Textbooks

The Scramble for Textbooks in Tanzania

Sonia Languille, 2015


The Scramble for Textbooks in Tanzania

In 2014, the Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) government in Tanzania decided to discontinue the market-based system for textbook provision that was established in the early 1990s and revert to full state control Drawing on the theory of political settlements and the literature on Tanzania’s industrial politics, the article examines the political economy of textbook provision in this country in order to generate new insights into the relations between the educational, political, and economic spheres. It shows how donor ideology and practices, while subjecting textbooks to generic market principles, also promoted the interests of Western publishing corporations. It then argues that the distribution of power within the state, and the ambiguous relations between the CCM ruling elites, bureaucrats, and the capitalist class, prevented the consolidation of a textbook industrial policy geared towards supporting the local publishing industry. Finally, the article explores elites’ diverse corrupt practices to capture public funding for textbooks at the national and local levels. Under Tanzania’s country-specific political settlement, the textbook sector, far from primarily serving educational goals, has indeed been reduced to a vast site of primitive accumulation.

Accessible Digital Textbooks using Universal Design for Learning

Accessible Digital Textbooks using Universal Design for Learning

This document outlines the details of accessible digital textbooks (ADT), its benefits, and the ways it can be implemented in countries across the world. This initiative uses a universal design for learning that enhances the need for books like ADT not just for students with disabilities, but all students.