South African Science in Transition

Abstract

Our main argument in this paper is that South African science is currently experiencing the third major transitional period in its long and interesting history. With the advent of a free and democratic South Africa in 1994, a new era dawned for science as well. We argue, in the main body of the paper, that it is appropriate to refer to this as the third transitional phase in the history of South African science. Two parallel challenges face the new government: first, to democratise the science system; second, to ensure that the national system of innovation is indeed sufficiently competitive to take its rightful place within a globalising science system. The paper discusses in some detail how South African science has attempted to address these two challenges over the past eight years. It concludes with an assessment of the current tensions and challenges in the national system of innovation.