The
Expansion
of
Mass
Education
in
Botswana:
Local
and
World
Society
Perspectives
JOHN
W.
MEYER,
JOANE
NAGEL,
AND
CONRAD
W.
SNYDER,
JR.
Since
the
end
of
the
Second
World
War,
the
growth
of
education
is
notable
for
several
reasons.
First,
the
institutions
of
mass
education
have
spread
to
virtually
all
countries
despite
vast
differences
in
political,
economic,
social,
and
cultural
organization.
Second,
rates
of
enrollment
around
the
world
are
high
and
represent
enormous
financial
investments
by
many
impoverished
states
and
economies.
1
And,
third,
the
rapidity
of
educa-
tional
expansion
across
states
was
unanticipated,
its
speed
catching
by
surprise
both
theorists
and
practitioners
alike.
Functional
theories
of
the
right
or
the
left
that
stress
national
factors
have
conspicuously
failed,
since
educational
expansion
has
spanned
state
boundaries
despite
great
variations
in
productive
capacity
and
social
mobi-
lization.
The
functionalist
view
has
generally
been
replaced
by
"con-
juncturalist"
or
historicist
arguments
that
local
combinations
and
conflicts
of
interest
and
status
groups
produced
expansion.
2
However, historicism,
with
a
focus
on
local
factors,
does
not
explain
well
a
social
change
that
is
worldwide.
World-level
processes
seem
to
be
at
work.
It
has
been
argued
that
general
models
of
modern
society
and
the
nation-state
have
spread
rapidly,
with
mass
education
as
a
derived consequence
of
the
urgency
of
national
integration
and
development,
14
Others
have
emphasized
the
tendency
for
modern
education
itself—and
the
associated
model
of
the
individual
life
course—to
flow
directly
as
ideology
and
practice
around
1
P.
Coombs,
The
World
Educational
Crisis
(Oxford:
Oxford
University
Press,
1968);
Unesco,
Statistical
Yearbooks
(Geneva:
United
Nations,
1965—90);
F.
O.
Ramirez
and
J.
Boli,
"Global
Patterns
of
Educational
Institutionalization,"
in
Institutional
Structure:
Constituting
State,
Society,
and
the
Individ-
ual,
ed.
G,
Thomas,
J.
W.
Meyer,
F.
O.
Ramirez,
and
J.
Boli
(Beverly
Hills,
Calif.:
Sage,
1987),
pp.
150—72;
J.
W.
Meyer,
F.
O.
Ramirez,
R.
Rubinson,
and
J.
Boli,
"The
World
Educational
Revolution,
1950—1970,"
Sociology
of
Education
50
(October
1977):
242—58;
J.
W.
Meyer,
F.
O.
Ramirez,
and
Y.
N.
Soysal,
"World
Expansion
of
Mass
Education,
1870—1980,"
Sociology
of
Education
65
(1992):
128—49.
2
R.
Collins,
"Functional
and
Conflict
Theories
of
Educational
Stratification,"
American
Sociologi-
cal
Review
36
(1971):
1002-19,
"Some
Comparative
Principles
of
Educational
Stratification,"
Harvard
Educational
Review
47
(1979):
1-27;
M.
Archer,
Social
Origins
of
Educational
Systems
(Beverly
Hills,
Calif.:
Sage,
1979);
see
the
review
by
J.
Craig,
"The
Expansion
of
Education,"
Review
of
Research
in
Education
9
(1981):
151—210.
3
J.
Boli,
F.
O.
Ramirez,
and
J.
W.
Meyer,
"Explaining
the
Origins
and
Expansion
of
Mass
Education,"
Comparative
Education
Review
29
(1985):
145—70;
Ramirez
and
Boli;
G.
I
nomas,
J.
W.
Meyer,
F.
O.
Ramirez,
and
J.
Boli,
eds.,
Institutional
Structure:
Constituting
State,
Society,
and
the
Individual
(Beverly
Hills,
Calif.:
Sage,
1987).
Comparative
Education
Review,
vol.
37,
no.
4.
©
1993
by
the
Comparative
and
International
Education
Society.
All
rights
reserved.
0010-4086/93/3704-0005101.00
454
November
1993
MASS
EDUCATION
IN
BOTSWANA
the
world.
4
Empirically,
the
expansion
of
mass
education
across
and
within
countries
has
the
statistical
characteristics
captured
by
diffusion
models.
5
But
diffusion
is
a
descriptive
model,
not
an
explanation,
and
it
is
necessary
to
specify
its
mechanisms.
