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A Thousand Flowers: Social Struggles Against Structural Adjustment in African Universities

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Review of 'A Thousand Flowers: Social Struggles Against Structural Adjustment in African Universities' by Silvia Federici, George Caffentzis and Ousseina Alidon, published by African World Press in June 2000.

Reviewer Dr W. P. Palmer

Recent books about African university systems are not very numerous, so when writing about the new Tanzanian University system, after working there briefly as a volunteer, I found this book entitled `A Thousand Flowers'. The book attempts to cover examples from a diverse range of African countries. The first part of the book consists of nine general essays coming under the heading `structural adjustment and the recolonization of education in Africa.' The second part of the book consists of eleven essays entitled `African students' and teacher struggles against structural adjustment and for academic freedom'. These essays relate to specific African countries and university systems representing Niger, Senegal, South Africa, Nigeria, Malawi, Kenya and Burkina Faso followed by a three page conclusion.

There was some information about Tanzania, but not a lot. The authors consider the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and their policies of structural adjustment as being particularly harmful to African University education and indeed they have been. However since about 2000 their policies have changed for the better. The only other review of this book on Amazon is insulting to the authors of `A Thousand Flowers' and should be disregarded. For myself, I found some parts of the book very useful but more generally the book gave a more radical appraisal of African university systems than fits my own philosophy.

BILL PALMER

The only thing that differentiates this trash from your local dump is the book doesn't actually smell like trash, but the words come close.