A Comparative Study of the Mass Literacy Campaigns of Tanzania and Kenya.

A two-pronged theory underlying literacy campaigns suggests that (1) the prevailing ideology of a society will determine the objectives of the literacy campaign as well as the language of justification used by the development elite in the promotion of adult literacy; and (2) the ideology, as expressed in the political culture of a society, will influence the technology of a literacy campaign in regard to the strategies used for the articulation of the national commitment; the mobilization of the masses; and the establishment of organizational structures, the management of incentives for the recruitment of participants and teachers, the development of curricula, and the design of systems for the delivery of instruction. This two-pronged theory can be seen at work in the literacy campaigns conducted in Tanzania and Kenya, where differing ideologies have resulted in differing methods for promoting literacy. Tanzania follows a socialist ideology, and emphasizes literacy as a tool for the participation of the masses in society in its very successful literacy campaign. Kenya, on the other hand, while following an espoused socialist philosophy, supports individual initiatives and thus uses different programs and incentives, with less success so far, in its less committed literacy campaign. Other studies of literacy campaigns also show much greater success rates in totalitarian than in free societies. Therefore, it is clear that democracies will have to better articulate their ideological positions on literacy and they will have to extend the conception of democracy to include political, social, and economic democracy if they expect to achieve success in literacy efforts. (KC)

an: ED208200; docTypes: Opinion Papers ; Reports - Descriptive ; Speeches/Meeting Papers; pubTypes: Conference PaperReport;