, subject, by eminent scholars who are not afraid to criticize their own colleagues as well as governments and outside agencies. ‘The failure of many African academics to fully appreciate the necessity to defend autonomy in the long-term interest of the academy was one of the most enduring legacies of the colonial situation’ (p. 95).