Towards the Decolonised University in Africa
Corresponding Author(s) : William Jethro Mpofu
Journal of Higher Education in Africa,
Vol. 23 No. 1 (2025): Journal of Higher Education in Africa: Special Issue on Decolonising Knowledge Production in the Humanities, Social Sciences and Arts
Abstract
This article deploys the philosophy of liberation perspective as a lens to flesh out an image of the decolonised university in Africa. The observation is that the Euro-American model of the university is currently hegemonic in Africa, and this Westernised, colonial system of higher education needs to be decolonised. This article begins by explaining the use of the philosophy of liberation perspective as a lens, then delves into the current Euro-American model of the university, which is a Westernised university in Africa rather than an African university. Finally, the paper presents a vision of the decolonised university in Africa, which would be multilingual, boast of human and epistemic diversity, and include inclusive architecture and infrastructures as part of its landscapes and spaces. In this decolonised university in Africa, knowledge and knowledge production would be treated as public goods and services rather than commodities in the marketplace. This university would be rooted in Africa while also being globally relevant and present. It would marry local relevance with international excellence. This decolonised university in Africa would be a planetary university of the Global South, where the planet and everything on it – all of nature and life – are valued. This idea might sound idealistic and utopian precisely because liberation itself, and the futures it seeks to imagine and enact, belong to utopia.
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- "Andrews, N., and Okpanachi, E., 2012, ‘Trends of epistemic oppression and academic dependency in Africa’s development: The need for a new intellectual path’, Journal of Pan African Studies, 5(8): 85–104.
- Antia, B.E., 2015, ‘University multilingualism: A critical narrative from the University of the Western Cape, South Africa’, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 36(6): 571–86.
- Chaudhuri, A., 2016, ‘The real meaning of #RhodesMustFall’, The Guardian, 16 March. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/mar/16/the-real-meaning-of-rhodes-must-fall (Accessed 6 June 2026).
- Chowdhury, R., 2021, ‘From Black pain to #RhodeMustFall: A rejectionist perspective’, Journal of Business Ethics, 170(2): 287–311.
- Dussel, E., 2013, ‘Agenda for a South–South philosophical dialogue’, Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-Knowledge, 11(1): 3–18.
- Dussel, E., 2020, Twenty Theses on Politics, Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Freire, P., 2020, ‘Pedagogy of the oppressed’, in Toward a Sociology of Education,
- London: Routledge, pp. 374–86.
- Freire, P., 2021, Education for Critical Consciousness, New York: Seabury Press. Godsell, G., Chikane, R., and Mpofu-Walsh, S., 2016, Fees Must Fall: Student
- Revolt, Decolonisation and Governance in South Africa, New York: New York University Press.
- Gordon, L.R., 2014, ‘Disciplinary decadence and the decolonisation of knowledge’,
- Africa Development, 39(1): 81–92.
- Grosfoguel, R., 2013, ‘The structure of knowledge in universities’, Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-knowledge, 11(1): 73–90.
- Hountondji, P., 1990, ‘Scientific dependence in Africa today’, Research in African Literatures, 21(3): 5–15.
- Kriger, R., 2016, ‘Shredding the veil of reconciliation: The Fallist movements – An opinion’, LitNet.
- Madiba, M., 2018, ‘The multilingual university’, in A. Creese and A. Blackledge (eds), The Routledge Handbook of Language and Superdiversity, London: Routledge,
- pp. 504–17.
- Majumdar, M.A., 2016, ‘The “Wretched of the Earth”– then and now’, International Journal of Francophone Studies, 19(1): 95–103."
- "Maldonado-Torres, N., 2008, Against War: Views from the Underside of Modernity, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
- Mamdani, M., 1989, ‘A glimpse at African Studies, made in USA’, Eastern Africa Social Science Research Review, 5(1): 18.
- Mamdani, M., 1998, ‘Is African studies to be turned into a new home for Bantu education at UCT?’ Social Dynamics, 1 June. DOI:10.1080/02533959808458649 Mamdani, M., 2007, Scholars in the Marketplace. The Dilemmas of Neo-Liberal Reform at Makerere University, 1989–2005: The Dilemmas of Neo-Liberal Reform
- at Makerere University, 1989–2005,Cape Town: HSRC Press.