The
organizational
apparatus
of
the
world
centers
that
orchestrate
the
diffusion
of
mass
education
(e.g.,
the
UN
system,
the
World
Bank,
professional
bodies,
and
national
aid
programs)
has
received
some
atten-
tion.
6
For
many
reasons,
these
international
actors
all
now
embrace
a
global
vision
of
rapidly
developing
independent
states,
and
mass
education
is
seen
by
all
as
a
crucial
property
(and
cause)
of
political
and
economic
development.
Most
of
this
research
has
its
focus
on
the
center,
examining
core
ideology,
interests,
and
organization.
However,
much
can
be
gained
by
looking
at
the
matter
from
the
other
end,
asking,
Why
have
peripheral
areas
of
the
world
been
so
quick
to
adopt
cultural
and
institutional
ar-
rangements
that
touch
so
close
to
main
values,
as
mass
education
does?
This
article
reports
perspectives
of
mass
educational
expansion
from
the
periphery
through
the
example
of
a
country
that
only
recently
em-
barked on
this
course—the
Republic
of
Botswana,
in
southern
Africa.
Despite
its
peripheral
character
and
relative
newness
among
the
world's
states,
Botswana
has,
to
a
surprising
extent,
rapidly
implemented
modern
educational
policies
taken
directly
from
metropolitan
centers.
We
consider
how
both
public
and
official
perceptions
in
Botswana
enrich
our
under-
standing
of
rapid
educational
expansion
and
modernization.
This
infor-
mation
was
derived
from
interviews
with
Botswana
educational
profes-
sionals
and
consumers
at
both
the
local
and
national
levels.
We
want
to
understand
why,
in
Botswana,
as
around
the
world,
education
is
unchal-
lenged
as
both
the
remedy
for
the
present
and
the
recipe
for
the
future.
Background
to
Botswana's
Educational
Expansion
Botswana
is
a
large
but
sparsely
populated
(slightly
more
than
1
mil-
lion
in
1988)
country
on
the
arid
inland
plateau
of
southern
Africa/
In
the
twentieth
century,
the
population,
comprising
mainly
Tswana
groups,
has been
dependent
on
cattle
and
dryland
agriculture,
with
labor
migra-
tion
to
the
South
African
mines.
Throughout
the
first
6
decades
of
this
century,
the
main
local
political
concern
was
less
to
achieve
autonomy
from
colonial
rule
(Botswana
was
a
protectorate
rather
than
a
colony)
than
4
K.
Huefner,
J.
W.
Meyer,
and
J.
Naumann,
"Comparative
Education
Policy
Research:
A
World
Society
Perspective,"
in
Comparative
Policy
Research:
Learning
from
Experience,
ed.
M.
Dierkes,
H.
N.
Weiler,
and
A.
B.
Antal
(London:
Gower,
1987),
pp.
188-243;
C.
McNeely,
"Cultural
Isomorphism
among
Nation
States"
(Ph.D.
diss.,
Stanford
University,
1989).
3
Meyer,
Ramirez,
Rubinson,
and
Boli;
Meyer,
Ramirez,
and
Soysal.
6
Huefner,
Meyer,
and
Naumann;
McNeely.
7
Unesco,
1989.
Comparative
Education
Review
455
MEYER,
NAGEL,
AND
SNYDER
to
avoid
absorption
by
South
Africa
or
Rhodesia.
8
Since
independence
in
1966,
Botswana's
democratic
government
has
been
engaged
in
a
continu-
ing national
effort
to
avoid
being
overwhelmed
by
entanglements
with
neighbors
involved
in
a
series
of
dramatic
internal
conflicts
(in
Rhodesia/
Zimbabwe,
South
West
Africa/Namibia,
and
South
Africa,
as
well
as
An-
gola
and
Mozambique).
The
current
economy
depends
on
a
limited
number
of
export
com-
modities
(principally
recently
developed
diamonds,
but
also
copper,
nickel,
and
cattle)
producing
a
GNP
per
capita
of
$880
in
1988,
which
is
one
of
the
highest
in
sub-Saharan
Africa.
9
The
central
government
benefits
directly
from
the
revenues
involved
and
is
in
a
relatively
strong
financial
position.
Both
revenue
and
governmental
capacity
are
strengthened
by
a
strong
involvement
in
external
assistance
programs
from
many
sources.
Traditional
schooling
in
Botswana
centered
on
training
and
discipline
organized
around
initiation
ceremonies,
with
nothing
resembling
modern
schooling.
Missionary
schooling
came
early
in
the
1800s,
but
on
a
very
limited
scale,
and
British
investment
was
nominal.
