Governance of the institutional leadership and student organisation interfaces in South Africa’s Higher Education Institutions

Abstract

This article focuses on the governance of the interface of student organisations with public higher education institutions in South Africa. It appraises relations between institutional leaders and student organisations, given the current turmoil in the institutions of higher education in South Africa. Institutions are products of mankind and their operations and evolution tend to portray the underlying human personalities and personal traits of those who hold power in key stakeholder positions. Higher education institutions have various stakeholders who are required to pursue common vision, mission and goals. Legislatively, stakeholders should ensure that they promote co-operative governance; however, the institutional interfaces of the leadership and student organisations in higher education institutions are riddled with protracted conflicts. The article asserts that shoddy transformation is stifling good governance of relations between leadership structures of higher education institutions in South Africa. As a result of position-making and the making of positions, which are broader characters of the South African society, albeit democratic, compromises are hard to establish in circumstances wherein stakeholders unidimensionally pursue rigid mandates driven by powerful interest groups.