- Mamdani, M., 2016, ‘Between the public intellectual and the scholar: Decolonization and some post-independence initiatives in African higher education’, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, 17(1): 68–83.
- Mamdani, M., 2019, ‘Decolonising universities’, in T. Halvorsen, K.S. Orgeret and R. Krøvel (eds), Sharing Knowledge Transforming Societies, Cape Town: African Minds.
- May, M.S., 2012, ‘Diversity dynamics operating between students, lecturers and management in a historically Black university: The lecturers’ perspective’, SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, 38(2): 138–46.
- Mazrui, A.A., 2003, ‘Towards re-Africanizing African universities: Who killed intellectualism in the post-colonial era?’ Alternatives: Turkish Journal of International Relations, 2(3&43 & 4).
- Mbembe, A., 2016. ‘Decolonising the university: New directions’, Arts and Humanities in Higher Education, 15(1): 29–45.
- Mbembe, A., 2021, ‘Thoughts on the planetary: An interview with Achille Mbembe’, in Decolonising the Neoliberal University, London: Birkbeck Law Press,
- pp. 122–36.
- Mignolo, W., 2011, The Darker Side of Western Modernity: Global Futures, Decolonial Options, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
- Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S.J., 2017, ‘The emergence and trajectories of struggles for an “African university”: The case of unfinished business of African epistemic decolonisation’, Kronos, 43(1): 51–77.
- Nkrumah, K., 1970, Consciencism, New York: New York University Press.
- Nyamnjoh, A., 2017, ‘The phenomenology of Rhodes Must Fall: Student activism and the experience of alienation at the University of Cape Town’, The Strategic Review for Southern Africa, 39(1).
- Nyamnjoh, F.B., 2012, ‘“Potted plants in greenhouses”: A critical reflection on the resilience of colonial education in Africa’, Journal of Asian and African Studies, 47(2): 129–54.
- Nyamnjoh, F.B., 2019, ‘Decolonizing the university in Africa’, in E. Hannah (ed.), Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. https://doi.org/10.1093/ acrefore/9780190228637.013.717
- Pillay, S.R., 2016, Silence is violence:(Critical) psychology in an era of #RhodesMustFall
- and #FeesMustFall, South African Journal of Psychology, 46(2): 155–59."
- "Prah, K.K., 2022, ‘Language and decolonization in institutions of higher learning in Africa’, in S. Makoni et al. (eds), Decolonial Voices, Language and Race, Bristol: Multilingual Matters/Channel View Publications.
- Quinn, R., 2017, An Analysis of Frantz Fanon’s the Wretched of the Earth, London: Macat Library.
- Rodney, W., 2018, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. London: Verso Books.
- Rolin, K., 2019,’ The epistemic significance of diversity’, The Routledge Handbook of Social Epistemology, pp. 158–66.
- Santos, B.d.S., 2012, ‘The university at a crossroads’, Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of self-knowledge, 10(1): 7–16.
- Santos, B.d.S., 2015, Epistemologies of the South: Justice Against Epistemicide, London: Routledge.
- Santos, B.d.S., 2018, The End of the Cognitive Empire: The Coming of Age of Epistemologies of the South, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
- Shuayb, I., (Shuayb and Luby), 2020, Inclusive University-Built Environments: The Impact of Improved Document M for Architects, Designers and Engineers, Cham, Switzerland: Springer International Publishing.
- Sikimić, V., 2023, ‘Epistemic inclusion as the key to benefiting from cognitive diversity in science’, Social Epistemology, 37(6): 753–65.
- Stokas, A.G., 2023, Reparative Universities: Why Diversity Alone Won’t Solve Racism In Higher Ed, Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.
- Van Jaarsveldt, L.C., De Vries, M.S., and Kroukamp, H.J., 2019, ‘South African students call to decolonize science: Implications for international standards, curriculum development and Public Administration education’, Teaching Public Administration, 37(1): 12–30.
