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Mulimbi, Bethany Lynn

This study examines how education can disrupt threats of conflict, specifically in the presence of ethnic diversity. We present a historical analysis of Botswana, using methods of process tracing drawing on documents, in-depth interviews, and Afrobarometer survey data. Post-independence Botswana engaged in redistribution of educational access across ethnic groups and promotion of common civic principles of social harmony. At the same time, it constructed through schools ethnically-based national identity, which excluded many minorities. Lack of recognition for ethnic minorities remains a persistent challenge, yet it exists in a context of high commitment to unity and the nation-state, even among minority groups, which may have allowed recent dissent to happen peacefully. The paper defines mechanisms by which educational redistribution and recognition can disrupt resource-based and identity-based inequalities that often lead to conflict. This model holds promise for conflict avoidance and mitigation in multiethnic states globally.

This article examines nation-state policies that have prioritized toleration of diversity over recognition through comparative case studies of three junior secondary schools in Botswana. Through data collected in observations, focus groups, interviews, and Participatory Action Research, we demonstrate how the schools, which varied in the ethnic composition of their students, teachers, and surrounding communities, responded differently to the reality of their multicultural student bodies. Two followed national policies closely, while the third crafted school level policies adapted to its student population, yet tightly constricted by national policies and curriculum. In all three schools, students of ethnic minority backgrounds experienced varying degrees of shame, discrimination, and a sense of exclusion from the nation and found little recourse to discuss and address these experiences within the structures of their schools. We argue that schools could better develop students’ capacity for equal citizenship were they supported by national education policies and curriculum to recognize the cultural, historical, and linguistic diversity of Botswana’s ethnic minorities explicitly in schools.