Drawing for the most part on empirical and historical studies, the contributors elucidate how ordinary African understand, confront and relate to the complex and competing forces of globalisation. They examine how contemporary and historical dynamics have shaped the ways in which globalisation is interacting with, and defining oft-neglected areas of social policy. The authors engage with, and question current, dominant orthodoxies, showing how prevailing economic thinking, particularly that of the dominant multilateral institutions, has undermined a sense of the importance of social policies relevant to a mode of economic development attuned to social transformation in Africa.

When the Dar es Salaam Declaration on Academic Freedom and Social Responsibility of Academics came up in the early 1990s, African higher-education systems were in a serious, multi-dimensional and long-standing crisis. Hand-in-hand with the imbalances and troubles that rocked and ruined African economies, the crisis in the academia was characterised by the collapse of infrastructures, inadequate teaching personnel and poor staff development and motivation. It was against this background that the questions of academic freedom and the responsibilities and autonomy of institutions of higher-learning were raised in the Dar es Salaam Declaration. In February 2005, the University of Dar es Salaam Staff Association (UDASA), in cooperation with CODESRIA, organised a workshop to bring together the staff associations of some public and private universities in Tanzania, in order to renew their commitment to the basic principles of the Dar es Salaam Declaration and its sister document - the Kampala Declaration on Intellectual Freedom and Social Responsibility. The workshop was also aimed at re-invigorating the social commitment of African intellectuals. The papers included in this volume reflect the depth and potentials of the debates that took place during the workshop. The volume is published in honour of Chachage Seithy L. Chachage, who was an active part of the workshop but unfortunately passed away in 2006. Chachage Seithy L. Chachage was a Professor of Sociology and Chairman of the University of Dar es Salaam Staff Association. He had published extensively on Sociology, and written many novels in Swahili language. Until his death on 9th July 2006, Professor Chachage was member of the Executive Committee of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), which he had served in several other capacities, including as Chair of its Scientific Committee.