- Wallerstein, I., 2004, ‘World-systems analysis: An introduction’, in World-systems Analysis, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
- Wa Thiong’o, N., 1998, ‘Decolonising the mind’, Diogenes, 46(184): 101–04.
- Wa Thiong’o, N., 2012, Globalectics: Theory and the Politics of Knowing, New York: Columbia University Press.
- Wong, H.L., 2014, ‘Architecture without barriers: Designing inclusive environments accessible to all’, Doctoral dissertation, Toronto Metropolitan University.
- Xu, X., 2022, ‘Epistemic diversity and cross-cultural comparative research: Ontology, challenges, and outcomes’ Globalisation, Societies and Education, 20(1): 36–48.
- Zeleza, P.T., 2018, ‘The giant challenge of higher education in Africa’, The Elephant, 5."
References
"Andrews, N., and Okpanachi, E., 2012, ‘Trends of epistemic oppression and academic dependency in Africa’s development: The need for a new intellectual path’, Journal of Pan African Studies, 5(8): 85–104.
Antia, B.E., 2015, ‘University multilingualism: A critical narrative from the University of the Western Cape, South Africa’, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 36(6): 571–86.
Chaudhuri, A., 2016, ‘The real meaning of #RhodesMustFall’, The Guardian, 16 March. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/mar/16/the-real-meaning-of-rhodes-must-fall (Accessed 6 June 2026).
Chowdhury, R., 2021, ‘From Black pain to #RhodeMustFall: A rejectionist perspective’, Journal of Business Ethics, 170(2): 287–311.
Dussel, E., 2013, ‘Agenda for a South–South philosophical dialogue’, Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-Knowledge, 11(1): 3–18.
Dussel, E., 2020, Twenty Theses on Politics, Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Freire, P., 2020, ‘Pedagogy of the oppressed’, in Toward a Sociology of Education,
London: Routledge, pp. 374–86.
Freire, P., 2021, Education for Critical Consciousness, New York: Seabury Press. Godsell, G., Chikane, R., and Mpofu-Walsh, S., 2016, Fees Must Fall: Student
Revolt, Decolonisation and Governance in South Africa, New York: New York University Press.
Gordon, L.R., 2014, ‘Disciplinary decadence and the decolonisation of knowledge’,
Africa Development, 39(1): 81–92.
Grosfoguel, R., 2013, ‘The structure of knowledge in universities’, Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-knowledge, 11(1): 73–90.
Hountondji, P., 1990, ‘Scientific dependence in Africa today’, Research in African Literatures, 21(3): 5–15.
Kriger, R., 2016, ‘Shredding the veil of reconciliation: The Fallist movements – An opinion’, LitNet.
Madiba, M., 2018, ‘The multilingual university’, in A. Creese and A. Blackledge (eds), The Routledge Handbook of Language and Superdiversity, London: Routledge,
pp. 504–17.
Majumdar, M.A., 2016, ‘The “Wretched of the Earth”– then and now’, International Journal of Francophone Studies, 19(1): 95–103."
"Maldonado-Torres, N., 2008, Against War: Views from the Underside of Modernity, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Mamdani, M., 1989, ‘A glimpse at African Studies, made in USA’, Eastern Africa Social Science Research Review, 5(1): 18.
Mamdani, M., 1998, ‘Is African studies to be turned into a new home for Bantu education at UCT?’ Social Dynamics, 1 June. DOI:10.1080/02533959808458649 Mamdani, M., 2007, Scholars in the Marketplace. The Dilemmas of Neo-Liberal Reform at Makerere University, 1989–2005: The Dilemmas of Neo-Liberal Reform
at Makerere University, 1989–2005,Cape Town: HSRC Press.
Mamdani, M., 2016, ‘Between the public intellectual and the scholar: Decolonization and some post-independence initiatives in African higher education’, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, 17(1): 68–83.
Mamdani, M., 2019, ‘Decolonising universities’, in T. Halvorsen, K.S. Orgeret and R. Krøvel (eds), Sharing Knowledge Transforming Societies, Cape Town: African Minds.
May, M.S., 2012, ‘Diversity dynamics operating between students, lecturers and management in a historically Black university: The lecturers’ perspective’, SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, 38(2): 138–46.
