Re-imaging the Eastern Cape Province: Sustainable Human Development from the Perspectives of the State, Civic Society, and the University

Abstract

The Eastern Cape Planning Commission identifies human development as the central concern that the Provincial Development Plan should be premised on (Eastern Cape Planning Commission, 2012). This article proposes to critically examine the emerging (albeit implicit) philosophicalfoundation for sustainable human development, which we read as a combination of consciousness, capability, and rational organisation, and discusses these three interrelating aspects against selected stakeholders of sustainable human development: the State, civic society and the university. We determine that a re-imagination of the Eastern Cape Province would require serious consideration for the reshaping of the State, a rethinking of the roles and relationships with, and between, civic society, and a review of the third mission of the university.