Editorial comment

Since 2002 South Africa’s higher education landscape has
undergone a number of changes. As a result of a process of mergers
introduced by the government, many of the country’s tertiary
institutions underwent substantial change. The transformation of
the tertiary education sector appears to be an ongoing project. That
is how it should be. Innovation and change go hand in hand in a
sector of education that has the responsibility of training the scientists
and technologists of tomorrow.

In this edition of TD, we publish a position paper by Dr Frans
Kamsteeg, a specialist in organization studies of the VU University
Amsterdam, on the merger process at North-West University. The
process started in 2002 when the national government took bold steps
to start with the complex integration of the country’s historically white
and black institutions of higher learning. For most institutions it
has been an encounter in change management that called for
exceptional managerial skill. Although the processes have been
completed on paper there still appears to be a lot of unfinished internal
business.

Dr Kamsteeg intends to solicit research support from a number of
academics at NWU, as well colleagues at other universities in the
country. They will work in collaboration with a number of
postgraduate students of the Netherlands in a project aimed at
understanding what has precisely happened since the university
started moving in the direction of a transformed institution.

The project will be funded largely from overseas.

It is evident that NWU’s management is eager to take note of what
the researchers have to say. The project appears to be bold and
innovative. For the university it could be of immense value in terms
of planning a cohesive sense of togetherness in a changed higher
educational environment. Moreover, it could also benefit higher
education in South Africa. Most of the country’s tertiary institutions
normally share information in an effort at promoting a more efficient
higher education system in the country.

The project should be of considerable interest for many institutions.

 Towards an understanding of mergers in

higher education

TD: The Journal for Transdisciplinary Research in Southern Africa, Vol. 4 no. 2, December 2008, pp. xi.