War-zones forever? Tackling violence in South Africa’s schools

Schools in much of post-apartheid South Africa are under siege from local violence. Children are regularly mugged and sexually assaulted and teachers are intimidated. Can violence be halted and the fear of violence diminished? How can schools, communities and the police work together to improve school security?

A paper from the University of Birmingham’s Centre for International Education and Research in the UK, examines the results of a pilot violence mitigation project in three Durban schools. While not dismissing the ingrained problems of crime and disorder in South African society, it argues that there are no grounds for fatalistic acceptance of school violence. Cheap and practical measures are available to make schools, and hopefully communities, safer places where violence, racism and sexism are actively opposed.

The degree of South Africa’s violence is starkly demonstrated by the fact that the annual murder toll of police officers between 1994-1998 was 240. Britain, by comparison lost two per annum. In Durban schools gang-related violence is a major problem, security measures tend to be inadequate and counselling for victims of violence and rape virtually non-existent. Demoralisation, vandalism and substance abuse are serious problems. Attendance by students, and often teachers, can be sporadic. The majority of students report feeling unsafe travelling to and from school.

Independent Projects Trust, a KwaZulu Natal conflict resolution NGO, began work to turn the tide by distributing a diagnostic questionnaire to participating schools and then getting students, teachers and police to attend workshops. It has acted as a catalyst, starting the ball rolling and enabling schools to come up with their own security plans.

An evaluation after a year found that:

• staff, students and the police are convinced that their schools are safer places
• reported crime may not have fallen dramatically (and rose in one school due to new confidence in reporting) but fatalism and fear of crime is significantly lower
• more spot checks by police and changed perceptions of risk have encouraged pupils to stop carrying guns and knives for protection
• school security fences have been repaired, gates and entrances are now monitored, counselling rooms have been set up to offer support to victims and crime statistics are now more accurate
• staff and students of the three neighbouring schools, each with a different ethnic mix, have overcome their suspicions and are now co-operating to defeat crime
• the apartheid-induced antagonism between the police and schools has been significantly reduced.

Policy considerations from the study include:

• recognising that violence is not gender neutral: it is overwhelmingly carried out by boys
• promoting gender equality more vigorously and providing models of masculine identity which are not based on the use of force and violence
• doing more to promote democratic values within schools and be willing to learn from theory and school democratisation experience elsewhere
• accepting that sanctioned violence breeds violence: tellingly, in the three participating schools corporal punishment is now not practised
• realising that regular parental contact is essential for building secure school communities
• recognising that the current inability to expel pupils, even if they have committed serious crimes, puts already embattled teachers under great stress.

Source(s):
‘Schooling and violence in South Africa: creating a safer school’, Intercultural Education, 12 (3): 261-271, by C. Harber, 2001 Full document.

Funded by: Independent Projects Trust, South Africa

id21 Research Highlight: 19 September 2002

Further Information:
Clive Harber
Centre for International Education and Research
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham B15 2TT
UK

Tel: +44 (0) 121 414 4866
Fax: +44 (0) 121 414 4865
Contact the contributor: c.r.harber@bham.ac.uk

Centre for International Education and Research, University of Birmingham, UK

Other related links:
'From guns and drugs to gender safety'

'Understanding adolescent violence: lessons from Palestine'

'Safe haven for girls: can teachers challenge gender violence?'

'Criminal justice? Tackling sexual abuse in schools'

Take a look at the Youth Justice Project at the University of Cape Town's Institute of Criminology for more resources on violence in schools.