At
independence,
pri-
mary
enrollments
represented
a
very
small
percentage
of
school-aged
population;
there
were
251
primary
schools
and
nine
secondary
schools
in
the
country.
10
By
1985
the
number
of
primary
schools
had
doubled
to
558,
and
the
number
of
secondary
schools
grew
to
68.
11
Since
1966,
educational
expansion
has
been
very
rapid,
representing
nearly
a
fivefold
increase,
from
fewer
than
80,000
students
in
1966
to
more
nearly
400,000
in
1990.
At
present,
primary
education
is
nearly
universal
in
Botswana,
and
in
the
1980s
it
embarked
on
a
program
of
universal
9-year
(junior
secondary)
education.
This
required
the
creation
of
many
new
junior
secondary
schools:
the
number
growing
from
just
over 40
in
1983
to
more
than
120
in
1989.
12
Senior
high
school
education
remains
limited
and
selective,
though
there
are
discussions
about
its
expansion.
At
independence
there
was
no
university,
but
(after
the
breakdown
of
a
joint
university
with
Lesotho
and
Swaziland)
the
University
of
Botswana
was
created
in
1981.
Botswana
represents
a
clear
instance
of
the
rapid expansion
of
mass
education.
The
enrollments
involved
are
by
no
means
simply
paper
fig-
ures.
There
is
a
workable
record-keeping
and
inspection
system.
The
schools
reported
exist,
operate
for
something
like
the
required
hours
per
8
F.
Morton
and
J.
Ramsay,
The
Birth
of
Botswana
(Gaborone:
Longman,
1987).
9
Unesco,
1989.
10
Republic
of
Botswana,
National
Development
Plan,
VI,
1985—1991
(Gaborone:
Republic
of
Botswana,
December
1985).
11
Ministry
of
Education,
Twenty
Years
of
Education
for
Kagisano,
the
1985/86
annual report
of
the
Ministry
of
Education
(Gaborone:
Republic
of
Botswana,
1986).
12
C.
W.
Snyder,
Jr.,
and
B.
Fuller,
"The
Qualitative
Context
of
Educational
Change"
(Gaborone:
Junior
Secondary
Education
Improvement
Project,
1989).
456
November
1993
MASS
EDUCATION
IN
BOTSWANA
day
and
days
per
year,
with
substantial
and
reasonably
paid
teaching
staffs
(shortages
produce
demand
for
expatriate
teachers
coming
from
other
African
countries
as
well
as
from
other
continents),
and
so
on.
13
The
quality
of
education
remains
a
challenge.
Teacher
qualifications
are
low,
students
are
often
ill
prepared,
curricula
and
instructional
materials
are
limited,
and
on
comparative
achievement
tests
Botswana
scores
are
low,
as
is
characteristic
of
Third
World
countries.
14
But
mass
education
is,
in
fact,
in
place.
These
revolutionary
changes
toward
mass
education
have
gone
on
with
little
opposition
and
with
less
conflict
than
might
have
been
expected.
In
the
next
sections,
we
discuss
local
perspectives
that
have
attenuated
potential
opposition
and
provided
positive
support
for
the
radically
al-
tered
institutional
system.
We
then
consider
some
consequences
of
pat-
terns
of
acceptance.
Methods
In
describing
Botswana
perspectives
on
mass
education,
we
rely
on
documents
describing
public
policies,
on
historical
materials,
and
espe-
cially
on
information
on
public
orientations
toward
the
modern
educa-
tional
system.
In
particular,
we
examine
reports
on
three
large
local
educa-
tional
"Consultative
Conferences"
sponsored
by
the
Ministry
of
Education
and
the
United
States
Agency
for
International
Development
(USAID)
in
1988
and
1989.
15
The
conferences
were
intended
to
get
local
input
and
responses
on
educational
policies
and
issues
(local
consultation,
in
the
form
of
an
institution
called
the
kgotla
is
a
traditional
as
well
as
contempo-
rary
feature
of
Botswana).'
0
The
conferences
were
structured
around
reports
and
small
group
discussions.
These
began
with
short
videos
depicting
quite
diverse
and
sometimes
very
critical
views
of
government
programs.
Each
conf
erence
involved
30—40
local
(usually
rather
elite)
participants,
a
dozen
or
so
13
Educational
Efficiency
Clearinghouse,
Botswana
Education
and
Human
Resources
Sector
Assess-
ment
Update
(Tallahassee
Learning
Systems
Institute,
March
1986).
14
A.
