A critical reflection on the South African National Qualification Framework

Across the world many countries and regions are now notonly talking about qualifications frameworks, but are either already implementingnational, regional and even transnational qualifications frameworks, or atthe very least, are engaged in initial exploratory discussions, feasibility studiesand draft-ing of concept documents.?The African continent is no exception: South Africa, Namibia and Mauritius areat advanced stages of implementation, the SADC region is considering a regionalqualifications framework, Ethiopia is at an early stage of implementation andthe Seychelles is well advanced, to mention but a few. Underlying this trendtowards qualifications frameworks by governments across the world, includingdeveloping countries in Africa, and with support from a range of internationalorganizations such as the ILO, UNDP, EU, World Bank and UNESCO, a critiqueof qualifications frameworks is also emerging; a critique that has been particularlyconstructive during the development and the implementation of the SouthAfrican national qualifications framework is one case in point.Considering the global trend, and the emerging critique, we use this paper tocritically reflect on the current state of qualifications frameworks and possiblefuture directions within Africa