Gender Equality in Knowledge Societies: South Africa Assessment
South Africa is the most developed S&T system on the African continent, with established research universities, a national innovation system, and significant government investment in science and technology capacity. It is also a society engaged in profound transformation following the end of apartheid — a transformation that requires addressing both gender inequity and racial inequity simultaneously within its science and technology institutions.
The GEKS National Summary for South Africa applies the Gender Equality in Knowledge Societies benchmarking framework to the South African context, examining women's participation at each level of the S&T system against a baseline that reflects both the country's development level and the specific transformation commitments embedded in its post-apartheid policy framework.
The summary documents the progress South Africa had made by the time of the assessment in increasing women's access to higher education and, to a lesser extent, to research careers. It also documents the points at which progress stalls: the transition from postdoctoral research to permanent academic positions, the representation of women in engineering and physical sciences relative to biological sciences, and the composition of the senior leadership of major research councils and funding bodies.
For African policymakers and for the international development community working on S&T capacity in Sub-Saharan Africa, the South Africa summary provides both a regional benchmark and a source of policy lessons relevant to comparable contexts.