The making of South Africa's national curriculum statement

Abstract

The paper discusses the relationship of different lobbies, voices, and interests to the curriculum, and argues that a neat translation between interests and curriculum outcomes is not possible, but that the echoes of struggles, which take both a material and symbolic form, are evident within the final version. The paper describes the influences of a vocational lobby, environmental and history interest groups, university-based intellectuals and non-governmental organizations, teachers-unions, and the Christian Right. It contends that there was no neat alignment of interests; they were sometimes internally fractured and alliances were unstable over time.