African universities can do more than teach and research: they can drive social change

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African universities have significant public resources, including knowledge, skilled people, infrastructure and networks. Beyond producing graduates, how can these resources be used to address problems that people experience in their everyday lives?

This is an important question where societies face challenges like limited income opportunities, inequality and the effects of climate change, and where not everyone has a chance to go to university.

The authors of this article contributed to a recent book on how universities can contribute to social innovation and sustainable development. This piece describes the key ideas presented in their research.

What do universities have to offer?

African universities are often discussed in terms of what they lack: funding, infrastructure, research capacity or positions in global university rankings. This deficit view is rooted in colonial histories in which European educational models displaced and devalued African ways of knowing and doing. It can obscure the vital role African universities already play as agents of social innovation and sustainable development.

Our research examined how African universities can promote social innovation: new ideas, practices and collaborations that respond to social needs and contribute to wider societal change. While universities are increasingly expected to contribute to foster social innovation for sustainable development, we still know relatively little about how they do it in practice, particularly in African contexts.

Our research uses the University of Cape Town as a case study. In analysing multiple social innovations within the university as researchers, we used our decades-long experience researching and practising social innovation for sustainable development in Africa.

Our research identified three pathways through which universities can pursue social innovation: social intrapreneurship, social entrepreneurship and social extrapreneurship.

What do intrapreneurship, entrepreneurship and extrapreneurship mean?

Intrapreneurship involves working from within an existing organisation to change the organisation itself – its systems, structures, practices and ways of working. This can mean challenging whatever limits innovation and disconnects the institution from society.

In a university, intrapreneurs can be academics, professional staff or students who use their positions and university resources to drive change. They might redesign teaching so that students work on real social problems they recognise from their own lives and communities. They might widen access to university resources such as knowledge, expertise, facilities and networks. Or they might change whose knowledge is valued and how the university engages with surrounding communities. The University of Cape Town's Centre for Higher Education Development is an example of intrapreneurship. It works to improve students' access to and success at the university through mentoring and academic advising programmes.

Secondly, there's social entrepreneurship. By connecting people, ideas and resources, universities can create an environment that supports the emergence of new organisations and ventures. Some of these will explicitly address social and environmental problems.

Much discussion about university entrepreneurship focuses on commercialisation through patents, spin-off companies and businesses based on university research. Social entrepreneurship expands this idea by considering how universities can spawn ventures with social impact too. Social enterprises can take on social and environmental problems. We analysed the University of Cape Town's Solution Space as an example. It supports entrepreneurs and new ventures through training, mentoring and access to networks.

The third aspect of innovation is called social “extrapreneurship”. Many complex problems cannot be solved by a university, government, business or civil society organisation acting alone. Universities can create spaces in which these different actors meet, exchange knowledge and develop solutions together. The university becomes a connector and convenor. The Social Innovation in Health Initiative, co-founded by the University of Cape Town's Bertha Centre for Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship, is an example. It connects researchers, innovators, health practitioners and others to develop and scale solutions to health challenges.

What's happening on the ground?

We looked beyond formal strategies at the University of Cape Town to examine how individuals and groups were addressing societal problems.

We found that the three approaches set out above can reinforce one another. An initiative that starts inside a university can develop into an independent social enterprise. Partnerships with outside organisations can change what happens inside the university. This is possible because universities connect students, researchers, communities, governments, businesses and civil society.

But we also identified barriers. Bureaucracy, rigid structures and limited resources can make it hard to sustain social innovation. Social innovation contributes to progress by challenging established norms and practices and stimulating academics, students and entrepreneurs to experiment with novel solutions to societal problems.

The University of Cape Town is a relatively well-resourced university. Many African universities operate under much greater constraints. More research across different contexts is needed to understand how these approaches operate under different conditions.

What do you recommend?

Our findings suggest that African universities aiming to contribute to social innovation and sustainable development should:

• create enabling conditions in which people can experiment with new approaches inside the institution

• support innovative ideas that can be transferred to external organisations

• build partnerships that connect the university across sectors and communities.

Implementing these recommendations requires navigating complex social and institutional contexts in which most African universities operate. In South Africa, this entails confronting the persistent legacy of colonialism and apartheid as well as inequalities in access, knowledge production and institutional power.

Universities cannot position themselves simply as outsiders arriving to “solve” society's problems. Social innovation requires reciprocal relationships in which different forms of knowledge are recognised and people develop solutions together.

Social innovation also invites us to redefine the meaning of “success” in social ventures. Every failed social venture offers useful insights that can inform teaching and future entrepreneurship.

This also changes how we think about the contribution of African universities. Their value cannot be captured only through publication counts, graduate numbers or positions in international rankings. African universities can help societies understand problems, bring together people who see those problems differently, experiment with solutions and develop the people and organisations capable of carrying those solutions forward. In doing so, they can help build more humane, enterprising and sustainable societies.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

By Annika Surmeier, Senior Lecturer, Graduate School of Business, University of Cape Town, University of Cape Town And

Addisu Lashitew, Associate professor, Business, McMaster University And

Bongi Bangeni, Senior Lecturer in Educational Development, University of Cape Town And

David Littlewood, Senior Lecturer in Strategic Management, University of Sheffield And

Gideon Nomdo, Course coordinator: Language in Humanities, University of Cape Town And

Kasturi Behari-Leak, Academic Staff Development Lecturer, Centre for Higher Education Development, University of Cape Town And

Phyllis Awor, Lecturer in Public Health, Makerere University