South African University history: a historiographical overview

University history has traditionally been the domain of the commemorative publication which presented institutions in a very favourable light, full of the boasts of growth and achievement. In considering university histories, it is useful to examine this traditional approach as well as more recent scholarly developments in the study of the history of institutions of higher learning internationally. In South Africa, most universities have some form of published history, although these vary greatly in scope, depth and critical approach. This article briefly considers volumes produced on South African universities and their past in the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Trends and approaches evident in this wide variety of publications are highlighted. Questions such as the choice of moments of origin and commemoration, the effect of Apartheid on the retelling of the past and the use of either an autobiographical or a collaborative approach are considered. The comparative lack of histories of former ‘non-white’ universities is also explored, while the predominance of interest in matters of institutional identity in the post-Apartheid context is highlighted.     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book Reviews in This Article:
Scholars, Sufis and Saints: Muslim Religious Institutions Since 1500. Edited by Nikki R. Keddie.
Sayyid Jam ad-D"al-Afghānī": A Political Biography. By Nikki R. Keddie.
Kit lkhtil Us-Madhib of Qzāī Nuā b. Muāmmad. Edited with a critical introduction by S.T. Lokhand walla.
Islam in Uganda :Islamisation Through a Centralised State in Pre-Colonial Africa. By Arye Oded.
The Politics of Palestinian Nationalism. By William B. Quandt, Fuad Jaber, Ann Mosely Lesch.
Arab Politics in the Soviet Mirror. By Aryeh Yodfat.     

EVALUATION FOR CUTBACK MANAGEMENT IN SMALL CITIES: CAN THE PROBLEMS BE SOLVED?

Problems of undertaking applied research in small cities planning economic cutbacks are explored. Researchers face problems in balancing administrative and political pressures. Predetermined ideas held by members of the city council on how the city should cut back services might cause politicians to ignore the findings of the study. While the belief of department heads that the study was simply going to excuse cutbacks could cause difficulty in data gathering efforts. In overcoming these problems care was needed in defining precisely what topics to study, in getting mutual consent on technical issues and in protecting the findings from possible distortion.     

Book reviews

S. Schafer, The Political Criminal: The Problem of Morality and Crime, Free Press, New York, 1974, pp. 179, $8.95.

Audrey Williamson, Thomas Paine: His Life. Work and Times, London, George Allen & Unwin. 1973, pp. 296, $14.40.

Anthony Clunies Ross and John Langmore, eds, Alternative Strategies for Papua New Guinea, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1973, pp. viii + 263, $5.95.

Frank Stevens, Aborigines in the Northern Territory Cattle Industry, ANU Press, Canberra, 1974, pp. xiv + 226, $7.95.

K. Lindgren, H. H. Mason and B. L. J. Gordon, The Corporation and Australian Society, Law Book Co., Sydney, 1974, pp. v + 334, $14.50.

J. R. Davis and P. Spearritt, Sydney at the Census: 1971 A Social Atlas, Urban Research Unit, ANU, Canberra, 1974.     

FACTORS AFFECTING RESPONSE TO NOISE IN OUTDOOR RECREATIONAL ENVIRONMENTS

As the world gets more and more crowded, silence becomes a rarer and rarer natural resource. (Rennicke 1987, 27)     

Police and Political Violence in the 1960s and 1970s: Germany and Italy in a Comparative Perspective

Notwithstanding the significant differences between the German and Italian police models (federal and civil vs. centralised and militarised), in both countries the confrontation with the protest movements of the 1960s and 1970s had a profound impact on police conceptions and public order strategies. Police forces in some German federal states (West Berlin) followed a hard line until the late 1960s, while in others (Munich, Hamburg) reforms to the Weimar-centred police intervention tactics took place beginning in the early to mid-1960s. In Italy, traditional police conceptions and strategies remained largely unchanged and re-emerged in 1968. Here, a movement from within the police led to the demilitarisation and unionisation of the state police in 1981. In both countries, fighting left-wing terrorism in the 1970s stimulated technical modernisation and enhanced the centralisation of the police. In critical response to police tactics, in the late 1970s Germany police matters were increasingly perceived as a concern not only of the state but of civil society—even if policing remained a highly contested terrain. In Italy, such matters largely remained state concerns in which only politicians and internal security specialists were entitled to intervene.