Mazrui, A.A., 2003, ‘Towards re-Africanizing African universities: Who killed intellectualism in the post-colonial era?’ Alternatives: Turkish Journal of International Relations, 2(3&43 & 4).
Mbembe, A., 2016. ‘Decolonising the university: New directions’, Arts and Humanities in Higher Education, 15(1): 29–45.
Mbembe, A., 2021, ‘Thoughts on the planetary: An interview with Achille Mbembe’, in Decolonising the Neoliberal University, London: Birkbeck Law Press,
pp. 122–36.
Mignolo, W., 2011, The Darker Side of Western Modernity: Global Futures, Decolonial Options, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S.J., 2017, ‘The emergence and trajectories of struggles for an “African university”: The case of unfinished business of African epistemic decolonisation’, Kronos, 43(1): 51–77.
Nkrumah, K., 1970, Consciencism, New York: New York University Press.
Nyamnjoh, A., 2017, ‘The phenomenology of Rhodes Must Fall: Student activism and the experience of alienation at the University of Cape Town’, The Strategic Review for Southern Africa, 39(1).
Nyamnjoh, F.B., 2012, ‘“Potted plants in greenhouses”: A critical reflection on the resilience of colonial education in Africa’, Journal of Asian and African Studies, 47(2): 129–54.
Nyamnjoh, F.B., 2019, ‘Decolonizing the university in Africa’, in E. Hannah (ed.), Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. https://doi.org/10.1093/ acrefore/9780190228637.013.717
Pillay, S.R., 2016, Silence is violence:(Critical) psychology in an era of #RhodesMustFall
and #FeesMustFall, South African Journal of Psychology, 46(2): 155–59."
"Prah, K.K., 2022, ‘Language and decolonization in institutions of higher learning in Africa’, in S. Makoni et al. (eds), Decolonial Voices, Language and Race, Bristol: Multilingual Matters/Channel View Publications.
Quinn, R., 2017, An Analysis of Frantz Fanon’s the Wretched of the Earth, London: Macat Library.
Rodney, W., 2018, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. London: Verso Books.
Rolin, K., 2019,’ The epistemic significance of diversity’, The Routledge Handbook of Social Epistemology, pp. 158–66.
Santos, B.d.S., 2012, ‘The university at a crossroads’, Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of self-knowledge, 10(1): 7–16.
Santos, B.d.S., 2015, Epistemologies of the South: Justice Against Epistemicide, London: Routledge.
Santos, B.d.S., 2018, The End of the Cognitive Empire: The Coming of Age of Epistemologies of the South, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Shuayb, I., (Shuayb and Luby), 2020, Inclusive University-Built Environments: The Impact of Improved Document M for Architects, Designers and Engineers, Cham, Switzerland: Springer International Publishing.
Sikimić, V., 2023, ‘Epistemic inclusion as the key to benefiting from cognitive diversity in science’, Social Epistemology, 37(6): 753–65.
Stokas, A.G., 2023, Reparative Universities: Why Diversity Alone Won’t Solve Racism In Higher Ed, Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Van Jaarsveldt, L.C., De Vries, M.S., and Kroukamp, H.J., 2019, ‘South African students call to decolonize science: Implications for international standards, curriculum development and Public Administration education’, Teaching Public Administration, 37(1): 12–30.
Wallerstein, I., 2004, ‘World-systems analysis: An introduction’, in World-systems Analysis, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Wa Thiong’o, N., 1998, ‘Decolonising the mind’, Diogenes, 46(184): 101–04.
Wa Thiong’o, N., 2012, Globalectics: Theory and the Politics of Knowing, New York: Columbia University Press.
Wong, H.L., 2014, ‘Architecture without barriers: Designing inclusive environments accessible to all’, Doctoral dissertation, Toronto Metropolitan University.
Xu, X., 2022, ‘Epistemic diversity and cross-cultural comparative research: Ontology, challenges, and outcomes’ Globalisation, Societies and Education, 20(1): 36–48.
Zeleza, P.T., 2018, ‘The giant challenge of higher education in Africa’, The Elephant, 5."