Inkeles,
"The
International
Evaluation
of
Education
Achievement:
A
Review,"
Proceedings
of
the
National
Academy
of
E ducation
4
(1977):
139-200;
S.
Heyneman
and
W.
Loxley,
"The
Effect
of
Primary
School
Quality
on
Academic
Achievement
in
29
High
and
Low-Income
Countries,"
American
Journal
of
Sociology
88
(1983):
1162—94.
1:>
M inistry
of
Education,
Therisana
Ka
Thuto:
Community
Consultation
on
Basic
Education
for
Kagi-
sano,
National
Curriculum
Consultathe
Series
Proceedings,
ed.
C.
W.
Snyder,
Jr.
(Gaborone:
Department
of
Curriculum
Development
and
Evaluation,
May
1988),
vol.
1;
Ministry
of
Education,
Therisana
Ka
Thuto:
Community
Consultation
on
Basic
Education
for
Kagisano,
National
Curriculum
Consultative
Series
Proceedings,
ed.
K.
Noel
(Gaborone:
Department
of
Curriculum
Development
and Evaluation,
October
1988),
vol.
2;
Ministry
of
Education,
Therisana
Ka
Thuto:
Community
Consultation
on
Basic
Education
for
Kagisano,
National
Curriculum
Consultative
Series
Proceedings,
ed.
K.
Noel
(Gaborone:
Department
of
Curriculum
Development
and
Evaluation,
July
1989),
vol.
3;
hereafter
cited
as
Therisana
Ka
Thuto.
16
Morton
and
Ramsay.
Comparative
Education
Review
457
MEYER,
NAGEL,
AND
SNYDER
officials
from
the
Ministry
of
Education,
and
a
similar
number
of
facilitators.
The
results
of
the
conferences
were
subsequently
published.
To
aid
in
understanding
these
reports,
interviews
were
conducted
in
June
1990,
with
local
and
ministry
participants
at
one
of
the
regional
conference
sites
in
Maun,
a
city
in
northwestern
Botswana.
The
Local
View
Most
striking
about
the
Consultative
Conference
participant
commen-
tary,
in
both
interviews
and
the
conference
reports,
is
the
extent
to
which
views
rest
on
resolutely
modern
assumptions.
1
'
While
substantive
issues
were
sometimes
different
from
those
that
might
concern
a
parent
in,
say,
Wichita
or
Tallahassee,
the
tone
of
the
discussion
was
neither
critical
nor
ambivalent
about
the
inevitability
of
the
modernization
of
education.
In
response
to
a
question
about
whether
Maun
participants
would
have
preferred
education
to
be
more
locally
adapted,
a
participant
re-
sponded,
"People
here
want
the
schools
to
be
just
like
those
in
Gaborone
[Botswana's capital]
. . .
they
ask,
'why
don't
we
have
the
same
facilities?'"
This
is
true
despite
the
potential
negative
consequences
of
educational
expansion
in
the
absence
of
parallel
economic
expansion.
Speaking
of
the
unemployment
of
educated
youth,
the
same
person
commented,
"Soon
it
will
be
just
the
same
here
as
in
Gaborone.
All
the
school
leavers
will
be
on
the
streets
stealing.
Nothing
will
be
safe.
We
are
educating
them
to
be
robbers."
Despite
this
troublesome observation,
participants
did
not
challenge
the
educational
project.
Modernity
was
taken
for
granted
as
a
kind
of
natural
fact,
as
simply
a
reality
(as
an
objective
value,
in
a
sense),
with
costs
recognized
but
inevitable.
Several
specific
assumptions
involved
were
notable
in
the
discussions.
1.
Botswana
is
to
be
seen
as
a
national
society.—Botswana
is
not
a
collection
of
tribes,
of
ancestral
polities,
of
corporate
familial
groups,
or
of
traditions.
"Society"
has
the
standard
modern
sociological
meaning:
a
social
system
in
the
conventional
sense,
made
up
of
rationalized
interdependent
compo-
nents
and
organized
in such
subsystems
as
the
economy
and
political
system.
The
basic
entities
in
this
vision
are
individuals
holding
occupa-
tional roles
in
the
formal
sector.
And
the
discussions
universally
assume
that
young
people
will
either
have
occupations
in
this
sector
or
be
"unemployed."
This
vision
of
Botswana
is
surprising,
since
it
defines
the
traditional
work
life
patterns
of
most
of
the
population
as
"unemployment."
Since
57
For
example,
as
discussed
by
A.
Inkeles
and
D,
A.
Smith,
Becoming
Modern
(Cambridge,
Mass.:
Harvard
University
Press,
1974).
458
November
1993